It currently costs around $100,000 per year per prisoner to keep them locked up in what amounts to pointless warehousing of people for the term of their sentence. Because very little of that annual cost is spent on rehabilitation, the recidivism rate is rising. This must change in two ways. We must lessen the number of people in prison, and focus on rehabilitation.
Private prisons will be banned. As such, all prisons will be nationalized as the responsibility of the Federal Government.
Prisons will be devoted to rehabilitation and pacification rather than punishment. For this reason, sugar, caffeine will be removed from the diet.
Prisoners will be taught reading and writing and meditation skills, as well as yoga, emotional discipline, money and investment skills as well as other life skills. They will have to display a proficiency in a number of core subjects before they are allowed to leave.
Those prisoners addicted to drugs will be given treatment and gradually weaned off their addiction. Though drug use is decriminalized in the general community, it will remain illegal in prisons.
