The racial makeup of prison inmates has long been a topic of interest in discussions of policymaking and social issues. Daily records are kept of prison populations to study demographic trends. For example, black Americans are overrepresented in prison, a fact that informs many policy debates. Blacks make up just over 13 percent of the general U.S. population but the U.S. prison and jail population is 38 percent black, according to research from the Prison Policy Initiative.
But according to the most recent census data, Pennsylvania has changed its record-keeping, resulting in far fewer inmates listed as Hispanic.
Pennsylvania’s population is 81.6 percent white, 12 percent black, and 7.8 percent Hispanic.
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