The kind who can't/won't make a living within the bounds of the law. I've known a few characters personally who have been in and out of jail, and they did not have mortgages or steady jobs that gave them skin in the game of Good Behaviour.

None of them were flight risks though.

If they're not flight risks and are not able to permanently disappear from the justice system's reach, then they're not the reason the bail system exists.

The main problem isn’t flight or cinemaesque disappearing, it’s simply avoiding arrest and being out in the community reoffending. If you’re busted for dealing meth and get released pending trial and then don’t show you’re probably just out there selling meth again, crashing at a buddy’s place and avoiding getting pulled over.

In Europe, the small minority deemed likely to reoffend are simply kept in jail pending trial. Are you saying that people likely to reoffend should not be allowed to do so unless they can afford the cash bail (which will be reimbursed once they show up to trial)?

Wasn't the purpose of bail an incentive to ensure people show up to their trial? How would expanding the scope of bail's purpose to "keeping people from reoffending" work?

How do they determine “likely to offend”. In use such a vague thing can easily boil down to “while people are less likely to offend than black people”. So those who could get out by paying bail now are eternally stuck.

Just being arrested for something doesn't make someone guilty of an offence. The for a trial is to determine whether the accused is guilty of an offence and whether or not they should be removed from the community to prevent them from re-offending.

In any case, drug dealers are more likely to have the cash to pay their bail and get back out on the street than the regular working poor.

Drug dealers are not rich or even middle class. That’s more Hollywood nonsense.