[[{“value”:”Tyler and I wrap up our series of podcasts on the 1970s with The 1970s Crime Wave. Here’s one bit: TABARROK: …people think that mass incarceration is a peculiarly American phenomena, or that it came out of nowhere, or was due solely to racism. Michelle Alexander’s, The New Jim Crow, takes his view. In fact, the
The post The 1970s Crime Wave appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.”}]]
Tyler and I wrap up our series of podcasts on the 1970s with The 1970s Crime Wave. Here’s one bit:
TABARROK: …people think that mass incarceration is a peculiarly American phenomena, or that it came out of nowhere, or was due solely to racism. Michelle Alexander’s, The New Jim Crow, takes his view. In fact, the United States was not a mass incarceration society in the 1960s.
It became one in the 1980s and 1990s due to the crime wave of the 1970s. It was not simply due to racism. It is true Blacks do commit more crimes relative to their population than whites, but Blacks are also overrepresented as victims. The simple fact of the matter is that Black victims of crime, the majority group, demanded more incarceration of Black criminals. In 1973, the NAACP demanded that the government lengthen minimum prison terms for muggers, pushers, and first-degree murders.
The Black newspaper, the Amsterdam News, advocated mandatory life sentences for “the non-addict drug pusher of hard drugs.” The Black columnist, Carl Rowan, wrote that “locking up thugs is not vindictive.” Eric Holder, under Obama, he was the secretary of—
COWEN: Of something.
TABARROK: Yes, of something. He called for stop and frisk. Eric Holder called for stop and frisk. Back then, the criminal justice system was also called racist, but the racism that people were pointing to was that Black criminals were let back on the streets to terrorize Black victims, and that Black criminals were given sentences which were too light. That was the criticism back then. It was Black and white victims together who drove the punishment of criminals. I think this actually tells you about two falsehoods. First, the primary driver of mass imprisonment was not racism. It was violent crime.
Second, this also puts the lie, sometimes you hear from conservatives, to this idea that Black leaders don’t care about Black-on-Black crime. That’s a lie. Many Black leaders have been, and were, and are tough on crime. Now, it’s true, as crime began to fall in the 1990s, many Blacks and whites began to have misgivings about mass incarceration. Crime was a huge problem in the 1970s and 1980s, and it hit the United States like a brick. It seemed to come out of nowhere. You can’t blame people for seeking solutions, even if the solutions come with their own problems.
A lot of amazing stuff in this episode. Here’s our Marginal Revolution Podcast 1970s trilogy
1970s Inflation: The Economic Fever That Changed America
Oil Shocks, Price Controls and War
The 1970s Crime Wave
Subscribe now to take a small step toward a much better world: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube.
The post The 1970s Crime Wave appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.
Economics, History, Law
Leave a Reply