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.

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