I don't know that you can directly compare the two judicial systems. Especially when China executes roughly 61 times as many prisoners - often for petty crimes from repeat offenders.
That being said the US puts far too many people in jail, often for far too long of sentences.
Still, I think there is something fundamentally flawed with a society where 40-50 % of all men have been arrested by the police by age 23.
I tried to find some comparable statistics and I found that 5-10 % of all 15-20 year old males in Sweden have been -suspected- for a crime. I doubt that all of them were actually arrested.
Also, prison contractors get more taxpayer dollars for lengthy sentences, whereas the state handles executions (that is, there's no profit in executions for the prison-industrial complex).
That being said the US puts far too many people in jail, often for far too long of sentences.