What are some of the reasons behind prison overcrowding?

There are two
main reasons for prison overcrowding.

First, there is the fact that the
United States imprisons a very large percent of its population when compared to other developed
countries.  The United States tends to have laws that are much more punitive than those of many
other countries when it comes to imprisoning people.  We imprison people for many crimes and we
tend to give them longer sentences.  We also do not do a very good job of rehabilitating them in
prison or helping them after they are released.  For these reasons, there is a huge number of
people who must be incarcerated.

At the same time, prisons are tremendously
expensive.  It costs tens of thousands of dollars to incarcerate any one inmate in a given
year.  This is increasing as more inmates come to be older with more health problems.  Because
prisons are so expensive and because there are so many demands on government funds, governments
are not eager to build more prisons. 

When there are large numbers of people
needing to be incarcerated and governments are reluctant to spend on new prisons, it is
inevitable that there will be overcrowding in American prisons.