A growth industry

Sweet land of liberty:

The U.S. prison population, already the largest in the world, grew by 1.9 percent in 2004, leaving federal jails at 40 percent over capacity, according to Justice Department figures released on Sunday.

Inmates in federal, state, local and other prisons totaled nearly 2.3 million at the end of last year, the government said. The 1.9 percent increase was lower than the average annual growth rate of 3.2 percent during the last decade.

According to the International Center for Prison Studies at King's College in London, there are more people behind bars in the United States than in any other country.

China had the second-largest prison population with 1.5 million prisoners, according to statistics updated in April and cited by King's College. The total U.S. population is about 296 million, while China's is 1.3 billion.