We should all care about the subject I am covering today because it is a societal plague, and a fundamentally unscrupulous multi-billion dollar industry in our country. What's more is, unless you're a billionaire, there's no way to fight this system other than plain ol' being good.
The Justice Policy Institute (JPI) released a report in 2011 chronicling the political strategies of private prison companies “working to make money through harsh policies and longer sentences.” The report’s authors note while the total number of people in prison increased by less than 16 percent, the number of people held in private federal and state facilities increased by 120 and 33 percent, respectively.
Government spending on corrections has soared since 1997 by 72 percent, up to $74 billion in 2014. As a direct result, the private prison industry has raked in tremendous profits. In 2010 just two of the largest private prison companies — Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) and GEO Group — made over $2.9 billion in revenue.
JPI claims the private industry hasn’t merely responded to the nation’s incarceration woes, it has actively sought to create the market conditions (ie. more prisoners) necessary to expand its business.
According to JPI, the private prison industry uses three strategies to influence public policy: lobbying, direct campaign contributions, and networking. The three main companies have contributed well over a quarter million dollars to federal candidates and over $6 million to state politicians. They have also spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on direct lobbying efforts. CCA has spent over $900,000 on federal lobbying and GEO spent anywhere from $120,000 to $199,992 in Florida alone during a short three-month span in 2011.
Meanwhile, “the relationship between government officials and private prison companies has been part of the fabric of the industry from the start,” notes the report. The cofounder of CCA himself once served as chairman of the Tennessee Republican Party. I guess he found a more spiffy way to make a little dough.
The impact that the private prison industry has had is hard to deny. In Arizona, 30 of the 36 legislators who co-sponsored the state’s controversial immigration law that would undoubtedly put more immigrants behind bars received campaign contributions from private prison lobbyists or companies.
These private prison corporations have also been involved in lobbying efforts related to a bill in Florida that would've required privatizing all of the prisons in South Florida, and have been more involved than a little bit in appropriations bills of this sort on the federal level.
Tracy Velázquez, executive director of JPI recommends that we “take a hard look at what the cost of this influence is, both to taxpayers and to the community as a whole, in terms of the policies being lobbied for, and the outcomes for people put in private prisons.”
So, why should you care?
For one, if you haven't been directly affected by the preceding, I'd be willing to bet you won't have to peruse too far down the ol' 'Friends List' to find someone you know who has. In addition, the system just keeps getting smarter, wealthier, and more powerful. When money talks, the powerful listen.
I will always try to stay on a positive note within my blog, and this one is no different. What we need to understand about this information is the simple fact that no matter what side of the fence you're on (pun intended), you are going to pay. So, I say this is plenty of reason to be good. Otherwise, you may end up having paid for your own incarceration by the time they welcome you at those razor wire-wrapped gates...
May the healing continue!
No comments:
Post a Comment