Lifetime Conviction Rates Signal Policy

Report and compare 'ever‑convicted' and 'ever‑imprisoned' rates (by cohort, sex, and origin) as a routine policy metric because these lifetime measures reveal different things than point‑in‑time prison counts: they show population‑level exposure to the criminal justice system and the interaction of immigration composition and sentence length. Comparing such rates across countries and linking them to modal sentence lengths highlights whether a large prison population is driven by more offenders or longer punishments. — Making lifetime conviction/imprisonment a standard metric would reorient debates over immigration, sentencing reform, and prison capacity by separating prevalence of offending from punishment intensity.