26 July 2004

Keep Those Prisons Full

Despite steady crime rates ever more people are having their lives controlled by the courts.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Aren't you reversing (or at least ignoring) cause and effect?

"Because ever more people are having their lives controlled by the courts, crime rates remain steady."

Ken Lammers said...

Not really. With a steady crime rate I would expect a stable percentage of people who were under supervision by the courts. If it followed that because ever more people were being put under the suprvision of the courts crime remains at a stable rate eventually we'd all have to be under supervision of the court to keep the crime rate the same. And then the next year the crime rate should rise because there would be no way to increase the percentage of people under court supervision. And the year after that it should rise more. And the year after that is should rise even more. Eventually we would be swamped. We'd be getting mugged at least two or three times a day, every day. ;-)

Actually, what I think is probably happening (at least if other States are like Virginia) is that the States are making more and more ticky-tack things illegal every time they go into session (gotta look tough on crime).