Biden to end DOJ private prison contracts

[CitizenVectron]

 

[Greatoneshere]

All of them? Fuckin' A, that's great!

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Note: this ONLY applies to the DOJ.

 

 It does NOT apply to private prison contracts entered into by DHS and its agencies like ICE and CBP.

[Greatoneshere]

4 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

Note: this ONLY applies to the DOJ.

 

 It does NOT apply to private prison contracts entered into by DHS and its agencies like ICE and CBP.

 

Oh, well, it's a start I guess. 

[Air_Delivery]

Private prisons are the biggest perversion of capitalism I can think of.

[CitizenVectron]

3 minutes ago, Air_Delivery said:

Private prisons are the biggest perversion of capitalism I can think of.

 

I'd say that private prisons and private medical services are both up there.

[Air_Delivery]

Just now, CitizenVectron said:

 

I'd say that private prisons and private medical services are both up there.

At least with medical services you have a choice somewhat. With prisons someone is literally a prisoner of a private corporation. That shit is straight out of Robocop.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

18 minutes ago, Air_Delivery said:

At least with medical services you have a choice somewhat. With prisons someone is literally a prisoner of a private corporation. That shit is straight out of Robocop.

Loved choosing what hospital to go to based on the agreements negotiated between the doctors, hospitals, and my insurance company last week. (When in reality I wanted the one with the fewest hospitalized covid patients that was in network)

[Air_Delivery]

2 minutes ago, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

Loved choosing what hospital to go to based on the agreements negotiated between the doctors, hospitals, and my insurance company last week. (When in reality I wanted the one with the fewest hospitalized covid patients that was in network)

I'm not saying our health care is great. I'm just saying being a prisoner of a private corporation is another level. 

[dualhunter]

31 minutes ago, Air_Delivery said:

Private prisons are the biggest perversion of capitalism I can think of.

 

For profit homeless shelters are worse than for profit prisons.

[Fizzzzle]

Private prisons are a pretty small part of the prison industrial complex. Only something like 5% of prisoners in the US are housed in privately owned prisons. Plenty of states don't even have any. The bigger issue is corporations profiting off of either prison labor or prison commissary. Those companies lobby governments to maintain things like mandatory minimums to retain the prison population.

[Air_Delivery]

1 minute ago, dualhunter said:

 

For profit homeless shelters are worse than for profit prisons.

Not even close. 

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-staggering-price-prisoners-relatives-must-pay-to-call-their-loved-ones/2017/05/26/16dff9f2-417f-11e7-8c25-44d09ff5a4a8_story.html

[LazyPiranha]

While for profit health is still a debacle, they at least have a monetary incentive to make people healthy, comfortable, and whole.  For profit prisons have nothing to gain from reforming people, criminal justice reform, or leniency.

[Fizzzzle]

2 minutes ago, Air_Delivery said:

Not even close. 

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-staggering-price-prisoners-relatives-must-pay-to-call-their-loved-ones/2017/05/26/16dff9f2-417f-11e7-8c25-44d09ff5a4a8_story.html

And those aren't just at for profit prisons. That's at every prison. $15 for a phone call. $3 for a shitty pack of cheese spread. $200 for a 10" TV, etc.

[Air_Delivery]

5 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

And those aren't just at for profit prisons. That's at every prison. $15 for a phone call. $3 for a shitty pack of cheese spread. $200 for a 10" TV, etc.

When I say private prisons I mean all profiting off of a literal captive audience. 

[dualhunter]

1 minute ago, Air_Delivery said:

Not even close. 

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-staggering-price-prisoners-relatives-must-pay-to-call-their-loved-ones/2017/05/26/16dff9f2-417f-11e7-8c25-44d09ff5a4a8_story.html

 

I'm not saying that somebody in a for profit prison has a better living situation than somebody receiving services at a for profit shelter, just that the concept of a non-charity charity is more absurd than for profit prisons. 

[Fizzzzle]

I just heard a rather cynical take that governments are only taking stances on private prisons now given that most of the industry is slowly backing away from running full prisons, anyway. As the war on drugs winds down and governments are trying to turn to alternatives other than locking people up, there won't be as much money in straight up owning prisons. Instead, they want to do things like privatize prison medical care and drug treatment programs. "Privatize prison medical care" is a horrible sentence to write.

 

Something else I just thought about - as the number of inmates gets reduced from drug crimes, the prisons themselves will start to be reduced. If I ran a private prison company, I'd probably be trying to get rid of my prisons before they get decommissioned, as most prisons are in the middle of nowhere. Though, I'm not sure if most private prisons are on land owned by the company or simply leased from the state. My guess is the latter more than the former.