When we talk about mass incarceration, prosecutors are hands down, the gatekeepers with far too much power. They are responsible for deciding who enters the system, for how long, and under what conditions.
But what often goes unnoticed is how those decisions shift the financial burden between counties and states, creating a broken incentive structure that leaves taxpayers footing the bill and communities paying the price.
This is especially true in rural Michigan counties with punitive practices, such as Barry, Cass, and Van Buren. Because they are so small, they are able to fly under the radar with the extreme damage they cause.
The County vs. State Divide
I recently finished Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration-and How to Achieve Real Reform by John Pfaff. He makes a compelling argument for reform in one very important part of the sentencing process: requiring counties to bear the financial burden for the people they send to prison.
In most states, county governments are responsible for jail costs, which typically house people pretrial or those serving short sentences (usually under a year). State governments, meanwhile, foot the bill for prison sentences, which involve longer terms after a felony conviction.
This creates a perverse incentive:
- Short jail sentences cost the counties money.
- Long prison sentences push the cost to the state.
So when prosecutors push for harsher prison sentences, they shift the entire financial responsibility upward, profit from court fees, and remove the immediate burden from their own county’s budget…and they get to falsely appear to be “tough on crime.”
These measures may also push for the expansion of their court house and prosecutorial office, creating incentive for additional tax burden.
Why Prosecutors Make These Choices
Prosecutors are elected in most states and as a result, they often campaign on being tough rather than fair. Since jail costs directly affect local budgets and can lead to political pushback from county commissioners, some prosecutors may:
- Push felony charges over misdemeanors, even when a misdemeanor would suffice.
- Recommend prison time over alternatives like probation or diversion programs.
- Avoid plea deals that would keep someone in local custody, favoring sentences that transfer them to state correctional facilities.
In doing so, they burnish their reputations as hard-nosed enforcers while handing off the long-term consequences and costs to state systems.
They are also creating long-term problems down the road and complaining about it, as we’re now seeing in with Juvenile Lifer Resentencings.
The Hidden Cost to Communities
While counties may “save money” in the short term by shifting people to state prisons, in the long-term they’re devastating their community with untold costs:
- Families are separated by hundreds of miles due to distant prison placements, forced to pay for phone calls and messages, and burdened with commissary bills.
- Reintegration becomes harder when individuals return home from state facilities disconnected from local reentry services.
- Prison time often leads to worse outcomes for employment, housing, and mental health, especially for low-income communities already underserved.
The people paying the ultimate price are rarely those who made the sentencing decisions; it’s the families left behind, the employers short on workers, and the neighborhoods stripped of opportunity.
Realigning Incentives for Justice, Not Cost-Shifting
If we want a truly fair criminal legal system, we need to rethink how local and state agencies share the cost of incarceration.
Possible solutions include:
- Requiring counties to pay a portion of prison costs if they initiate the prosecution.
- Investing in local diversion, treatment, and restorative justice programs that reduce reliance on incarceration.
- Increasing transparency around how sentencing recommendations are made and how they affect both budgets and outcomes.
Prosecutors should be incentivized to choose the most effective path to public safety, not the one that looks good politically or benefits their local budget at the expense of state taxpayers and human dignity.
