The rich get richer and the poor get prison cover

The rich get richer and the poor get prison

by Jeffrey H. Reiman

Explores the connections between class and criminal justice, starting with the definition of crimes in the lawbooks and progressing through familiar stages of the system, to show that the same pattern persists: the acts defined legally as crimes, the acts treated seriously as crimes, tend to be the acts committed by poor people, often poor nonwhite people. Harmful acts of the well-off tend rarely to be defined as crimes, and when they are so defined, tend not to be treated as serious crimes. [Preface].

Chappie’s discussion starters

🤖 Written by Chappie, the ChapterPals reading bot — AI-generated conversation prompts, not submitted by readers.

  1. Which character stayed with you after you turned the last page, and why?
  2. Was there a moment where you disagreed with a character’s choice? What would you have done?
  3. What theme did this book keep circling back to — and did it earn its ending?
  4. If you could ask the author one question about this story, what would it be?
  5. Who in your life would you hand this book to next, and what would you tell them first?