A Modest Proposal for creating a growth economy by investing in crime

The G20 have been scratching their heads about how to recover from the Great Recession
and create jobs in stalled economies. They could do worse than taking a page from the
policy book of the Harper Government, as the Canadian Government is now known, and
invest in crime.

The Harper Government’s modest proposal has the advantage of not requiring high crime
rates, or any statistical data for that matter. For with this plan the government can create
crime. The secret to creating crime is, of course, in manufacturing criminals. I would argue
that, with the Harper Government’s Tough on Crime proposal, we can make such good
criminals that, with a little venture capital, we will be able to increase employment and
boost the economy for decades to come.

The first step is blindingly simple, yet elegantly efficient: increase jail time. For if there’s
one thing the research tells us, it’s the longer the sentence the better schooled the criminal.
And if there’s one thing the Harper Government loves, it’s research. That step has been
taken, thanks to their Truth in Sentencing Act. Next up are tougher laws for drug-related
crimes and plans for mandatory minimum sentences for a variety of offences, including
unreported crimes.

The second step will require a little more work: redefine criminal to include a wider range
of activities – shop-lifting for example, or being downtown during a protest. I tell you, it’s
a gold mine – there are nearly 29 million people over the age of 14 who shop in
downtowns all over Canada. All the government has to do is call another meeting of the
G20. That would also afford the world’s leaders a first hand view of another example of
Canada’s fiscal acumen.

We know the Harper Government is serious about this because they already have at least
two senior party officials in place and out front: Senators Doug Finley and Irving Gerstein
who know a thing or two about redefining what is legal and what not – allegedly.

The third step, waiting for the appropriate time in the future (ie, a Conservative majority)
will be to incarcerate people before they commit a criminal act. I have it on good authority
that the Harper Government has already contracted the Cruise Corp. to look into how this
might work. The fourth and final step will be to sentence people for thinking about a
criminal act. By that time, the list of criminal activities will have expanded to include
homosexuality, reading or writing statistical reports, praying to more than one God at a
time, praying to the wrong God, and having impure thoughts about John Baird.

All this raw material creates an obvious need for more refineries (formerly known as
prisons). The Harper Government has estimated the start-up costs required for this venture
to be $2 billion, give or take a half billion, over the next five years. The Parliamentary
Budget Officer thinks it will cost $5 billion, which is still $100 million less than what the
Liberals were going to spend on the Kelowna Accord.
But what price can you put on safe streets and a revitalized economy? The cost is not the
point; the point is that the Harper Government is protecting Canadians and investing in the
future.

The trick is to keep operating costs at a minimum. As criminologists are forever telling us,
if you want to equip people for a life of crime, do not serve up rehabilitation along with
punishment. So, no more coddling those who have preyed on the rest of us: no counselling
services, no holidays in mental health wards hopped up on anti-depressants, no workplace
training, no free food – inmates will have to grow their own in the exercise yards of their
refineries.

Criminological research demonstrates such a regime will leave people angry enough and
educated enough in a variety of criminal activities to make a career out of breaking the law
when they get out. The Harper Government has obviously done its homework. Turning out
better criminals will create a need for more police officers, more paramedics, more
lawyers, more courts, more court workers. The need for more law enforcement products
(guns, pepper spray, handcuffs, sound canons) will provide a ready and sustainable market
for our manufacturing sector. You can see how quickly this can become a growth industry.

When the whole thing gets expensive enough, we anticipate the Harper Government will
do the right thing and privatize the system by leasing the job to the highest bidder, or
Lockheed Martin in a non-compete. This should offset at least some of the start-up costs
while Canadians hold on to the capital assets – the prisons themselves. There are major
companies in the US with the experience and expertise and purchasing power to make the
system work efficiently. The corporation to whom we lease the operation will be listed on
the TSX which will provide a wonderful investment opportunity. If the TSX merges with
the LSE, we would expect to see a healthy jump in investment in Canadian oil and
criminal commodities.

Of course, it will take a few years to get going. Those first incarcerated under the new
tough on crime legislation will have to work their way through the system. But if
everything goes according to plan, crime rates should start to take off within 3 years of
start-up and police and justice budgets within 5 years. You can’t hurry this sort of thing,
you have to be in for the long term.

Once running at full capacity, there are a number of measures of success. We expect
“protection from crime rates” (formerly known as “recidivism rates”) will climb to 90% or
even higher, which means there will be an unending supply of recyclable material, a
manufacturing and environmental bonus. The goal is parity with the US: 1 in every 100
Canadians in jail.

Critics of the Harper Government’s scheme are saying that it is Kafkaesque, especially
with its eventual incorporation of sentencing for unreported, planned and thought crimes.
They argue that it is a cynical warping of a governments’ duty to reduce, not increase,
crime. But it is not the government’s duty to reduce crime. That is the duty of the police,
and it is a principle of democracy that government not be seen to be directing the police.

It is true, as Jesus said, “The poor you will always have with you.” The same goes for
crime. As the recession swells the ranks of the poor and the poor swell the ranks of the
criminal, we will need all the tools we can get to catch and incarcerate those who would
have committed a crime anyway, sooner or later, probably. It only takes a little common
sense (and the providence of the Harper Government) to know that it’s better to be safe
than sorry and a stitch in time saves nine.

Soft on crime liberals, and even some conservatives like Newt Gingrich, say the US war
on crime was a bad idea; that it was a mistake to lock up everyone who commits a criminal
act. They say it’s cheaper to treat drug addicts and the mentally ill than to put them in
prison. So what? We’re in a recession people. As Bill Clinton used to say, “It’s the
economy stupid.”

Rehabilitation, re-integration, reconciliation – these are all code words for soft on crime.
They are reformer pipe dreams undermined by liberal practice. They also have the counter-
productive consequence of reducing the supply of criminals to our refineries. How are
drug offenders, for example, or the mentally ill to be contributing members of this growth
industry if they get off drugs or are put on drugs, as the case may be? If you are in the
business of adding value to a product, it makes no sense to siphon off a major source of
raw materials. Look at what all those pipelines going south from the tar sands into the US
have done to our oil refinery business. We must not let that happen to our criminal refining
industry.

All things considered, there is much to recommend this plan. It will create jobs out of
virtually nothing. To quote Shoeless Joe, “If you build it they will come.” It will stimulate
our construction and manufacturing industries. It will, at one blow, protect Canadians from
a new breed of hardened criminal and sweep from our streets the more reprobate of those
in the underclass. Or, to paraphrase the Queen of Hearts, never mind the verdict, let’s have
the sentence.

David McLaren has worked in government, the private sector, with NGOs and First
Nations. He is a writer living at Neyaashiinigmiing on the Bruce Peninsula in Ontario.
More articles are at http://jdavidmclaren.wordpress.com/.

March 2011
© David McLaren