[dmwallin]

The USA is already one of the world leaders in percent of population incarcerated; it doesn't seem we are suffering from an inability to imprison. If we as a society decide to revoke someones freedom and choice, then we should be willing to shoulder the cost. Making imprisoning low cost, or even worse profitable, creates massively perverse incentives. If it costs the system little to nothing, why bother to make sure people are really guilty? Why bother to spend the money to rehabilitate? Your goal should be to align incentives, which makes a high-cost and humane prison system have lots of favorable characteristics.