Brief: Can We Wait 75 Years to Cut the Prison Population in Half?
Date:  03-12-2018

With 1.5 million people in prison in 2016, the prison population remains larger than the total population of 11 states
From Marc Maurer, Executive Director of The Sentencing Project:

“…While most states have downsized their prison populations in recent years, the pace of decarceration is insufficient to undo nearly four decades of unrelenting growth. At the recent pace of decarceration, it will take 75 years—until 2093—to cut the U.S. prison population by 50 percent.

By 2016, 42 states had at least modestly downsized their prison populations from their peak levels in the last two decades. Six states—New Jersey, Alaska, New York, Vermont, Connecticut, and California—lead the nation in reducing their prison populations by 25% or more. Southern states including Mississippi and South Carolina have also made double-digit percentage reductions in their prison populations. But the pace of state and federal prison decarceration has been modest overall, declining 6% since a 2009 peak.

Read the Swentencing Project’s new analysis here.