The United States has the highest number of incarcerated citizens compared to any other country on Earth. In the last decade it has come to the media's attention that American corporations have begun to create factories and facilities that are now using prison labor as their main source of production. While prison labor is not a new concept for this country, now people are coming forward and speaking out against it more than ever before. The media has been equating this choice of prison labor to slavery, deeming it as unethical and unconstitutional work.
On December 6, 1865 Congress passed the 13th Amendment stating, “Amendment XIII, Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall …show more content…
“Captive Labor: America’s Prisoners As Corporate Workforce,” by Nicholas Confessore, describes the injustice of prisoners:
“Prison employers pay no health insurance, no unemployment insurance, no payroll, or Social Security taxes, no workers’ compensation, no vacation time, sick leave, or overtime...They have no right to circulate an employee petition of newsletter, no right to call a meeting, and no access to the press.”
Since the beginning of standard labor laws around 1886 unions and the United States Government have been working towards regulating working conditions and the welfare of workers. People in prison have no access to these rights and are not protected by them. Prisoners are being sent off to work extremely long days with minimal brakes, and are underpaid. The lack of rights that prisoners have and the inability for them to gain more is a direct result of specific wording of The 13th Amendment.
In John W. Whitehead’s article, “Jailing Americans for Profit: The Rise of the Prison Industrial Complex,” he addresses how prisons benefit from high incarceration rates, he …show more content…
Because higher population and incarceration rates lead to prison and state tax breaks and higher profit levels, many states are not actively working on decreasing the amount of people who are incarcerated every year. Similarly in the article “How America Became the Most Imprisoned Nation in the World” by John Surico he states, “Over the past few decades, the United States has built more jails and prisons than colleges; there are now more than 5,000 of them across the 50 states, to be precise.” States and prisons profiting off of having people incarcerated has been happening since slavery was abolished. The actions and intentions of the government and the lawmakers in this country is to keep treating minorities as second class citizens and to continue to benefit from them at their expense and
On December 6, 1865 Congress passed the 13th Amendment stating, “Amendment XIII, Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall …show more content…
“Captive Labor: America’s Prisoners As Corporate Workforce,” by Nicholas Confessore, describes the injustice of prisoners:
“Prison employers pay no health insurance, no unemployment insurance, no payroll, or Social Security taxes, no workers’ compensation, no vacation time, sick leave, or overtime...They have no right to circulate an employee petition of newsletter, no right to call a meeting, and no access to the press.”
Since the beginning of standard labor laws around 1886 unions and the United States Government have been working towards regulating working conditions and the welfare of workers. People in prison have no access to these rights and are not protected by them. Prisoners are being sent off to work extremely long days with minimal brakes, and are underpaid. The lack of rights that prisoners have and the inability for them to gain more is a direct result of specific wording of The 13th Amendment.
In John W. Whitehead’s article, “Jailing Americans for Profit: The Rise of the Prison Industrial Complex,” he addresses how prisons benefit from high incarceration rates, he …show more content…
Because higher population and incarceration rates lead to prison and state tax breaks and higher profit levels, many states are not actively working on decreasing the amount of people who are incarcerated every year. Similarly in the article “How America Became the Most Imprisoned Nation in the World” by John Surico he states, “Over the past few decades, the United States has built more jails and prisons than colleges; there are now more than 5,000 of them across the 50 states, to be precise.” States and prisons profiting off of having people incarcerated has been happening since slavery was abolished. The actions and intentions of the government and the lawmakers in this country is to keep treating minorities as second class citizens and to continue to benefit from them at their expense and