HELP US END MASS INCARCERATION The Prison Policy Initiative uses research, advocacy, and organizing to dismantle mass incarceration. We’ve been in this movement for 22 years, thanks to individual donors like you.

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Peter Wagner, Executive Director
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chart showing 128,500 people ages 18 to 24 & 159,200 people 55 & older were in state prisons in 2016, & the share of older people in prison has grown from 3 to 13 % since 1986

Data Source: Bureau of Justice Statistics’ Survey of Prison Inmates, 2016 data analyzed by the Prison Policy Initiative & the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ reports Survey of State Prison Inmates, 1991, page 3, and Profile of Prison Inmates, 2016, Table 1. (Graph: Wendy Sawyer, 2022)

This graph originally appeared in Beyond the count: A deep dive into state prison populations.

The underlying data for this graphic can be found in the report’s appendix tables.

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