America's Incarceration Rate

How Bad is the Incarceration Rate In America? So bad that Sesame Street had to release a kit aimed at helping kids deal with the fact one of their parents was kidnapped by the state:

Nearly seven million people are under correctional supervision in the U.S.; more than two million of them are in a jail or prison. If you want to know what those numbers mean for the American family, consider this: The makers of Sesame Street decided to design and release an educational kit titled "Little Children, Big Challenges: Incarceration."

The kit is "an educational outreach initiative for families with children (ages 3 – 8) who are coping with a parent’s incarceration." Can you imagine telling a five-year-old about prison? "Our resources," say Sesame Streeters, "provide talking points and tools to help families manage the changes resulting from this situation and to find comfort in one another." (Ages 3-8? Christ in Heaven.)

If that isn't a sad statement of American society I don't know what is. What makes it worse is that this epidemic isn't likely to stop because the state relies on the slave labor widespread incarceration gives them.