Pew Center: more than 1% of USA is in prison

Three decades of growth in America’s prison
population has quietly nudged the nation across a
sobering threshold: for the first time, more than one
in every 100 adults is now confined in an American
jail or prison. According to figures gathered and
analyzed by the Pew Public Safety Performance
Project, the number of people behind bars in the
United States continued to climb in 2007, saddling
cash-strapped states with soaring costs they can ill
afford and failing to have a clear impact either on
recidivism or overall crime.
For some groups, the incarceration numbers are
especially startling. While one in 30 men between
the ages of 20 and 34 is behind bars, for black
males in that age group the figure is one in nine.

http://www.pewcenteronthestates.org/uploadedFiles/One%20in%20100.pdf

Actually, the Prison-Industrial Complex might be even better than the Military-Industrial Complex at the task of maintaining social hierarchy.

Consider the similarities with Rome. As the Empire declined, it forced children to enter their parents’ professions. The stigma of imprisonment enacts a similar restriction on ghetto dwellers: if one is born poor, one is likely to stay poor.