• ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    242
    ·
    1 year ago

    Largest prison population both in absolute size AND per capita. Also, random fact, their constitution allows prisoners to be forced into slave labour. Also, another random fact, their prisons are run for profit. None of these facts are related of course!

    • cornbread@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      67
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Not to nitpick but not ALL prisons in the US are for-profit. They should be illegal though.

      Fun fact - other countries that have for-profit prisons include Australia, Canada, France, the UK, Israel, South Korea, and New Zealand.

      This won’t do much since most of these prisons operate under state jurisdiction, but in 2021, President Joe Biden issued an executive order to stop the United States Department of Justice from renewing further contracts with private prisons.

    • The Dark Lord ☑️@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      67
      ·
      1 year ago

      Next you’re going to tell me that these for-profit prisons lobby the government for harsher prison sentences for things like cannabis possession.

    • httpjames@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      24
      ·
      1 year ago

      And house arrest is being used for mass incarceration of people being ACCUSED before conviction. The punishment can be more severe before conviction.

          • PMmesexypajamas@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            4
            ·
            1 year ago

            Uhh…nope.

            Also…about 25% of the people incarcerated in America aren’t even convicted of a crime yet.

            Even if they’re found innocent, it’s likely already cost them their job or made it so they are so far behind on bills from not working that it becomes next to impossible to climb out from under

      • 🐱TheCat@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        33
        ·
        1 year ago

        Listen I live in the USA, but if thats your best pushback to all those facts - should tell you what a dire state we are in. And prisons that aren’t for profit still send out prisoners to for-profit industries to work, so it’s kind of a moot point.

        • Fedizen@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          5
          ·
          1 year ago

          california spending 100k+ per prisoner but renting them out for pennies is one of the insane unsustainable aspects of the system and then going and saying “we can’t afford to let them out” is mind numbing.

          The whole circus is just to keep wages down and arrest anybody folks don’t want in their shitty suburb.

      • bdonvr@thelemmy.club
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        26
        ·
        1 year ago

        And how many of these other prisons offer up their prisoners as extremely cheap labor to businesses that ARE for profit?