In chapter 13 of Corrections in America, the author describes the history of private-sector involvement in corrections and identifies its advantages. The author also describes how prison inmates were considered slaves of the state. Overall, this chapter compares gatekeepers and rainmakers. A private sector correctional facility is any prison, for-profit prison, detention center, is a facility in which juveniles and adults are physically restricted, housed, or interned by a nongovernmental organization which is constructed by a public-sector government agency.
Implications for this book include Santos’s desire to help fix the prison system and the mass incarceration issue the U.S is facing. Santos is also helping other that are being prosecuted by the failing system. Upon being released and piecing his life back together, Santos started his own foundation called the Michael G Santos foundation. Through this foundation, Santos is helping bring awareness to the socials issues that result from mass incarceration while also helping former prisoner transition and integrate successfully back into the work force. Through Santos’s hard work and commitment, Santos successfully helped Maine’s department of corrections enhance their prison system by the virtue of his own programs that he has developed post
This preconceived notion could not be farther from the truth. In reality, these reform movements are idiotically placing a bandaid over the tremendous issue that the prison system is. An imbalance of reforms between women and men, unrestrained sexual abuse in women’s prisons, and tyrannical gender roles are just three of countless examples of how prison reform movements only create more misfortune and fail to provide any real solution to worsening prison conditions. Perhaps instead of conjuring up additional ideas on how to reform prisons, America’s so-called democratic society should agree upon abolishing prisons as a whole. This being said, it is crucial to identify ongoing issues in today’s society, understand how they contribute to unlawful behavior, and seek a solution.
The massive overpopulation of prisons in the United States led to the idea that capitalism could help to reduce burdens and responsibilities of running prisons on the government. Creators of private prisons originally sold the idea that opening up prisons to the free market would bring in competition to drive down prices. In addition to lowering the burden on the government and taxpayers, the new Private run prison would implement real world job training as well as opportunities allowing those incarcerated to become contributing members of society upon release. While the initial salesman of private prison painted a beautiful
Prison has become a multi-billion dollar industry, leading to the privatization of prisons through partnerships between ALEC, and the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). When a state contracts CCA to run their “correctional facilities”, they must keep prisons filled. This is done, once again, by criminalizing minor offenses, raising bail, and lengthening sentences. The bail system, in particular, keeps many people that otherwise wouldn’t be in jail behind bars, because bail is set to numbers as high as $10,000.
Private prisons have exponentially expanded throughout the U.S. in the past decades and with the expansion of a corporation there will be setbacks. The YouTube video by John Oliver he enlightens the viewers about the negatives of private prisons and the companies who operates them like GEO group and the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). Oliver states that in 2012, about 8.7% of inmates were held in private prisons. Oliver reiterates that GEO group and the CCA had a combined revenue of over 3 billion dollars. It’s unfathomable that some corporations that are supposed to be taking care of the inmates with healthcare and decent food are essentially profiting from inmates.
It is a shocking truth that privatized prisons in America are getting paid for having a certain amount of inmates filling their beds. Between 1990 and 2009, the number of private prison inmates increased by more that 1600 percent and 65 percent of all private prison contracts pay private prisons a set amount of cash per prisoner. AZ, OK, LA and VA all have contracts that require 95% to 100% occupancy in private prisons at all times. When the prisons dont meet this percentage, they have to pay. Or in some corrupt and terrible situations the prisons pay members of authority to arrest and put people in their prisons so they dont have to pay and can get more money because their beds are full.
The Impact of Privatization on Prison Quality Crime policies adopted in the US since the 1980s as well as federal and state budget constraints have facilitated a crisis in the nation’s prisons. Campaigns like The War on Drugs, harsher sentencing policies, and the adoption of mandatory minimum sentences have resulted in overcrowding of the country’s prison system. The need for managing the rapid growth in prison population has driven the government to look for efficient alternatives to provide correctional services without increasing public spending, including the privatization of penitentiaries. Proponents of privatized prisons have long claimed that the private sector could operate prisons more efficiently.
Prisons that are managed by the government is the most effective form of prison system. The government is responsible for the services that the citizens want to be provided publicly and are willing to pay (Gregson, 2000). Privatization means that there will be more government spending as the government will be the financier as they shift the functions and responsibilities to the private sector (Gregson, 2000). Private prisons can raise concerns on how are they managed.
The prison industrial complex is defined as the “overlapping interests of government and industry that use surveillance, policing, and imprisonment as solutions to economic, social, and political problems” (Lecture 9). This complex forms the basis behind the Prison Industries Enhancement Program, allowing private sector industries to supply prisons with their services as well as use prison labor to produce goods, a clear example of continued oppression. The practice of [“making] the convicts’ labor more profitable” by leasing them to businesses stems back to the first prison systems. In fact, Texas put its prisoners to work making cabinets and working various trade jobs (Perkinson 77). However, this system has evolved slightly and the National Corrections Industry Association now monitors “PIE” programs, though it is not very effective because its members are biased and invested in the program.
Thesis: It is very important for the sake of Americans tax dollars that we change the way that prisons are run and increase the productivity of inmates so when they are released from jail they are ready to be a productive member in society and have the confidence to achieve new goals. Introduction: Day after day, millions of inmates sit in jail doing nothing productive with their lives. We are paying to house inmates that may not even have a good reason to be there. For example, drug offenders are being kept with murderers and other violent offenders.
In this nation correctional system,more than one million men and women and young adults ( teens ) are living lives in confinement. They are there for many many reasons, for example: anger, drug abuse, robbery, murder. 15 million prisoners of a different sort are facing life or
One of the biggest issues with America’s prison system is overcrowding. Overcrowding affects the cost of incarceration and the mentality of prisoners. However, the issue has yet to be seriously addressed. In fact, many politicians claim that mass incarceration has led to a dramatic decline in crime, citing statistics from the 1990s, when crime rates fell by almost 40 percent.
As time goes on it seems that discussions surrounding prison reform have only picked up and it has started to be a common topic among rising politicians. My research topic is important in today’s society because it involves the people that play a big part in our ordinary
The prison-industrial complex is a corrupt political system that consists of overpowered politicians whose sole ambition is exploiting poor, uneducated, and under-privileged Americans to make money. Although, it wasn’t initially the purpose when Rockefeller started the war on drugs, but he started something bigger than he could’ve imagined at that time. The prison system has been proven to be ineffective, and costly waste of resources. However, it probably won’t be abolished due to the cash flow that it brings to some of the largest corporations in the
