AP U.S. Government and Politics

Over the past 8 years, as states across the U.S. have cut their rates of imprisonment what has happened to their crime rates?

1. How accurate was your prediction?

2. What is the big story with this data?

3. What do you think is causing this to happen?

4. What are two consequences of this?

5. If you were in charge of criminal justice in your state and you saw these statistics what would you do about it?

6. Who is in charge of criminal justice decisions in your state?

7. At the national level?

8. What does this chart tell us about federalism?

9. Is this information good news?

10. Do you see any geographical patterns or trends in this data?

11. How familiar do you think the average American is with this information?

12. Explain how the typical American liberal, conservative, and Libertarian would respond to this data:

13. If you asked the average American what happens to the crime rate when we cut the incarceration rate, what do you think they would say?

14. What is the difference between causation and correlation?

Learning Extension

Read the entire article about incarceration and crime rates at Vox.

Action Extension

Contact your state governor and share this information with them and your recommendation of what they should do about it.

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