Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison, The, 10/e

Illustrates the issue of economic
inequality within the American justice system.¿
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The best-selling text, The Rich Get
Richer and the Poor Get Prison contends that the criminal
justice system is biased against the poor from start to
finish.¿ The authors argue that even before the process of
arrest, trial, and sentencing, the system is biased against the
poor in what it chooses to treat as crime.¿
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The authors show that numerous acts of the
well-off--such as their refusal to make workplaces safe, refusal to
curtail deadly pollution, promotion of unnecessary surgery, and
prescriptions for unnecessary drugs--cause as much harm as the acts
of the poor that are treated as crimes. However, the dangerous acts
of the well-off are almost never treated as crimes, and when they
are, they are almost never treated as severely as the crimes of the
poor. ¿Not only does the criminal justice system fail to
protect against the harmful acts of well-off people, it also fails
to remedy the causes of crime, such as poverty. This results in a
large population of poor criminals in our prisons and in our media.
The authors contend that the idea of crime as a work of the poor
serves the interests of the rich and powerful while conveying a
misleading notion that the real threat to Americans comes from the
bottom of society rather than the top.
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Learning Goals
Upon completing this book, readers will be
able to:

Examine the criminal justice system through the lens of the
poor.
Understand that much of what goes on in the criminal justice
system violates one€s own sense of fairness.
Morally evaluate the criminal justice system€s
failures.
Identify the type of legislature that is biased against the
poor.

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Note:¿ MySearchLab with eText
does not come automatically packed with this text. To purchase
MySearchLab with eText, please visit www.mysearchlab.com or you can
purchase a ValuePack of the text + MySearchLab with eText (at no
additional cost):¿ ValuePack ISBN-10: 0205896103 ¿/
ValuePack ISBN-13: 9780205896103.
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