Our country has the unenviable distinction of holding more people in prisons than any other country in the world. In the United States, 2.3 million people are in prison — a number that represents nearly 25 percent of the world's prison population, according to a report last week in The New York Times. The number is staggering, and it calls into question the recent hardening of attitudes and policies toward crime in America.

The data suggest that local, state and national leaders should be asking if the policies are working as expected. Also: At what cost do we continue with them?

The United States, which has only 5 percent of the world's population, puts more people in jail than does China, which has four times as many people, according to data collected by the International Center for Prison Studies at King's College, London. Crime experts and legal scholars interviewed by The Times say that the high-incarceration rate has helped to reduce crime in the United States, even though it isn't clear by how much.

As a result of tougher laws that began in the mid-1970s, U.S. crime rates began to decline. In the 1990s, crime dropped by more than 40 percent, according to the National Institute of Justice. Crime fighters now have many weapons, including mandatory sentencing, better law enforcement and improved technologies such as DNA analysis and computer forensics. An illustration of changing attitudes in how the justice system has changed in attitude is the experience of the late Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Joe Durant, a former prosecutor.

In 1977, Judge Durant was considered one of the brightest minds on the bench. But a single decision that year earned him a reputation for leniency. Judge Durant sentenced former Miami Dolphin players Don Reese and Randy Crowder to a year in jail and five-years' probation for selling cocaine to undercover police. The sentence was reasonable, but out of step with the times. A news magazine called the judge, "Let 'em go, Joe." The nickname stuck and led to Judge Durant's defeat in the next election.

Today, in contrast, long sentences are a distinguishing factor in America's high incarceration rate. We put more people in jail and for longer periods, including for nonviolent crimes, such as for writing bad checks and possessing drugs. In America, more than half the people arrested test positive for illegal drugs — and, if convicted, they go to jail or prison. In the rest of the world, people who commit nonviolent crimes are less likely to go to jail and, if they are incarcerated, will serve less time than someone similarly charged here.

In Florida, we know firsthand about the high cost of incarceration. Our prisons were so packed in the 1990s that the courts ordered thousands of ire a real threat and rehabilitate those who can be productive members of society.