That private prisons have contracts stipulating a minimum number of prisoners with long-term guarantees is dystopian on its own. Every bit past that is a shit cherry on top. The incestuous relationship between government and private industry exists because regulatory capture is ridiculously difficult to frugally undo once contracts are in place. How no one has tracked down the ceos of Corrections Corp of America et al., I honestly don’t know. There’s a very small, specific, actionable set of people making the world worse.
this post was submitted on 29 Jan 2024
186 points (100.0% liked)
News
23376 readers
3539 users here now
Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.
Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.
7. No duplicate posts.
If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners.
The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
Even non-private prisons suck.
Here in WI, the state owns the prisons, but contracts out a lot of stuff such as commissary, phones, and healthcare. The issue with these contracts is that they create a monopoly inside. Want a ramen? It's going to cost. Want to call relatives? It's going to cost. Want healthcare? Well, that one they're not supposed to deny you, but they charge a $15 copay, which is an arm and a leg when you make .15 an hour. And if the healthcare sucks, you're shit out of luck.
That's just privatisation with extra steps.
That's what public prisons are. Everything has been contracted out so it's almost the same as a private prison. It just doesn't have a minimum capacity contract.
It’s kind of a viscous cycle. Politicians have convinced themselves, and lots of voters, that private industry is cheaper than “government run.” They forget that the only time that might be true when there’s sufficient competition in the market to drive costs down - which there usually isn’t. They also forget that private companies’ motive is profit, not rehabilitation. In fact, rehabilitation is the last thing they want. You’ll find that private correctional companies often lobby pretty hard for stricter laws, and tougher sentencing guidelines. Now, why do you think these companies would want MORE people in prisons!?
Yay! Capitalism!
I guess they didn't watch John Oliver episode about it.