Don't we also need to increase minority voter registration and make sure that felons who have served their time can vote and take part in the judicial process, or are juries selected in some other way? I honestly have no idea how that works.

And yes, the $25 per diem is just stupid. That doesn't even pay for parking and lunch downtown.

We are all equal in that every one of us has better shit to do than jury duty.

Also, please stop with the univariate analysis, people. It’s just dumb and it only works on people that can’t comprehend more than one data component at a time.

In short, it’s the easiest, most obvious way to lie using statistics.

The increase in conviction for whites happens when there's a Black person on the jury. At the same time it decreases convictions of Blacks. How is this a good outcome?

You support convicting more white people so less black people are convicted? How does the ends justify the means again?

@6:

This is not a zero-sum scenario: sentencing more white people does not correlate to fewer black people being sentenced, because juries are still going to be predominantly white regardless of who's in the dock. What the studies show - and which you attempt to conflate into an "either/or" binary - is that, when there's more representation on juries both whites and blacks tend to be convicted at equal rates.

#7 Who's conflating now?

You are willing to see more Whites convicted if it means less Blacks are convicted. No thanks.

Oh bub, do put a sock in it. Just because you're on the dole or have a trust fund or something where you don't have to worry about money, that doesn't mean that there aren't others that do. And of course it's not about making money, but it is about not losing money.

I personally have been lucky in my career in that every place I've ever worked has paid regular wages for time on juries. But knowing something about the world around me, I realize that not every company is like that.

The requirement that Jurors speak English fluently, and juror lists comprised of voter registration data prevents hundreds of thousands of Washington residents from participating in our judicial system, creating huge disparities in some counties (Yakima in particular, with it's large undocumented and Hispanic population).

In addition, people of lower socioeconomic status move more often and update their driver's licences and voter registration less often. Without updated contact information, many residents never receive their summon's.

While throwing money at the problem in the form of better juror pay seems like a good idea (and certainly ease the burden on poorer folks) I'm surprised that both a Public Defender and a Judge would both choose to spend precious judicial dollars (considering the woefully underfunded Public Defender budgets) on jurors, when it would it could be spent on providing better representation to those who need it. That's to say nothing of the access to justice implications of steadily rising court fees (the preferred method of raising money to fund our courts- good luck getting anything out of the legislature).

Outreach activities face a similar problem, in that it takes away money that could be spent on providing better representation. As an anecdotal evidence, one public defender that I know working in Snohomish County currently has 270 open cases, another in King County has 230. As talented, committed, and hardworking as they are, that type of caseload prevents them from providing the quality of representation people need, a burden that falls hardest on the most disadvantaged among us. For my money, I'd hire some more public defenders before I spent a dime on business outreach.

Even worse, the authors suggest increasing the burden on jurors by forcing them to spend extra hours going to and from jury service at the worst times during the day for Seattle traffic. I don't see how that would increase response rates.

The author's hearts are in the right place here, but their solutions (more study, $ for jurors) are little more than window dressing at best.

@2 No one is “doing it for the money.” People who are self-employed or who work minimum-wage service jobs are losing their income while serving on jury duty, and $25/day doesn’t pay the rent.

Paying more might help. Forcing employers to pay salaries and wages while serving might help. "Blanketing" some zip codes no doubt would help and no doubt would be unconstitutional as no longer random. Courts in Washington do not enforce jury summons. The easy way to get out of jury service is to ignore the summons. Nothing will happen. Courts just summon two or three times the number needed. Will arresting people make for a more proportional yield? I suspect it will help.

Bub, I suppose I am a bit testy. You see, my eyes hurt from rolling so much when I read your plucky little story about your supposed business and how noble you are, when in reality you're being your usual skinflint self and opposing an increase in the per diem for jury service because there's a chance that somebody who you think doesn't deserve it may get it. Typical conservative knee-jerk reaction.

Stupid and suspicious is no way to go through life, dear.

Bub dear, Midol & Jack are for amateurs. Try Tequila and Pamprin if you really want to party.

I've been around the Slog block for many many centuries, you know. I've seen screen ID's change, but the people behind them remain the same. You can tell by their retrograde opinions and their writing style, but also by their backstories: Sometimes they're gay, but not always. They often have children who are as put-upon as they are. They almost always own businesses that they have built by the sweat of their brow despite Seattle's awful business climate, and usually only after overcoming some sort of almost insurmountable hardship that none of the rest of us can comprehend. Sometimes they're Bible-addled, sometimes they like to make a big point about what a swell Atheist they are.

My point is I've heard your song before. But I admit that I'd miss you if you were gone.