Using a Zero Base Strategy to Model Reduction in Incarceration at the State Level

• In Event: Policy Trends, Reforms, and Strategies in Reducing Incarceration: The Role of States and Communities

Abstract

Many states are looking for ways to make significant reductions in their prison populations. But to date, only a vet small number of states have succeeded in significant reductions, and most reforms that are proposed promise very little in the way of direct reductions in the number of people in prison. We describe a “zero-base” strategy for looking at prison populations that uses 1980 and 1988 as base years for estimating a “foundational prison population size. We then show how elimination of particular legal and policy interventions since those dates would result in specified changes in the number of prisoners. We also describe likely impact on crime rates of those changes.

Authors

• Todd Clear, Rutgers University

• James Austin, JFA Institute