$1,260,000. That’s how much the average execution costs in the United States. The death penalty is one of the most disputed laws in the country. Many people praise it for the justice it gives to those whose loved ones have been murdered, and others call it a cruel act which makes its advocates no better than the criminals they’re killing. Though many object to it for its brutality, 33 states utilize the death penalty as punishment for murder. It is a process that is flawed on many levels, and as a result it should be abolished in all US states.

One problem with the death penalty is that it doesn’t deter crime. Scientific studies have not produced any evidence that capital punishment slows down crime rates more than the idea of life without parole. States without the death penalty even see fewer homicides committed each year. This may also be because the death penalty is only used in about 150 out of 22,000 murder cases each year, and therefore the odds of being sentenced to death are very low. The death penalty doesn’t do anything to stop crime in our country.

Another distinct flaw in the death penalty is the cost. On average, a capital case is 70% more expensive than a case which does not result in a death sentence, and that includes the cost of incarceration. Taxpayer money could be more efficiently used for life imprisonment, which allows people who want murders killed to see them waste away in jail for the rest of their lives. For some people, this may not be enough, but in those cases some of the money saved by imprisoning the criminals could be used to help families affected by the criminals by spending it on counseling or other services. Also, with the trouble currently faced by the US economy, life without parole is a more sensible option for murder cases.

A third fault of capital punishment is the lack of racial equality in capital cases. A 2011 study in Louisiana found that the odds of a death sentence were 97% higher in cases in which the victim was white than those in which the victim was black. A similar study conducted in California in 2005 showed that people who murdered whites were more than three times more likely to be executed than those who murdered blacks and more than four times more likely to be executed than those who murdered Latinos. In a society that believes in racial equality, it is appalling that a practice that is not implemented in a racially blind manner continues to be used in more than two thirds of the country. America has come so far since the days of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. It’s unacceptable to let people choose who lives and who dies in a discriminatory manner.

Finally, the death penalty’s biggest problem is the risk of innocence. If people are wrongly imprisoned, they can be released, but if people are wrongly killed, there’s no way to give them their lives back. As of March 6, 2013, the number of people executed since the reinstitution of the death penalty in 1976 was 1324 with more people being killed each month. Of these people, 10 were found to be innocent after their execution, and 19 others who may have been innocent have been executed in this century alone. A total of 142 people have been exonerated from death row after being wrongly condemned to death. All of these people were or almost were killed for crimes they didn’t commit. Human error has lead to the wrongful killing of innocent people who were falsely accused. There is no foolproof method of determining the guilt of people on trial, and it’s wrong to sacrifice the lives of innocent Americans for the sake of killing criminals, however heinous their crimes. We as a country should be protecting our citizens, not killing them for things they didn’t do. The death penalty doesn’t solve problems; it creates new ones.

The death penalty is wrong. It is a barbaric process from another time, and the fact that it is applied in a racially unequal manner and to cases where the accused was wrongly convicted makes it even worse. Studies have even shown that it doesn’t deter crime. There is seemingly no reason for the death penalty to continue to be used, and yet the majority of the country still issues capital punishment. Additionally, it’s hurting states’ economies. When people are looking for ways to decrease state spending, nobody ever thinks to abolish the death penalty. Capital punishment is holding back our society in numerous ways; it’s time for a change.