Criminal Justice Trends Paper

Introduction

The U.S. workforce has change dramatically over the years and has faced some of the most dramatic changes within the 21st century.  Some of these changes include the decreasing rate of baby boomers and the increase of the following generation entering the workforce.  The generation that follows the baby boomers is much smaller in numbers, however is expected to change the work culture significantly.  With that being said, the U.S. workforce is becoming increasingly more diverse in terms of age, race, gender, and baby boomers are approaching retirement.   These are some examples of what is expected to impact future trends within the correctional agencies.   The field of corrections finds itself facing unparalleled work force challenges as it enters the 21st century.  This paper will evaluate past, present, and future trends of the corrections component and will discuss the budgetary and managerial impact that future trends will likely have not only in corrections but also in other components of the criminal justice system. It will include current research data (qualitative and quantitative) in the analysis.

Past Trends

Past correctional trends include a "get tough" approach to crime.  Essentially creating a criminal justice system that was focused on deterring crime through harsh punishments.  There was little focus on creating treatment programs or implementing other rehabilitation programs to reduce recidivism.  Instead reforms such as the three-strike legislation was implemented into law, targeting drug crimes and repeat offenders for non-violent crimes, thus causing an increase in arrest rates, conviction rates, and offenders serving longer sentences. With prison populations rising the demand for correctional officers and correctional staff also increased.  The laws also changed the demographic of the prison population, creating a higher demand for facilities that are able to house juveniles, adult men, and adult women.  According to Webb (2009), we have an incarceration rate in the United States that is five times higher than the rest of the world.   With 5% of the world's population, our country now houses 25% of the world's reported prisoners (Webb, 2009).   While harsh punishments are part of past criminal justice trends, they still affect the present and future trends within corrections.  Correctional agencies must deal with high demands for officers, retaining already employed correctional staff, and appealing to a new demographic.

Present Trends

Overcrowded prisons and changes in prison population demographics force the labor force to accept the need for change.  The make-up of the overall labor force has experienced dramatic changes and is expected to continue to change in years to come. Within the recent decades there are various factors that have influenced change within the labor force and these contributing factors have allowed for a more diverse workforce, embracing such differences in race, gender, and age.  In the past the correctional workforce was made up of mostly white-male officers.  In 2001, the demographic fell from 72 percent to 65 percent and is expected to continue to decrease as the labor force continues to embrace diversity. The most significant change is related to the increase of women who have entered the workforce and in fact the increase in women has compensated for the declining activity rate of men and in addition has helped to raise the overall work activity rate.  The pool of qualified candidates between the ages of 25 to 44 is expected to decrease by 4 million because the baby boomers are expected to retire in the near future (cite). While the correctional agencies are becoming more diverse, they still face challenges of continuing to meet overall labor shortages and marketing correctional jobs in ways that are aggressive and competitive.  

Future Trends

Challenges of the 21st century include labor shortages related to finding qualified candidates and correctional agencies competing with other criminal justice agencies for the qualified applicants. Other criminal justice agencies are stated to offer better pay and more desirable compensation packages. Although there has been an increase in the employment of correctional officers the growth in numbers is not enough to keep up with the increased demand for correctional officers. It is projected that the prison population will continue to rise and there will be a need to fill over 490,000 correctional officer positions throughout the U.S.  It is said that corrections will be second on the list of career fields that will be affected by the shortage of workers.   Because the dynamics of the overall workforce embraces changes in gender, race, and age, correctional agencies have major obstacles to overcome.  As noted, the age of the younger generation does not find the corrections field appealing for various reasons.  The field of corrections is viewed as a job that doesn't require any skill and the typical location of a prison for work travel less than desirable.  Shift work and the mandating of overtime to meet understaffed needs is also not appealing as the younger generation does not operate like their parents, they do not want work to consume their lives.  Correctional officers are viewed as also poorly trained and less educated individuals.  Careers in law enforcement are generally more appealing and law enforcement officers appear to be more educated individuals and have more skills.  As a result, correctional agencies will need to appeal to a younger generation, ethnic minorities, and women.

Budgetary and managerial Impact that future trends

As the criminal justice system faces the burden of overcrowded prisons, prisons also face decreasing operating budgets.   It has become more expensive to operate and maintain a prison unit because the capita cost of incarceration has risen.   Overcrowded prisons can cause many problems.   One of several major concerns in overcrowded prisons is that there is limited space to house offenders and without the proper space available many offenders are housed together or double-celled.  Overcrowded prisons impact the offender to officer ratio, creating concerns for officer, correctional staff, and offender safety.   Prisons conduct daily operations with minimal staff and have less money to spend on equipment needed to safely operate a prison.  In some cases the overall criminal justice system is dealing with decreasing budgets by changing policies such as sentencing and because the largest budget savings result from changing policies that impact the number of offenders that are sent to prison and the length of their prison sentence.  Therefore by reducing the prison population, the demand for correctional officers will decrease, resulting in budget savings.  Staffing typically accounts for 75 to 80 percent of corrections budgets; substantial cost reduction occurs when there is a reduction in prison population—whether a single cellblock or an entire prison (Scott-Hayward, 2009).  For example, in the state of Washington it is said to cost $45 million dollars a year to operate a prison and if crime rates continue rise there will be increased need more prison beds.  Should the state need build additional prisons there is an associated cost of $250 million dollars to build.  While considering that an increase in prison population impacts demands for prisons and correctional staff there are other parts of the criminal justice that is impacted.  For example, police,  courts, prosecutors, public defenders, and many other aspects of the criminal justice.  The community and taxpayers are impacted by the rising of prison populations.  All of which come at a cost.