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Wilson's criticisms of Pew study miss mark, ignore contrary research

By Gritsforbreakfast

A reader points me to an article in the LA Times by James Q. Wilson ("Do the time, lower the crime," March 30) responding to the recent study by the Pew Center on the States regarding America's high incarceration rate, which now exceeds one out of every 100 US adults. Wilson is one of the chief ideologists promoting a "get tough" approach nationally, so it's worth taking a moment to identify a few of the overstatements and obfuscations that to me typify his public pronouncements on crime.For example, on the all-important subject of whether high imprisonment rates reduce crime, Wilson writes:nowhere in the [Pew] report is there any discussion of the effect of prison on crime, and the argument about costs seems based on the false assumption that we are locking people up at high rates for the wrong reasons...continue to full post

Full post as published by Grits for Breakfast on March 31, 2008 (boomark / email).