[Epistemic Status: I agree with the argument I'm making, but not with some of the propositions I accept in order to most effectively make it. See the first comment for details.]

Paul Manafort just narrowly avoided spending time in Rikers, which has left some people disappointed. There’s a certain glee that’s common to cases where the defendant is hated, as people begin to speculate just how grim their life will be in prison.

To some, the indignities and violence of life in jail and prison are just part of the punishment; an added way of getting justice for what criminals have done.

I think this perspective is wrong-headed. I think the commonly held intuition that prison life (as opposed to simple confinement in prison) is a punishment rests upon a very shaky moral foundation, one that falls apart under any inspection. There already exist many...

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What happens if you don’t pay your taxes?

I’ve never actually tried this, but I’m pretty sure the sequence of events goes like this:

• The government sends you a letter saying "hey, you really should pay your taxes".
• The government sends you a few more letters, just in case you forgot about the first.
• The government sends police to your house to inform that you have been charged with tax evasion.
• If you continue to refuse to pay your taxes, a judge finds you guilty of tax evasion.
• If you still refuse to pay, a judge sends you to jail.

Here jail is the terminal punishment. Demands 1-4 above are backed up by threat of jail¹. But there is no threat that gets you to go to jail; if you refuse, armed men and women will drag you there by force (and a...

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