Does imprisonment lower crime?
             Most people believe that imprisonment is the most effective way to reduce crime rate. That prisons are the best institutions for confining and punishing people who have been convicted of crimes or people who are awaiting trail. Prisons punish criminals by restricting their freedom. For example, prisons limit where prisoners can go, what they may do, with who they can associate. There are prisons with different degree of security, prisons for youth offenders, separate prisons for male and female offenders. Inmates serve sentences ranging from a few months to the rest of their life. Majority of society thinks that prisons are very important because they help protect society from dangerous criminals.
             People who support sending more offenders to prisons and keeping them there longer argue that if we restrain people through imprisonment , they can not commit more crimes, but I disagree with the idea that imprisonment lowers crime rate. There is about two million people in the United States in prisons today (682 per 100,000), $40 billon dollars is spend every year to finance prisons, it costs $25-75,000 per inmate annually to keep them locked up, approximately 1000 new jails and prisons have been build since 1980. But still the US has one of the highest crimes in the world. Recidivism rate after one year is 15%, after 5 years is 51%, and after 18 years is 63%. ( Source of information: US government statistics web site.) These numbers show us that imprisonment of people regardless the nature of their crime isn't effective, and is very expensive.
             Today's prisons are overcrowded institutions who failed to rehabilitate prisoners. They are too big, to be able function properly. Imprisonment of less serious offenders related to drugs or addiction related crimes and small chef is increasing dramatically. The law of &
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