Cause and Effect

NY Times editorial March 10, 2008: "Criminal behavior partly explains the size of the prison population, but incarceration rates have continued to rise while crime rates have fallen. " ("Prison Nation") So if incarceration rates get lower, would crime rates rise?

Here is an item from the West Seattle Blog that would suggest such a likelihood:

"NOT JUST STOLEN - STOLEN FROM POLICE: Just after 8 o’clock last
night, at 10th SW and Trenton, an officer ran a routine check on the license
plate of an SUV. It came back as stolen from the Port of Seattle Police
Department. Needless to say, the officer promptly pulled over the SUV. The
29-year-old driver wouldn’t give his name, but two other officers recognized him
— because they had arrested him within the past two weeks … for auto theft. His
two passengers were allowed to go, but he was taken to the King County Jail. The
jail register shows he’s still there, and it’s his fifth time there in the past
seven months."

Dr. Theodore Dalrymple, a retired prison doctor, has this to say

"I have never understood the liberal assumption that if there
were justice in the world, there would be fewer rather than more prisoners."
("Policeman in
Wonderland")