Private Prisons: The More Americans They Put Behind Bars The More Money They MakeMichael Snyder Overall, the U.S. has approximately 25 percent of the entire global prison population even though it only has 5 percent of the total global population. The United States has the highest incarceration rate on the entire globe by far, and no nation in the history of the world has ever locked up more of its own citizens than we have. Are we really such a cesspool of filth and decay that we need to lock up so many of our own people? Or are there some other factors at work? Could part of the problem be that we have allowed companies to lock up men and women in cages for profit? The two largest private prison companies combined to bring in close to $3,000,000,000 in revenue in 2010, and the largest private prison companies have spent tens of millions of dollars on lobbying and campaign contributions over the past decade. Putting Americans behind bars has become very big business, and those companies have been given a perverse incentive to push for even more Americans to be locked up. It is a system that is absolutely teeming with corruption, and it is going to get a lot worse unless someone does something about it. One of the keys to success in the private prison business it to get politicians to vote your way. That is why the big private prison companies spend so much money on lobbying and campaign contributions. If you can believe it, three of the largest private prison companies have spent approximately $45,000,000 combined on lobbying and campaign contributions over the past decade. Would they be spending so much money if those companies did not believe that it was getting results? Just look at what has happened to the U.S. prison population over the past several decades. Prior to 1980, there were virtually no private prisons in the United States. But since that time, we have seen the overall prison population and the private prison population absolutely explode. For example, between 1990 and 2009 the number of Americans in private prisons grew by about 1600 percent. Overall, the U.S. prison population more than quadrupled between 1980 and 2007. So something has definitely changed. Not that it is wrong to put people in prison when they commit crimes. Of course not. And right now violent crime is rapidly rising in many of our largest cities. When people commit violent crimes they need to be removed from the streets. But when you put those criminals into the hands of private companies that are just in it to make a buck, the potential for abuse is enormous. For example, when auditors visited one private prison in Texas, they got so much fecal matter on their shoes they had to wipe their feet on the grass outside. The prisoners were literally living in their own manure. How would you feel if a member of your own family was locked up in such a facility? And the truth is that there seem to be endless stories of abuse in private prisons. One private prison company reportedly charges inmates $5.00 a minute to make phone calls but only pays them $1.00 a day to work Speaking of work, private prisons have found that exploiting their inmates as a source of slave labor can be extraordinarily profitable. Today, private prisons are stealing jobs from ordinary American workers in a whole host of industries. The following is from an article by Vicky Pelaez And many of the largest corporations in America have rushed in to take advantage of this pool of very cheap slave labor. Just check out some of the big names that have been exploiting prison labor But of course some of the biggest profits for private prisons come from detaining young people. Today, private prison companies operate more than 50 percent of all youth correctional facilities in the United States. And sometimes judges have even been bribed by these companies to sentence kids to very harsh sentences and to send them to their facilities. The following is from a report about two judges in Pennsylvania that were recently convicted for taking money to send kids to private prisons Are you starting to see why private prisons are such a problem? Hundreds of kids had their lives permanently altered by those corrupt judges. The more Americans they put behind bars, the more money these private prisons make. It is a system that needs to be brought to an end. So what do you think? Do you believe that private prisons are a good idea or a bad idea? Please feel free to post a comment with your thoughts below RELATED ACTIVIST POST ARTICLE: 