Since 1984 we have built 24 new prisons in California and only one state university. In the 132 years prior to 1984, we built 12 prisons and 28 universities. Since 1984, the Department of Corrections added 25,864 employees while the higher education workforce was reduced by 8,082. The most comprehensive study of racial discrimination and the death penalty found that killers of whites were eleven times more likely to be condemned to death than killers of African-Americans. One third of the increase in prison and jail populations since 1980 is due to increase in drug law violators behind bars.
Women prisoners are the fastest growing segment in prison population.
The War on Drugs is the single most significant factor contributing to the rise in prisoners. A survey by the National Institute for Drug Abuse found that arrest rates bear no relation to drug use. African Americans and whites use cocaine and marijuana at roughly the same rate, yet African Americans undergo five times the number of arrests of whites for these drugs. Later, The Sentencing Project, 1995. 2. First Commitment Characteristics, California Department of the Youth Authority, 1995.