Pros And Cons Of The Spoils Of Mass Incarceration

To understand the article you must understand what private prisons are and why they exist. Private prisons are a government effort to save money by outsourcing control of detention facilities to corporations. The biggest and most influential corporation is the Corrections Corporation of America aka the CCA. This idea of outsourcing prisons is becoming very common. Australia, Europe and the United States all use these prisons in efforts to save money. “It

580). Gran and Henry (2007-2008) argue that evidence of efficiency in private prisons provides questionable support, in part because of difficulty in comparing private and government-run prisons. They also state that while private prisons may be less expensive to construct and operate, those cost savings may be “the result of cost cutting by the private firms” (p. 176). Arguments against private prisons are more ubiquitous and include the following: • “The necessity for detailed contract development, monitoring, and regulation will be so significant that it will eat up any savings achieved through privatization;” • “The government will retain its legal liability and therefore will be liable for actions of contractors over which it has only limited

Throughout mankind, the ideas of avarice and prosperity have pushed companies to work harder, although sometimes this can come with a price. Corruption infiltrates all manners of society like government and industries and the American prison system is no different. Since America must provide housing for those who are incarcerated, they build one prison per week due to the increased rate of criminals (Franklin). Many peoples’ crimes do not fit their punishment and additionally the duration of the punishment does not match the crime committed. Why is that? The corruption of state and local governments have an incentive to maintain a certain population within prisons. This is a current conflict within the United States. Therefore, state and local governments should not have the power to dictate the amount people who reside in America’s prisons. Further, financial incentives from companies should be banned from influencing the population of prisons.

In 2013 a paper from authors, Kish and Lipton discuss the title: Do private prisons really offer savings compared with their public counterparts? The purpose of this article is to shed light on the privatization as far as the cost savings. The authors point out the key points of cost saving are: The construction of a private prison is typically faster since voter approval is not required. The reduction of staff members is one way of reducing cost. The author states the problem being, the measurement and similar comparison of facilities plague research in this field. Matching prison facilities and populations is challenging. Medical costs are large part of the budget in a prison. The full cost of such contracting is difficult to

By understaffing prisons, owners save a significant amount of money because of fewer salaries, benefits, training fees, equipment, etc. Less workers puts extra stress on the prison guards who are assigned workloads usually handed to multiple guard (Blesset 24). This creates the possibility of more prison crimes involving both staff and prisoners (Benjamin 98). Guards faced with psychological and physical trauma due to stabbings or other violent crimes may behave more aggressively toward prisoners. This could create a cycle of aggression that harms all people involved with prisons. Privately owned prisons are equally (if not more) susceptible to this type of aggressive environment (Horent and Taylor 42). The lack of safety in these prison will make any logical person wonder why there is not more money inputted into safety. The answer is simply to increase

Despite what you may think, private prisons have existed in the United States dating all the way back to 1852, beginning with the San Quentin state prison. Private prisons did not truly become as common as they are today though until President Ronald Reagan led a large-scale effort for increased privatization around the United States during the 1980’s. One result of this effort was a large upswing in the number of private prisons. As a result of private prisons becoming more common place, it has been seen that compared to prisons run by the government, length of sentences have gone up within private prisons, while at the same time the treatment of prisoners has gone down. This topic interests me because I believe that it should never be in the best interests of such a large and powerful group to have as many people as possible in prison for as long as possible. In my opinion, it is not ethically correct on a basic human level to ever have it in people’s best interests to keep other people in prison. I chose this topic because I have always held a strong opinion on this topic but have never had the time to do extensive research on it and either confirm or dispel my current beliefs about it.

The opposing view makes a good argument stating that the private prisons save a considerable amount of money by leveraging price controls for

I. The first problem with private prisons is inherent in the phenomenon itself (McMahon, 1997, p. 116).

Private prisons are operated under there own guidelines and regulations so they have the option to accept or decline any type of offender. Typically, privately ran facilities do not usually accept offenders who are too costly to hold. These would include certain medical conditions, mental health issues, and dietary requirements that all increase the cost of housing a offender. Research shows that private prisons typically house less violent and serious offenders than public prisons as this would increase the amount of security needed.

As previously stated, private prison companies have to rely on the big prison population in order for them to make money because he main concern of these private corporations that run these facilities is money. Due to this, these companies will do whatever it takes to make sure the prison population increases so they can keep making money. Therefore, the private prison companies will lobby for laws to boost the prison population. Due to this financial motive they will do whatever it takes to make money. In the Corrections Corporation of America’s 2010 Annual Report they even stated the following:

Many people, since the early 1990s, when the privatization of prisons became popular, have had concerns that these companies would be more worried about profit than the prisoners human rights. Since then, private prisons have only increased in popularity. The original reason private prisons exist are cash strapped states were looking for an alternative to state and federal facilities to incarcerate inmates affordably. It is now a 5 billion industry. Many states pay millions of dollars each year to the private companies. Colorado has the largest number of private prisons in the country. “The state had not saved money by contracting out minimum security beds, and that more money is actually spent on private medium security beds than would be spent in a publicly operated institution.” (Mason) This study, performed in 2010 in Arizona, showed that they were not saving and were actually spending more money on the private facility than the public. The U.S. General Accounting Office, in 1996, went over five different research studies and came to the conclusion that there was no real evidence that prisons for profit saved the government and the general public money. Private

Because of this fiscal pressure, governments are looking for alternatives to the public prison system. The predominant idea for reformation is privatization of prisons. Journals abound with responses to this idea including Ph.D. Gaes’s article in the National Institute of Justice Journal, L. Beaty’s article in The Case Journal, and R. Culp’s article in the Criminal Justice Policy Review.

Corporate officials often have conflicting motivations to run these prisons and sacrifice the quality of care in their organizations in order to make a profit. A majority of the problems arising in private prisons is due in part to lack of government oversight and insufficient accountability. In addition to inadequate accountability, for-profit prisons hope to generate the greatest possible profit, and do this by any means necessary. Some will argue that the savings to the taxpayer is worth it, however the current data available clearly says otherwise.

Privatization of prisons is the confining of inmates by a third party that is contracted by a government agency and it refers to the takeover of present public facilities by private operators and the operation of new prisons by for-profit prison companies. Privatization is simply a contract that shifts public functions and responsibilities, in whole, from the public sector to the private sector. Private prisons can also be defined as a contract to provide other services to public prisons such as transportation, maintenance, food, and a contract to project and operate new prisons. There are two sides to the argument about the privatization of prisons. Both have strong arguments in whether they are for or against the model. I have researched the history behind private prisons, the positives for them and also negatives that present.

Consequently, the conditions in many private prisons are terrible, and oversight is limited. (Edwards, 2005)” If corners were cut then the private prison would be cutting its own throat. Private prisons were seen as unfit to house inmates that were sent to prison because the prisoners could escape easier in a facility that was not run by the government.