US prisons are a business. Private coorporations build and manage prisons and get paid by the state to handle prisoners.
This creates an immediate conflict of interest: The prison industry wants as many felons ar possible while the state prefers free taxpaying americans.
To further increase revenue, prisoners are put to work. Now, that isn't a bad thing per se, but ask yourself this: Do you really want to tell a convicted murderer your name, address and credit card number?
Because that's what can happen if a travel agency decides to use the "work force" of a prison as call agents.
From an old Michael Moore show "TV Nation".
Clip is from a documentary focusing on the War on Drugs. The prison piece is only a small part of the whole documentary.
And probably the most perverse thing: Prison stocks are traded at wall street with their worth determined by the number of currently incarcareted inmates.
I think the problem with the prison industry is a common one with government contracting. In the normal market if you raise your prices too high eventually you just won't sell anything. The government can't really say no in the end and private industry knows that. They then use the money the government pays them to then lobby for longer sentences and for further criminalition of non-violent offenses.
Basically we need to give those people the middle finger and decriminalize pot and then tax the shit out of it. The way the law works that wouldn't free all the people convicted of non-violent marijuana related crimes, but their sentences should be short enough to where within 10 years or so we'd have a major reversal of our prison situation.
This is another word that is starting to lose its original meaning, used by people to convince themselves that this world is a much nicer place than it really is and would be perfect if only the evil west would reform.
Prisoners are working voluntarily. And nobody forced them to become prisoners.
To call their situation "slavery" is making a mockery of real slavery.
Right. The term "indentured servant" would probably be more accurate.
True, but even that is slightly different.
A real indentured servant became such to escape poverty. Working prisoners have chosen to a commit a crime and that's how they got into the situation they are in.
i'm learning a lot from all your replies. i never knew this was happening to our society today. kind of bothered me.