4 ms·
But how are we going to fill the (corporate) prisons then? These wards have families to feed, too!
by dan_bk 12y ago
But how are we going to fill the (corporate) prisons then? These wards have families to feed, too!
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- nitrogen 12y agoWhat if we paid them to guard empty cells? Then the people who would have been in the cells can be working, paying more taxes, and funding more guards with those taxes. Everybody wins.
- lostcolony 12y agoActually, that's not completely facetious. What if the payment structure was changed from being based on the number of inmates, to a flat fee, with a cap on how many prisoners a single company could guard (going over that requires housing by the state). Then the company is incentivized to lower the number of people being put in jail rather than raise it; you start seeing lobbying for decriminalization of non-violent offenses, since that leads to fewer prisoners, less cost, same revenue, thus increased profits.
- DanBC 12y agoHow many US prisoners are in corporate prisons?
- calibraxis 12y agoIn the US: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prison#In_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prison#In_the_United_St...) "The trend toward privately operated correctional facilities has continued with 85,604 adults (3.7% of the total US prison population) now housed in 107 privately operated prisons as of 2011[13] Companies operating such facilities include the Corrections Corporation of America, the GEO Group, Inc. (formerly known as Wackenhut Securities), and Community Education Centers. In the past two decades CCA has seen its profits increase by more than 500 percent.[14] The prison industry as a whole took in over $5 billion in revenue in 2011.[15] "According to journalist Matt Taibbi, Wall Street banks took notice of this big influx of cash, and are now some of the prison industry's biggest investors. Wells Fargo has around 100 million invested in GEO Group and 6 million in CCA. Other major investors include Bank of America, Fidelity Investments, General Electric and The Vanguard Group. CCA's share price went from a dollar in 2000 to $34.34 in 2013.[15]" Distinctions between corporations and government aside (their interests are the same, to a first approximation; and of course corporations are government-created entities)... the "drug war" is an effective pretext for social control, particularly in the top jailer of its own people: the US. Puts certain demographics in a horrific box with no freedom.
- eric_bullington 12y agoProPublica puts the percentage of inmates in private facilities at around 8% in 2010. The 3.7% figure appears to come from a cited academic work that I can't verify, so I'm not sure how much stock I'd put in that figure. ProPublica tends to put out pretty reliable stats. More concerning than the total percentage is the rate at which this number is increasing (~40% per year).
- eric_bullington 12y agoNot many (a little under 10%) but expanding rapidly[1] (~40% per year). 1. http://www.propublica.org/article/by-the-numbers-the-u.s.s-growing-for-profit-detention-industry http://www.propublica.org/article/by-the-numbers-the-u.s.s-g...
- tinco 12y agoAround 100,000, or 4% of total US prisoners[1]. 90% of them are in the facilities of the Corrections Corporation of America[2]. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prison#In_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prison#In_the_United_St... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corrections_Corporation_of_America http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corrections_Corporation_of_Amer... edit: so that question was interesting enough for 3 people to look up the answer at the same time ;) Also I had to double check, wtf at the 100,000 prisoners being only 4% of total US prisoners..
- Zigurd 12y agoYahoo finance says roughly 10% of prisons are privately operated. One company has capacity for over 120,000 inmates, so I'd estimate the private prison population is in the low to middle 100ks. A huge segment of policing, courts, and prisons is dependent on the Drug War, and there is enormous public and private sector profiteering in it. But I'd say the other bad effects, like the proliferation of SWAT, no-knock raids, and militarization are worse than the expense and corruption. Some of the other answers here are low due to counting only federal inmates, or being out of date.
- wolfgke 12y agoIf you choose a job whose necessity will disappear in the future, then it's bad luck for you. Better job choice next time. For me this argument is the same as coachmen complaining about cars taking away their jobs.
- qbrass 12y agoYou rename the prisons "treatment centers" and treat drug abuse as a medical problem. Then you just have people committed instead of prosecuted.