The problem with prisons is that most people in prisons should not be there, that they do not solve most problems they say they are solving, and that they are a horrendous waste and destruction of social wealth.
I'm not sure if prisons don't help local economies. I used to live in a prison town (Plattsburgh). Most of the guards there used to have manufacturing jobs, so if they could not have gotten prison jobs, they would have starved.
Joanna
----- Original Message ----- From: "Dennis Claxton" <ddclaxton at earthlink.net> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org, lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Sent: Monday, October 31, 2011 12:33:36 PM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] lbo-talk Digest, Vol 1736, Issue 3
Joanna wrote:
>The current prison industrial complex regime
We seem to be stuck with this term but there are real problems with it. It suggests that industry makes a lot money from prison labor but that's not the case. Industry and prison labor are not a good fit and companies don't like to use it nearly as much as people think. Guards don't like inmates working for someone else because it interferes with their authority and companies don't need the headache of frequent disruptions that happen for many reasons, e.g. inmates can't work when a facility is locked down or when weather interferes with prisoners moving around (a foggy day say, when movement is restricted because of decreased visibility).
Prisons don't help local economies either. Most prison employees don't live in the towns where prisons are located and they buy supplies from outside. Prisons are nothing but trouble for locals.
The motor for prison expansion is government, not industry. Politicians have been getting easy votes for decades by being tough on crime and prison guards' unions have been throwing tons of money at legislators to not only get raises for themselves, but to keep their jobs secure by backing three-strikes laws etc.
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