How many prisoners are there in the U.S. and what is the impact on society?
A In the mid 1970’s there were approximately 250,000 people in prison in the U.S. Today, roughly 30 years later, we have approximately 2.3 million people incarcerated. We have another 350,000 children under 18 who are serving time in juvenile detention centers, for a total of 2.65 million people in the criminal justice system in the U.S., with 3700 of those in central Texas The largest mission field in North America is right in our own backyard! These packed prisons are costing U.S. tax payers approximately $88 billion each year. In 2007, Texas, with the second largest prison population in the nation, spent approximately $2.6 billion on its prison system. Not included in these costs is the lost productivity of the inmates and the devastating financial effects on their families.
