Cleo

The Price of Incarceration
California spends large amounts of money coming from taxpayers to essentially operate prisons. In the article titled, "Soaring Costs For California's Failing Prison System," the ex-California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger said, "Spending 45% more on prisons than universities is no way to proceed in the future" back in 2010 (Faryon and Penner). It is illogical thatour state spends more money on a single inmate versus a student's education in one year. At this point, we all know that the state of California is spending more money on incarceration than education. It is not a surprise that the bad economy of California is becoming a chronic problem because the state is not managing money effectively. For example, the laws in California need a drastic change toprevent the incarceration of individuals for minor felonies. In not doing so, prisons end up over crowded, which can save the state from spending large amount of money in state prisons. Also, the immigration law system needs to re-evaluate laws. Two decades ago, any individual who has gotten caught illegally crossing from Mexico to U.S, was released after a couple of weeks. Nowadays, immigrationauthorities let them free for the first time, but at the second attempt crossing the U.S border and getting arrested by the immigration authorities, these individuals will face federal charges and can serve up to six years in prison.
This can become a burden to taxpayers because they will eventually finance expenses. Furthermore, the state of California is pursuing excellence in the matterof work related environment, being kind to earth, and trying to enforce laws to get the finest citizens in the country. As a result, the system have to send many individuals in prisons to pay long years in a prison cell. Years before, committing the same felonies only required the criminal to pay a fine, and they were able to go home. Finally, the law of "three strikes and you're out" putsindividuals away in prison for life even when their crimes were non-violent. This law generalized felonies without any measurement of aggravating assault. In all of these scenarios in which individuals are ending up on prison for long sentences, many of them enjoy benefits that not even hard working free citizens have access to. If the state is going to be incrementing punishments and filling up theprisons to their maximum, it is convenient to cut benefits to the extreme, so prisoners really feel the punishment and not want to return ever again. Instead, we are providing full cover package in health benefits, a convenience food care according to the need of an inmate, and even entertainment. Inmates should be limited to services that are financed by California taxpayers because the state ofCalifornia is misspending large amount in prisons.
According to the article, "The Cost Of Housing an Inmate," the California state needs to cover an extensive variety of costs to maintain and keep a prison adequately. The state must maintain basic needs of an inmate such as food, shelter, clothing, and health care. The California law dictates a high control on support services. There aremiscellaneous costs from the start to the end process of an inmate. Each inmate needs to go through an evaluation, processing, and the most expensive service, security. For example: reception/diagnosis per prisoner averages: in cost per year $156; security $11,016, for supervising an inmate 24 hours a day; health care costs $3,044; inmate support costs $5,384; inmate work/training $1,158. Since more oftenwe have long sentences, there are more inmates that reach the age of 55. This cause an increment on health cost up to $50,000 a year per inmate over the age 55 (Faryon and Penner).
Beside the medical care, inmates in California prisons also enjoy the benefit of dental and mental health, according to Diana Bocco, the author of the article "Benefits For Inmates." Nowadays, the California...