October 26, 2010 | 12:25 PM | By

By the numbers: the prison population

FILED UNDER: Corrections, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Prison Overcrowding, Prisons

A lot of numbers get tossed around about prisons and prisoners. Tracking down the actual numbers, some things might surprise the average reader: like the fact that California, widely thought of as ground zero in a nationwide prison crisis, actually has a pretty average incarceration rate. Here’s a portrait of the US and California prison populations, by the numbers:

  • 1 in 116: Men is in prison in California; compared to 1 in 104 men nationwide
  • 1 in 100: Americans was in jail or on parole in 2008; in 1970, that number was 1 in 400
  • 1 in 28: American children currently has a parent behind bars; for Black children it’s 1 in 9
  • 1 in 15: general fund dollars in the average state is spent on prisons; in CA, it’s (a projected) 1 in 14
  • 1 in 6: CA Third strikers’ last strike was a drug offense; 1 in 2 was a crime against person
  • 1 in 5: CA male prisoners, approximately, is in prison on a drug offense; For women it’s about 1 in 4
  • 1 in 3: CA prisoners is admitted from Los Angeles County; 1 in 38 from Alameda; 1 in 111 from SF

Sources here, here, here, and here.