COLLEGE DWELLERS OUTNUMBER THE IMPRISONED
The number of inmates in adult correctional facilities in the United States has topped two million for the first time, the Census Bureau said yesterday. But in a reversal from 2000, more Americans over all now live in college dormitories than in prisons.

In a detailed look at people living in what the bureau calls group quarters, the census counted 2.3 million Americans in college and university dormitories, 2.1 million in adult correctional institutions and 1.8 million in nursing homes.

The number of state and federal prisoners in 2006 was more than double the prison population in 1990 and up slightly from nearly 2 million in 2000. Women accounted for 10 percent of the inmates in 2006, compared with 8 percent in 1990.

In 2000, the last year that the census measured people in group quarters, inmates in adult and juvenile correctional institutions slightly outnumbered dormitory dwellers at colleges and universities.

According to government figures, more than twice as many young black men are now attending college than are imprisoned.

[There are also more illegal aliens than inmates. So what?]