Bibliograph

Not a crime to be poor, the criminalization of poverty in America, Peter Edelman

Type

Label

Not a crime to be poor, the criminalization of poverty in America, Peter Edelman

Language

eng

Index

no index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

Not a crime to be poor

Nature of contents

dictionaries

Responsibility statement

Peter Edelman

Sub title

the criminalization of poverty in America

Summary

In one of the richest countries on Earth it has effectively become a crime to be poor. For example, in Ferguson, Missouri, the U.S. Department of Justice didn't just expose racially biased policing; it also exposed exorbitant fines and fees for minor crimes that mainly hit the city's poor, African American population, resulting in jail by the thousands. As Peter Edelman explains in Not a Crime to Be Poor, in fact Ferguson is everywhere: the debtors' prisons of the twenty-first century. The anti-tax revolution that began with the Reagan era led state and local governments, starved for revenues, to squeeze ordinary people, collect fines and fees to the tune of 10 million people who now owe $50 billion. Nor is the criminalization of poverty confined to money. Schoolchildren are sent to court for playground skirmishes that previously sent them to the principal's office. Women are evicted from their homes for calling the police too often to ask for protection from domestic violence. The homeless are arrested for sleeping in the park or urinating in public

Target audience

adult

Classification