20 hours mandatory service hosing shit off the sidewalks would be a better deterrent anyway.

I'm all for rapid unpleasant but not cruel consequences.

The biggest thing seems to be preventing those administering the consequences from indulging in sadism, or exploiting those who they administer.

If the consequence for minor property damage(think public defecation, minor vandalism etc) a 2-4 hour shift cleaning the streets, potentially connects people with the consequences of their actions without becoming cruel

That's how we ended up with private prisons which in turn has a profit motive to lobby to criminalize more things so they make more money.

Maybe spend a small fraction of that million on a child much earlier?

Making jail "cheaper for taxpayers" tends to mean things like more mandatory labour, more phone calls that cost $5 / min, etc. Trying to squeeze money out of inmates will only make them resent the system even more.

We could bring back large-scale public executions.

Make the punishment for shoplifting being tortured to death in a public square, and the cost of prison will go down. Sounds shocking to you? It used to be the standard in the Western world, until just a couple of centuries ago.

I mean there are places where removing a hand is still the standard, and it reduces but doesn't end crime.

I live in a community with a massive number of Somali refugees. Amputated hands for crime/whatever are a common sight among the older men. Somalia is one of the most dangerous places in the world.

Over time, Europe has abolished the death penalty. They have the lowest murder rates in the history of civilization. In the US, there are wide variations between states for violent crime. Unsurprisingly, the states with the most draconian laws have the highest rates of crime.

I've concluded that violent punishment does not reduce violent crime.

Didn't mean to suggest that it does.

I don't think that comparison is fair. Europe is an advanced, civilised and homogeneous place; Somalia and the US are nothing like that (for different reasons)

It's an absolutely fair comparison. Remember, it wasn't that long ago that all of Europe was unimaginably barbaric by modern standards. Literally millions of people were put to death in gruesome ways for crimes we'd consider trivial (or not even crimes) today. And yet, the murder rate dropped right along with the end of absurdly draconian punishment.

Moreover, the violent crime rates for many parts of the US are no higher than in Europe. Coincidentally, those places tend to be the same states that have ended capital punishment.

Now, I'm not drawing a causal relationship between draconian punishment and an increase in crime. I'm just saying there's demonstrably no relationship between "tough on crime" harsh sentencing and a decrease in crime. Fear of violent retribution by the State is not what stops people from committing crimes. We have to look at other reasons.