Prison Costs

I look around me at times and wonder how our culture, norms and mores became so subverted. When I grew up, the only time the house was locked was when you left on vacation. Business was conducted with a handshake. A much wiser man than I by the name of Cicero once noted that you can judge how corrupt a society is by the number of laws on its books.

According to what I read in the papers, we currently have a prison population in excess of 1 million; the cost to keep those persons is somewhere between $25,000 and $35,000 per inmate.

Since we are now a global economy, perhaps some procedure can be put in place where U.S. companies can employ certain members of our prison population, pay the state or federal government some form of compensation for the use of the individual(s), thereby making them more competitive in the world marketplace and reducing the cost to taxpayers.

SAMUEL J. COHEN

Irvine