[nfoz]

Sure jail for a day or few maybe. Would cause tremendous discomfort and embarrassment IMO. But years?? For either of these crimes, sounds crazy. I see jails as a way to remove people who could be violent out of society while they can receive sober reflection, counselling, etc. But to toss around an arbitrary number of years for nonviolent offences sounds vindictive and terrifying.

[nradov]

Potential criminals should be terrified. That's the point of deterrence. You have to make an object lesson out of some people.

[adrian_b]

In my opinion some of the punishments used in antiquity were far more rational than those of today. Prison as a punishment did not exist, because anyone would have considered it stupid to pay money for housing & feeding a felon.

For theft and other forms of damage that are not irreversible, the deterrence was achieved not by threatening with prison, but by forcing the guilty person to pay a multiple of the value of the stolen goods or of the damages.

The multiplying factor varied from country to country. Where laws were less severe, a thief had to pay double or maybe quadruple, but where laws were more severe a thief had to pay ten times the value of what he had stolen.

So even today this would be a better punishment. Nobody has any advantage if someone who has stolen 10 million goes to jail, but if he had to pay back at least 20 million, then that would be real deterrence.

In antiquity, those who could not pay back the required amounts risked to become slaves, a method which would not be applicable today. Nevertheless, in the present society where it is almost impossible to hide, it should be easier to enforce payment without such extremes.

[RantyDave]

Potential criminals may be terrified, but that's because they're thinking straight. Some stupid kid about to commit the crime that sends him to prison and ruins his entire life, is thinking about $200 for some more meth. As a deterrent, it just doesn't work.

[saiya-jin]

Well, maybe it works, but nobody hears about crimes that were not done because people were scared of the consequences.

Just to be clear - I ma not a fan of how democracy like US manages their prisons, prisoners, and folks after prison - yes its kind of a death sentence for any serious job, it doesn't matter much if you would be a stellar citizen and employee afterwards for rest of your life. Clearly pure punishment and no correction, 3rd world medieval style. But that's another topic.

Kids that do stupid things for meth should get a) treatment for addiction and b) be removed from society until deemed worthy of coming back. In some place, like, dunno, lighter prison err correction facility (depending on the crime committed)

[asdff]

Good luck parking a car on the street if you'd be able to commit gta and get off with an apology and a class you zone out in. It should feel terrifying to commit a crime and the law should behave vindictively. What good is the social contract otherwise?

[RantyDave]

But it doesn't work! If it worked, there would be no theft. Clearly prison is seen as a minor deterrent, is of obviously no use regarding actual rehabilitation... and is very, very expensive.

[kortilla]

> Clearly prison is seen as a minor deterrent

That’s a bold statement since I don’t remember a question on the census asking me how many crimes I didn’t commit due to fear of retribution.

[clairity]

yes, some jail is warranted, but the magnitudes of the crimes make a difference. a few days for a watch. a couple years maybe (what the defense had hoped for) for millions of dollars, because that represents stealing a few dozen person-years of economic output (not to mention the non-monetary aspects).

[Gibbon1]

I rolled that around in my brain for a decade and eventually decided people who commit financial crimes need to have a day in prison tacked onto their sentence for every $1000 they steal. Under that scheme Jeff Davis dies in prison. And that shouldn't be anything we should care about.