For example the federal state, lease system and county governments pay private companies a fee for each inmate. Which means that they are able to keep prisoners as long as they want to keep their facilities filled. “Important evidence of the abuse that takes place behind the walls and gates of private prisons, it came to light in connection with a lawsuit filed by one of the prisoners who was bitten by a dog” pg. 96.
Private prisons were constructed as a response to the overcrowding in federal prisons during the 1980s; many people speculate whether or not private prisons are good or bad. Critics argue that private prisons like any business are driven by profit, and prisons profit from the amount of criminals they are able to contain which gives the private prisons and their shareholders incentive to keep the prison population high and expenses low. The National Council on Crime and Delinquency estimates that over the next ten years state and federal expenditures on prisons will amount to $351 billion6. These government subsidies along with the support of private prison shareholders allow the prison industrial complex to keep their power and influence
The Reason Foundation study also criticizes the GAO study for overlooking certain cost comparisons in Australia, the United Kingdom, Kentucky, Texas, and Florida and notes that the GAO study is narrow because of its insistence on comparing identical facilities and refusal to consider hypothetical projections of government-run facilities (Moore 13). Yet even the Reason Foundation’s table of comparative studies shows a range in estimated savings of between 0 percent and 28 percent (Moore 12), suggesting that cost savings associated with private facilities are neither definite nor consistent. In addition, another factor that may be unaccounted for in the reports that claim private prisons are most cost-efficient is the cost of government monitoring and
This falls into the ethical issues because it makes it seem as though when someone enters a private prison, the odds are much likelier that they’ll have a longer stay than a public one. Time is something one can never get back, and private prisons are purposely wasting inmates’ lives just for financial gain (Pelaez). Prison privatization may also have affected sentencing. Prison privatization was supposed to be a solution to mass incarceration, not promote it. However, since privatization, three strike laws have been enacted.
Private prisons are seen as a money-making investment and not a place of rehabilitation, and thus the prisoners needs are viewed in dollar signs. Without laws and governmental overseeing, private prisons can restrict the amenities available to prisoners. Although prisoners still maintain the majority of rights that non-prisoners do according to the law, the quality of life in private prisons is strictly at the mercy of millionaires who are looking to maximize their profits (Tencer 2012). In order to maintain those max profits, the prisons must stay full. Private prisons often have stricter rules that result in extended sentences for what are usually minor
developed—the first institution in which men were both “confined and set to labor in order to learn the habits of industry” (LeBaron, 2012, p.331). Although prisons had been designed to enforce and promote punishment, retribution and deterrence, they have also fallen into the conceptual belief that they were in many instances, nothing more than a sweat shop for the socially-undesired. At this point in history, there was very little reform and an immense lack of regulation for prisons or for the proper way they should be ran. Finances. In modern-day calculations, prison labor has been rather beneficial to the U.S. government, bringing in an average of 1.6 billion dollars in 1997.
Those who find themselves sentenced to time in a penitentiary, jail, or prison are at risk of either being broken or strengthened by the time they spend behind bars. There is a great debate of whether or not the prison system in the United States is positive or negative. The following will briefly highlight the positives, negatives, and possible alternatives for our nation's prison system. First, there is a long list of negatives that the prison system in America brings. The prison system is filled with crime, hate, and negativity almost as much as the free world is.
Others believe that the profit they make off of the prison gives them a reason not to give prisoners gain time. This in turn creates more costs and causes employee turnovers. Another cause of controversy is some people’s belief that it is immoral to gain profit from human punishment. There are seven privately owned prisons in Florida as of
These factors create vulnerable circumstances for both inmates and the society. Moreover, these are possibly clear symbols of a failed concept, this raises questions on the methodological aspect of private prisons. Another disturbing effect the privatization of prisons has contributed to, is noted by Ecenbarger, (2012). It involves a case whereby thousands of young men, were wrongfully convicted with many not even receiving legal representation.
I think people probably think private prisons are better then public, just because it says private.
The corruption of the private prison system Is the private prison system really as effective as they say? The private Prison system is a system that should be outlawed. The industry promotes predatory practices based on people with lower incomes, encourages longer and harsher sentences than necessary, and leads to a high reoffending rate. The private prison system otherwise known as for-profit prisons came around in 1983. The industry grew from having ten percent over two decades ago of the prison close to fifty percent today.
Private prisons tend not to house costlier inmates, due to the higher cost of supervising them. Scott Merryman states that, from 1990 to 1995, the overwhelming numbers of inmates in private facilities were classified as minimum-security, and this condition is still relevant today. Public prisons consist of twenty percent maximum-security inmates compared to the five percent in private prisons. Also, public prisons have thirty-five percent of their inmates in minimum-security, while the private prisons have sixty-five percent of their inmates in minimum-security. There are states that have private prisons that choose not to have any high maximum-security inmates at all.
These companies are not well regulated and costly, and support legislation that benefits their income. They have no incentive to rehabilitate, in fact just the opposite, and are therefore wasting lives trying to earn more money. The abolition of private prisons in the United States is a necessary course of action to ensure the maximum health of the
2. The Prison-Industrial Complex introduced by Eric Schlosser, is a theory that claims that the prison system is constructed by political pressures, economic requirements, and commercial demands. The prison system has been continuously growing in the last three decades, regardless of the actual need for it. The PIC is specifically harmful to the most vulnerable of people, such as homeless people, mentally ill, etc. The PIC does more harm, than good, therefore, it is a poor system all-around.
The mission of a prison facility is a statement of an organization’s major function and what it is to accomplish. More commonly the mission for all prisons is security, safety, and rehabilitation. A major key feature to accomplish this mission for a facility is the hiring of staff. One reason hiring of staff is so important is because you have to have the right number of staff members in each part of the facility such as operations, management, and specialized individuals such as consolers to properly do what is needed to accomplish the mission. If your under staffed on correction officers than that will leave a lot of opportunity for the inmates to escape.