States aren't eliminating the jobs being done by public workers, they're giving them to prisoners

[ck4829]

Before he went to jail, Danny Ivey had barely seen a backyard garden.

But here he was, two years left on his sentence for grand theft, bent over in a field, snapping wide, green collard leaves from their stems. For the rest of the week, Mr. Ivey and his fellow inmates would be eating the greens he picked, and the State of Florida would be saving most of the $2.29 a day it allots for their meals.

Prison labor — making license plates, picking up litter — is nothing new, and nearly all states have such programs. But these days, officials are expanding the practice to combat cuts in federal financing and dwindling tax revenue, using prisoners to paint vehicles, clean courthouses, sweep campsites and perform many other services done before the recession by private contractors or government employees.

In New Jersey, inmates on roadkill patrol clean deer carcasses from highways. Georgia inmates tend municipal graveyards. In Ohio, they paint their own cells. In California, prison officials hope to expand existing programs, including one in which wet-suit-clad inmates repair leaky public water tanks. There are no figures on how many prisoners have been enrolled in new or expanded programs nationwide, but experts in criminal justice have taken note of the increase.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/25/us/25inmates.html?_r=1

Inmates should learn skills, but paying them a nickel a day and knowing that the money can't really go anywhere isn't going to help the economy.

[raccoon]

1. In SC, they are doing trash pickup. At least in one area I know of. nt

[bluetex]

2. I like it....

Reduces the cost to the taxpayers.
Give the inmates something productive to do with their time, which builds self-worth and self-esteem.

[Fuddnik]

3. It also replaces a families income with slave labor.

[raccoon]

5. Exactly! And compare that with a unionized worker in NYC picking up trash,

think how his/her income contributes to the economy...vs. prisoners doing it for peanuts.

[w4rma]

9. Which reduces tax income which increases everybody's share of taxes that need to be paid. (nt)

[BanzaiBonnie]

10. The new slaves

[bluetex]

18. Slaves?

Hardly.

They're prisoners. Duly convicted by a jury of their peers after a trial. Or....they plead guilty to the crimes they were charged with. Either way....they're not slaves. Equating prisoners with slaves is an insult to the many men, women and children who are currently enslaved in African countries today, as well as those who endured untold hardship at the hands of those who first captured...then enslaved them.

Is it your position sitting in a cell hour after hour, day after day creates a more meaningful existance....

Than doing honest work?

[JoeyT]

20. Yeah, it's awesome for them.

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2008/12/beaumont_prison_abuse.php
14/7s aren't even legal when they're voluntary, by the way.

Also, this: "While they worked," it states in the lawsuit, the inmates "were constantly ridiculed, tormented and yelled at because of deadlines on million-dollar contracts. If they faltered, they were told in no uncertain terms that they would be taken to the hole. Duress and coercion were unrelenting and ubiquitous."

Your definition of "meaningful existance" clearly differs from mine. Yes, sitting in a cell day after day would be better.

This sort of shit isn't uncommon in prison work. I've seen and heard far far worse than this. This is just the first google result that popped up.

Make sure to read the comments too, where people cheer the abuse on.

[hifiguy]

14. A few more like this post

and your pizza will be arriving shortly.

[socialist_n_TN]

15. It also give MORE incentives to imprision MORE people

for bullshit reasons. Watch this spread, ESPECIALLY with and in privatized prisons.

[xphile]

17. How does slavery build self worth and self esteem?

I don't know anyone who feels good about being a slave.

[Hannah Bell]

19. picking up garbage under coercion builds self-esteem? who knew?

[catbyte]

4. I wonder who the first corp will be to use prisoners to manufacture

goods. I know it's coming if things stay as they are. Gutting labor unions, overturning labor laws. It's infuriating. God, I hate Republicans...

:puke:

Diane
Anishnabe in MI

[Brickbat]

6. It happens already. Our states and federal government are set up to outsource jobs to the prison

industry for slave labor.

http://www.minncor.com/

http://www.unicor.gov/

Here's an article:

http://www.cio.com/article/595304/Prison_Labor_Outsourcing_s_Best_Kept_Secret_

ETA: There was just an article on DU about U.S. prisoners who manufacture Patriot missiles through the UNICOR "program":

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/03/prisoners-help-build-patriot-missiles/

From the article:

Unicor used to make helmets for the military, as well. But that work was suspended when 44,000 helmets were recalled for shoddy quality.

[mrcheerful]

7. Ahhhhh you do know that Michigan prisons already have programs in place that

they already have prisoners working in corporation controlled factories? In fact Adrain Mi uses level 1 prisoners to work in a plastic factory, they used to use both level 1 and 2 prisoners at the factory but after 1990 when Adrain had a level 2 and 4 riot the level 2 prisoners were excluded from the program. It is amazing that citizens know very little about their states prison system and care very little on what really goes on behind prison walls, unless it effects them in some way.

[Aerows]

16. I know Dell...

...has been doing this for a while, and some Tomahawk missile parts are made by prisoners for .25 an hour.

This is essentially slave labor, and takes jobs that people with families could be doing out of the economy.

[Pacifist Patriot]

8. Slave labor

[babydollhead]

11. THIS is why "no pictures allowed to be taken of Farms"

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Photographing cows or other farm scenery could land you in jail under Senate bill
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Comments (121)
February 23, 2011
By:
Bruce Ritchie

Taking photographs from the roadside of a sunrise over hay bales near the Suwannee River, horses grazing near Ocala or sunset over citrus groves along the Indian River could land you in jail under a Senate bill filed Monday.

SB 1246 by Sen. Jim Norman, R-Tampa, would make it a first-degree felony to photograph a farm without first obtaining written permission from the owner. A farm is defined as any land "cultivated for the purpose of agricultural production, the raising and breeding of domestic animals or the storage of a commodity."

Media law experts say the ban would violate freedoms protected in the U. S. Constitution. But Wilton Simpson, a farmer who lives in Norman's district, said the bill is needed to protect the property rights of farmers and the "intellectual property" involving farm operations.

Simpson, president of Simpson Farms near Dade City, said the law would prevent people from posing as farmworkers so that they can secretly film agricultural operations.

He said he could not name an instance in which that happened. But animal rights groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and Animal Freedom display undercover videos on their web sites to make their case that livestock farming and meat consumption are cruel.

Jeff Kerr, general counsel for PETA, said the state should be ashamed that such a bill would be introduced.

"Mr. Norman should be filing bills to throw the doors of animal producers wide open to show the public where their food comes from rather than criminalizing those who would show animal cruelty," he said.

Simpson agreed the bill would make it illegal to photograph a farm from a roadside without written permission. Norman could not be reached for comment.

Judy Dalglish, executive director for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said shooting property from a roadside or from the air is legal. The bill "is just flat-out unconstitutional not to mention stupid," she said.

And she said there are laws already to prosecute trespassing onto property without permission. And if someone poses as a farm employee to shoot undercover video, they can be fired and possibly sued.

"Why pass a law you know will not stand constitutional muster?" Dalglish said.

Simpson said he doesn't think that "innocent" roadside photography would be prosecuted even if the bill is passed as introduced.

"Farmers are a common-sense people," he said. "A tourist who stops and takes a picture of cows -- I would not imagine any farmer in the state of Florida that cares about that at all."

[Tsiyu]

12. Given the disparity in sentencing

racial minorities and the impoverished are the ones doing more than their share of this slave labor.

It is unconstitutional - unless made part of one's sentence - in my opinion, and very reminiscent of the meanest, darkest times in labor's history.

But wholesome people love it and corporations love it and who cares if the prisoner's kids ain't got no shoes even though she's a working woman?

[hifiguy]

13. I have been saying for several years that

the plutocrats are seeking a way around the 13th amendment to reinstate slavery. Looks like they have found it. And when being poor is finally made a crime they will have slaves to their black hearts' content.

[JoeyT]

21. This is even more of a win for them.

If they had slaves they would have to feed them. With slaves on loan from the prison industry, the public has to feed them.