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and the Nation (A BJS Report)
Bureau of Justice Statistics
In 1999, Alaska spent more per
capita on justice functions than any other state—almost
$725 per person. The national average was $442 per capita. Of
the $725, just over $283 was spent on law enforcement, $195 on
judicial and legal functions, and $246 on corrections.
While the per capita expenditures
were the highest among the states, the percentage of local and
state employees working in the justice system in Alaska was among
the lowest. Only nine percent of Alaska’s state workers
were so employed, compared to a national average of almost 13
percent. Close to 4400 individuals worked in state and local
justice positions in Alaska in 1999.
In 1999, the United States spent
a record $147 billion for police protection, corrections, and
judicial and legal activities. The nation’s expenditure
for operations and outlay of the justice system increased 309
percent from almost $36 billion in 1982. (Discounting inflation,
that represents a 145 percent increase in constant dollars.)
Local governments funded more than
half of all justice system expenses. Another 39 percent of justice
funding came from the states.
Criminal and civil justice expenditures
comprised approximately 7.7 percent of all state and local public
expenditures in 1999. Compared to justice expenditures, state
and local governments in the United States spent almost four
times as much on education, almost twice as much on public welfare,
and a roughly equal amount on hospitals and health care.
In March 1999, the nation’s
justice system employed nearly 2.2 million persons, with a total
March payroll of $7.2 billion. More than half of all justice
employees worked at the local level. A third were state employees.
The remaining 8.7 percent were federal employees, more than half
of whom worked in police protection.
Expansion of the Nation’s Justice System, 1982-1999
The increase in justice expenditures
over nearly 20 years reflects the expansion of the nation’s
justice system. For example, in 1982 the justice system employed
approximately 1.27 million persons; in 1999 it reached over 2
million.
Police protection. One indicator
of police workload, the FBI’s arrest estimates for state
and local police agencies, grew from 12 million in 1982 to an
estimated 14 million in 1999. The number of employees in police
work increased from approximately 724,000 to over one million.
Judicial and legal. The
judicial and legal workload, including civil and criminal cases,
prosecutor functions, and public defender services also expanded
during this period. Cases filed in general and limited jurisdiction
state courts went from about 86 million to 91 million in 15-year
period from 1984 to 1999. The juvenile court workload also expanded
from one million delinquency cases in 1982 to 1.8 million in
1998. The total of judicial and legal employees grew about 84
percent to 455,000 persons in 1999.
Corrections. The total number
of state and federal inmates grew from 400,000 in 1982 to nearly
1,300,000 in 1999. This was accompanied by the opening of over
600 state and at least 51 federal correctional facilities. The
number of local jail inmates also tripled, from approximately
200,000 in 1982 to 600,000 in 1999. Adults on probation increased
from over 1.3 to nearly 3.8 million persons. Overall, corrections
employment more than doubled from nearly 300,000 to over 716,000
during this period.
This article is based on the BJS Bulletin “Justice Expenditures and Employment in the United States, 1999,” NCJ-191746.