The only objection I can think of to this concept is that unskilled worker have a justified fear of being undercut by convicts. But if that could be worked around, is there any reason why guys should sit around in cells all day? Let them earn their keep, just like everyone else must do.
But this seems to be widely considered a terrible idea. (I think it might even be banned by international treaties.)
If they paid convicts an actuall wage, like maybe $10 an hour or sime sort, I wouldn’t have as much objection to it. As it is, it’s a way for companies to save money and lay off employees. Employees who are laid off will turn to crime to support themselves. They will then end up in prison doing the same job except for less money. That’s what already happens with much of the welfare reform.
I think the money, however much of it there is, should help pay for their upkeep in the corrections system. Or recompense their victims, if any. I would imagine the market value of convicts would be somewhat less than the market value of ex-cons. Which is to say, not a whole lot. I can’t fathom alot of offers of more than minimum wage. But what of it? Let them do what they can. It’s better than nothing.
I say make them work. Take their earnings and put it toward repaying their societal debts. These people will get out of jail but it shouldn’t be free and learning some job skills isn’t a bad idea either.
In the case of child molesters ans rapists I would suggest that they be put on chain gangs doing roadwork in Alaska when it’s 40 below, and make sure they work naked.
I don’t agree with the idea of forced labor, even for convicts. I find that depriving a criminal of freedom, temporarily or not, is acceptable, since it seems the only way society can defend itself. Forcing people to work, though, would be slavery.
Now, enabling them to work if they want to, even encouraging them, might be a good thing for everybody. It would allow them to learn or maintain skills that will help them avoid prison after they get out.
Are convicts presently allowed to work?
And if I’m not mistaken, it was banned in this country about 140 years ago.
stoidela
Whether you agree or not, convict labor has been part of our penal system from the beginning. I just saw a program on this on the History Channel a few weeks ago. When the country was very new and the population small, concentrated in small villages, it was easy to punish offenders. Public humiliation in the form of branding, whipping and putting people in the stocks generally worked. But with the influx of immigrants after the Revolutionary War came more crime. That’s when prisons were established. That was the beginning of the “chain gang”. Prisons situated in town were small, they housed prisoners that went out into the town during the day on “work details”. The problem was the public often wouldn’t leave them alone. It isn’t what you think, they sympathized. Probably because the growing immigrant population was often poor and struggling and could empathize. So prisons were then moved to the country where they became large self containted entities. Even then prisoners were put to work making brooms and furniture. It wasn’t until after the Civil War in the South when “chain gangs” began to become a horrendously inhumane pratice. So prison labor is nothing new.
I personally don’t see anything wrong with prison labor programs from the prisoner’s standpoint. In many ways these programs can be good. Men who have never recieved training can learn job skills. And yes, in most states they are paid, but I’d say 10 bucks an hour for their time is a little much. After all they are in prison and have already been convicted of some felony that curtails their rights, why should they be given anything above minimum wage. Even that is high by my way of thinking. Don’t you think enough bullshit goes on in a prison as it is without these people going to work everyday!? Please! What else should they be doing with their time? And the cost to run prison facilities is high enough without housing people who contribute absolutely nothing.
What the problem is with prison industries is UNICOR. Many business owners believe that they have an unfair advantage over privately owned businesses because the government mandates that UNICOR will be their supplier. So if you are a government agency and looking for a contractor for furniture then you must go to UNICOR first. If they make what you’re looking for then you have to purchase from them. So you can see why private industry might not like the practice.
Needs2know
I think that there is a significant difference between slavery as it happened in the US and convict labor. Slavery was a forced servitude of innocent people, where they, and their offspring, were personal property. Convict labor is performed by people found guilty of a crime and sentenced for a specific time period.
I say, put convicts to work. Have them clean garbage off the side of the road. Have them plant trees to stabilize the soil. Have them clean up polluted rivers. I have a feeling that many prisoners would rather do something than sit around all day. They might as well do something that will benefit society and is not currently being done.
Two important points… 1. I don’t think that convicts should produce a commercial product. That does take jobs away from non-convicts and is an unfair advantage for the firms which use convict labor. 2. Only non-violent/low escape risk offenders should be able to leave the prison. No sense putting the public at further risk.
Amendment 13, United States Constitution
"Section 1.
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
Section 2.
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."
Slavery or involuntary servitude is still permitted as a form of punishment for a crime.
Marc
I don’t like the idea of a situation that would make it advantagous for the state to take in more prisoners.
I’m all for working prisoners. They work the prison farm here in Mississippi, raising livestock and crops. They save Parchman quite a lot of money. And it’s good for them, cause they are out doing something.
If I recall, Montana had a program where they worked cattle drives and ranges. One guy said no one dared escape, it would ruin the program. For guys who are going to be in prison for life, that’s their only hope of doing something.
Generally, working prisioners like that keeps them busy, and busy means happier, sometimes.
The main problem with convict labor stems from places like China. See, if you can actually make a profit on the convicts, then you want more of them. If you can 'convict" someone of “baing an enemy of the state”, or 'wrong thinking", it really is slavery.
Well, to a large extent we don’t have that in America. But, gov’t could do similar stuff to increase the convict pop, such as lessening crime prevention, and increasing crime arresting. Courts would become suspect if we thought the gov’t WANTED more prisoners. The traffic courts are currently, to a large extent (here in CA), travesties of justice, and kangaroo courts, where the Judge acts as judge, jury and prosecutor.
In some areas, such as SF & SJ, where parking tickets mean big bux for the general fund, they actually make illegal parking “attractive”, so that more folks will do it, thus more $$.
So, some amount of convict labor might be OK, but not to the extent it turns a “profit”.
In my city, we have “snow emergencies” during major storms.
When a snow emergency is announced (usually on the radio), you are required to park in special designated areas for 48 hours while they clear the streets of snow. Any cars parked illegally are towed and impounded immediately.
What they like to do occasionally is to announce a snow emergency at 3am. They then have all cars that have not been moved (which is pretty much anyone with on-street parking) towed and impounded by 6am.
The city government reportedly makes a ton of money from this, as fines run $100 and up. Considering the widespread parking shortage in this city (finding a parking spot on the streets of albany after 9pm is impossible), that’s a lot of cars.
Can you imagine if these people had an incentive to put us in jail?
When I first saw Florida, back in the 1960s, it wasn’t uncommon to see groups of prisoners doing road side work. Cleaning the right-of-way, mowing grass, etc., etc. I fail to see where work of this sort is wrong, provided the guards have some respect for human beings.
At one time, both Federal and State Government agencies used office furniture that was made by convicts. I don’t know if this is still the case or not. I see nothing wrong with that.
I think that if I were to be incarcerated, I would prefer having an opportunity to do something, rather than just sit or stand around.
Well, we should clarify here:
Work programs for convicts is a somewhat accepted practice. Usually, there isn’t a huge profit incentive from a gov’t standpoint, and the work needs to get done (roadside brush clearing is a good example).
The problem is with programs that put convicts in working environments that would normally be occupied by ordinary people. I know that at least one major airline (was it TWA?) was employing convicts to answer phones and take plane reservations. They were paid some rediculously low wage (a few cents an hour).
I don’t want to be giving my credit card number and personal info to a convicted rapist. Thanks. And I also don’t like giving the incentive for putting more people in jail so that we can use them as cheap labor.
How about this (I’m getting really cynical now): I work as a telephone receptionist for $12 an hour. I get “downsized” because the company I work for decides it’s cheaper to use convicts at 10 cents an hour to do the same work. Unable to get a job, I’m forced into a life of poverty, and get arrested and convicted while trying to steal food from a supermarket. I end up in prison and…voila! I’m back doing my old job again, for less than one tenth what I was making originally. Convenient, no?
Ok, so it’s extreme. But the fact remains, we don’t want the government(or anyone, for that matter) to have a large financial incentive to imprison people.
Jail work supervisor speaking.
In my view there is nothing wrong with making prisoners work in principle, indeed several enquiry reports in the UK such as The Woolf Report and The Woodcock Report actually state
“Prisoners labour represents a valuable resource which must not be wasted”
These reports go on further to make work in prisons a very high priority not just economically but in terms of security, as activity eases discontent.
Prior to these reports it was not unusual for inmates to be locked in their cells for 23 hours a day in overcrowded unsanitory conditions for years on end.
It is one of the reasons cited as the spark to several prison riots the most notable of which was the Strangeways jail riot in Manchester.
Since the widespread introduction of meaningful work (as opposed to the Victorian treadmill or oakum picking) in prisons of types category B and lower there have been far fewer incidents of organised malcontent.
Prisoners always work inside, just not always outside. All services within the prison, food service, laundry, sanitation, groundskeeping, are performed by inmates at ridiculously low wages. This is a good thing. You gotta keep people busy.
I think it’s OK for inmates to work that the state is responible for. Ed mentioned the roadside brush clearing. These jobs are done by ‘chain-gangs’ and are usually considered cushy work assignments by inmates. Hey, it’s a chance to work outside the walls, and only the best behaved inmates are chosen.
But I agree with most of the posters that profit industries should NOT use prison labor. However, I find the idea of the goverment imprisoning people just to add to someone’s labor pool to be silly.
It is a valid concern because that’s how some chain gangs operated in the past. There was an incentive for state, county, and local governments to imprison people for long periods of time for minor crimes. And for the most part it was black people who were sentenced to chain gangs.
Granted this was the past and what’s past is past. However in recent years the President has called for mandatory “volunteerism” in schools across America. So I’d have to say that some government officials appear to have some incentive to force minors to labor for them. I don’t find it hard to believe that government officials might have an incentive to imprison adults for labor.
Marc
Before we all go off the deep end of accusing the government of imprisoning people for the money, keep a couple of facts in mind.
First, convict labor is nowhere near as cheap as it looks. True, the convict gets paid very little in wages but the government still has to pay his room and board. So there’s virtually no chance that the government will be able to sell a convict’s labor for more than it’s paying for his upkeep.
Second, looking at the bigger picture, even if it were possible for the government to run prisons at a profit, why would they? Plenty of factories and stores make profits now, but the government isn’t trying to run them. Government institutions are not intended or designed to be run on a profit motive so there’s no reason why they would run prisons that way even if they could.
Government institutions may not be designed to be run at a profit. Prisons run by the private sector very much must operate at a profit.