Nah - let's leave them in society to commit more crimes and groom future generations.
Full disclosure: I'm not educated on this matter at all. I suspect "research" suggests locking them away does have a negative effect on the cycle and I'm sure there are many cases of shoddy, bias police work that is unfairly locking people away for life (not that any system will be perfect). But that's a simple, general concept here. Don't commit felonies - instead, be a decent human being that's a constructive part of society. It's not like it's one and done. You get 3 chances not to be a douche - providing some buffer against the bias police, immaturity + stupidity.
I'm sorry, but if you steal from people on 3 separate occasions - f*** you, you're scum.