"They want to build a prison... for you and me to live in..."

[Soylent Brice]

after just minutes of perusing this website you may be thinking... "wow, forget cheap labor overseas!!"

this is another facet of our country that goes largely ignored. they're building an empire. there is no where the top 1% won't try to exploit to make another buck.

http://www.caselaw.org/JailWork.html

after thumbing through this i begin to feel as though i'm at some sort of pyramid scheme seminar. oh, and don't forget to check out their PowerPoint presentations.

http://www.caselaw.org/Secondary%20Pages/InmateLaborUses.html

"Many agencies have realized enormous benefits from their jail industry programs.

Agencies that operate jail industries agree that it offers one of the few "win/win" opportunities in corrections. Everyone benefits from a successful industry program—the jail, taxpayers, the community, families...and the inmate."

oh yes, i'm sure that guy who got busted for pot is just ectatic to be there. :sarcasm:

is this what it's coming to? imprisonment as a profit does not sit well with me. personally, rehabilitation seems more "profitable". call me crazy...


please weigh in with "fun" facts of prison and prison labor stats. i'm curious to see what DUers have to say about this.

[EOTE]

1. What this country needs right now is more excuses to lock people up.

I mean, it's not enough that we lead the developed world (and most of the undeveloped world) in terms of percentage of our population in prison, we need to lead by a wider margin. And now that the prison industrial complex has even more incentive to do this, maybe we can reach 10% by 2020? Maybe 15%? One thing is for certain, we definitely don't have enough people in jail as it is. Perhaps we could start jailing jaywalkers and people who fail their piss tests too.

[Soylent Brice]

2. yeah, we're number 1. yay.

it's hard work stayin' on top, ain't it?

[EOTE]

3. What, no replies?

I'll have to give this thread a K&R. This is an extremely important issue, I'd hate to see it sink so quickly.

[Deja Q]

5. Jaywalkers and other blistering idiots who think they have no responsiblity should be locked up.

Auto laws should go back in favor of auto drivers; pedestrians have a responsibility too and the law ignores them, always pinning the blame for everything on the drivers. I call "bullshit!" on that. Try driving in uptown Minneapolis, or even around 8th/Hennepin during a summer's night. The creeps will slowly walk across, glaring at you as if you're the antichrist. Complete and utter strangers. And they know they can get away with it while everyone honks at you because you're the first car and nobody can see the piggish bastard shuffling along, looking like he's going to change direction and rip your head off.

Mind you, the volume of red and blue swirling lights at that time of night; cops are probably too busy with drug raids, hookers, and DWIs.

It's like nobody gives a rat's anymore.



Okay, if there is a tinfoil thing going on, maybe that's true. It's also true there are legitimate dipshits out there who really should be jailed, or at least taught rudimentary civility.

[Joe the Liberal]

4. k & r......

:kick:

[tridim]

6. Investigate BushCo..

The results would easily fill several prisons.

[Soylent Brice]

13. now that's a solution!!!

i wouldn't so much as mind the prison labor corporate complex at that point.

excellent idea. we can stick them all into one prison to themselves and call the prison/company "TRAITOR JOES"

[Hydra]

7. No stats here

But I won't be surprised when they start locking able-bodied people without charge so that they can pay them $.35 an hour.

Fortunately it would cost more to house me and keep me alive with my various illnesses than my work is worth.

[pleah]

8. K&R

:( Are we there yet?

[Soylent Brice]

15. from what i can tell, we're on the right path.

[kenichol]

9. Think Drug War & Mandatory Minimums

The private prison industry pours $$ into campaigns for those who vote for Mandatory Minimums for non-violent drug offenses...that fills up their private prisons so they can contribute more $$ to those who will vote to keep/extend mandatory minimums...
No more. No more War on Drugs, no more war on those suffering from addiction or are using 'illegal' drugs, but aren't hurting anyone (maybe not even themselves).

[The Doctor.]

10. Criminalize Debt Default!!!

That'll fill the roles!

[Wiley50]

11. PM Joanne98. She's DU's expert on prison industries n/t

[Soylent Brice]

14. thanks for the head's up!!

[reggie the dog]

12. system of a down, hell yeah

"UTILIZING DRUGS TO PAY FOR SECRET WARS AROUND THE WORLD DRUGS ARE NOW YOUR GLOBAL POLICY, NOW YOU POLICE THE GLOBE

DRUG MONEY IS USED TO RIG ELECTIONS AND CREATE BRUTAL CORPORATE SPONSORED DICTATORS AROUND THE WOLRD"

In concert they started that song out with "hey kids, do you like druuuugs?????" lots of joints were lit at that point.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

16. We are purposefully building a giant permanent criminal underclass

built on class warfare, hopelessness and drug laws that make the word cynical inoperative. Throw in cheap prison labor for the benefit of corporations and then we can see it in its true light as a way to reconstitute if not slavery, then serfdom.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

17. kicking to keep this secret shame, nightmare, in focus.

It could be you someone you know, it could be you. One never knows. Perhaps one day, bloggers will be declared enemies of the state and will spend the rest of their lives making sneakers even more cheaply than third world sweatshops.

[Blue Diadem]

18. I remember reading about this threatening Michigan jobs several years ago.

Here's the article link:

http://www.mackinac.org/article.aspx?ID=4189

Prison Monopoly Threatens Michigan Jobs

Imagine a company that pays its workers as little as 25 cents an hour and often charges more for its goods than any of its competitors, even though it pays no taxes or dividends. The marketplace would put it out of business before it got off the ground, probably before government regulators even found out about it.

Yet such a firm does exist. It's not a private one operating in a free market. It's a half-billion-dollar government enterprise that wants to get bigger, at the expense of taxpayers and the jobs of workers in the private sector. Welcome to the world of Federal Prison Industries Inc., or FPI -- a unit of the U.S. Justice Department.

More than 22,000 inmates in more than 100 of the nation's correctional facilities make up the captive work force of FPI. They make clothing, electronic and vehicle components, industrial items and dozens of other products including one of crucial significance to the economy of west Michigan -- office furniture.

snip: West Michigan furniture makers, already reeling from a soft economy, are rightfully up in arms about Federal Prison Industries. More than a third of what prisoners make is furniture, and the agency's policies and plans represent an unjustifiable threat to the health of the industry and thousands of west Michigan jobs.


more at link: http://www.mackinac.org/article.aspx?ID=4189
Original article appeared in the detroit news

[eridani]

19. Hey, we don't merely put each other in jail

We also beat the shit out of other countries and take their stuff, and sell each other cheap imported poisoned crap.

[Name removed]

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