Private Prisons Vs Private Prison

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.

Crime rates are down in America, yet there is an unproportionately large number of Americans incarcerated. This paper will delve into and examine this problem and how it is closely linked to private prisons and the issues surrounding them. While private prisons claim to be cost effective and well-run, evidence has shown that these profit-driven companies ignore ethical consequences by purposefully lengthening prisoners’ sentences, target certain groups for incarceration and maintain despicable living standards for the prisoners; ultimately, these prisons have caused more harm than good for the state.

Private prisons have a negative effect on states and local governments. Unfortunately, the number of private prisons has been increasing since their inception in 1983 causing further problems. For-profit prisons offer no real benefits and are bad investments for states. Furthermore, private prisons beleaguer communities with high turnover rates that hurt local economies. The demands of these institutions put an excessive burden on the local community’s infrastructure. Similarly, private prisons strain the county and city legal systems. More often than not, spin-off industries and economic benefits promised by the for-profit correction industry fail to appear. Additionally, private prisons are allowed to cherry pick the least expensive

The United States of America has more people incarcerated than any other country on earth, a whopping 2,220,300 adults are currently locked behind bars. We have 500,000 more citizens locked up than China, a country 5 times our population run by an authoritarian government. From 1990 - 2000 the prison population increased by 1,000,000. The main reason for incarceration as a punishment in this country is rehabilitation, or so we have been told. In recent years an industry has developed that revolves around high incarceration rates and lengthy sentences, needless to say business is booming. The for-profit prison industry now makes millions off the backs of American inmates their families and every American taxpayer. The two largest

Almost two million men and women are held in prisons across the US. However, as each year passes more and more of these men and women are being held in privately run prisons. At first glance saving the U.S. government money through the use of private prisons might seem like a good thing, but as a whole these privately run prisons are hurting our country. Should the justice system really be something we should be turning into a business opportunity to make money? I believe the U.S. should stop giving grants to private prisons and instead use that money to expand and improve the public prison system. Moving towards private prisons is putting more money in the pockets of corporations and less money towards improving

Motivated by profitable outcomes, these companies have made incarceration in the United States “ less about justice, and more about the profit motive” (Morial). The idea of making money off of people because of crimes more or less petty crimes are easy targets in the judicial system. Business corporations and political figures, who have high ordinance of power, make the belief of finding the best and most profitable solutions to the economy through prisons. They use free labor of prisoners as equity to their own monetary advantage, which puts them on the upper hand in government and with other corporations that sway political decisions. Monetary values direct how prison systems are ran to build up commission for legislation and

The United States is known for being the greatest country in the world. Land of the free, home of the brave, and leader of the free world, but the United States is actually the world's leading jailer. Incarceration rates have been increasing exponentially in the United States, however the crime rate has been on a steady decline over the last quarter of a century. These increasing number of imprisonments has resulted in the United States leading the nations by highest percentage of incarcerations per capita. The high incarceration rate in the U.S. has negatively affected the economy. As stated by Christian Henrichson “ such as employee benefits, capital costs, in-prison education services, or hospital care for inmates”, it is costly not only for state governments to maintain the correctional facilities, but many are funded by taxpayers. Taxpayers are deluded by state and federal governments by convincing them that if prisons aren’t supported and unfunded, the safety of citizens is in jeopardy due to crime rates increasing and low incarceration rates.

This type of ownership and management of prisons, though not new, only began again in recent history in the 1980's. The reasons for this development of private prisons are threefold and these three trends converged in the 1980's: the ideological imperatives of the free market, the huge increase in the number of prisoners, and the increase in imprisonment costs (Smith, 1993). In this Reaganite era it seemed that private enterprise could do any job the government had been doing cheaper and more efficiently, including running prisons.

As the number of prisoners have constantly been rising at an exceedly fast pace, several governments around the world have embraced the use of private prisons. Private prisons are confinements run by a third party, through an agreement with the government. In the United States, it is estimated that there are over 1.6 million inmates, of that there are 8% that are housed in privately-operated prisons. While the other 92% are housed in the public prison system. Private prisons have existed since the 19th century. Their use increased in the 20th century and continues to rise in some states. When a government makes an agreement with a private prison, it makes payments per prisoner or vacancy in jail on a regular basis for maintenance of the prisoners. Privatization became involved due to the fact that prisons were becoming overpopulated. Public prisons contracted the confinement and care of prisoners with other organizations. Due to the cost-effectiveness of private firms, prisons began to contract out more services, such as medical care, food service, inmate transportation, and vocational training. Over time private firms saw an opportunity for expansion and eventually took over entire prison operations. However, now their security, how they treat the inmates, and their true cost effectiveness has come into question

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

The economic components associated with maintaining and operating public prisons in the U.S. has become a prominent topic in recent years. Many anti-prison activist such a Angela Y. Davis and Ruth Wilson Gilmore contend that the involvement of private corporations and the prevailing social ideology have contributed to the radical expansion of prisons in America.

In the world today, the United States has 2.2 million people in jails or prisons, which is a 500% increase over the last thirty years. This makes the United States have the highest number of people who are incarcerated in the world today. One issue with the criminal justice system is the emergence of private prisons. In 2010, one out of every thirteen prisoners was being held in privately operated prisons (Mason, “Dollars and Detainees”). Private Prisons are prisons that are for profit which I find to be outrageous. There are many problems behind the model of private prisons. For example, the more inmates that are housed in the private facilities the more money the corporations make, therefore, these corporations want the inmates

The United States has been staring down a crisis to our nation for decades; the overpopulation of inmates housed in our prisons. Our nation has five percent of world population yet houses twenty five percent of the world’s inmates (Liptak, 2008). As states turn to private prisons for as a quick solution to their ever expanding inmate population they are sponsoring the very originations that are responsible for creating overcrowding to begin with. Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) – which is the largest private prison company in the United States -- has lobbied away 17.5 million dollars in the last 10 years; 17.5 million taxpayer dollars spent on making immigration laws and drug laws stricter (Lee, 2012). CCA is a public traded stock with emphasis as any business would have on their profit. Private prisons seems like a quick solution for states that are running out of space and focused on saving money up front seems yet they are not the answer when their corporations are

Currently, many prisons are beginning to be run by private corporations. If a company is running a prison then they need prisoners to stay in business. Around 1 in every 107 Americans is currently being housed in a prison. The United States has about 5 percent of the world’s population yet 25 percent of its prisoners(ACA, 2008). This is the easiest way to maintain a large prison population is by maintaining the current drug war. The largest private prison company in the United States is Corrections Corp. of America(ACA, 2008). In the last twenty years, CCA has donated nearly $5 million dollars to certain political

Privatizing prisons may be one way for the prison population to get back under control. Prisons are overcrowded and need extra money to house inmates or to build a new prison. The issue of a serious need for space needs to be addressed. “As a national average, it costs roughly $20,000 per year to keep an inmate in prison. There are approximately 650,000 inmates in state and local prisons, double the number five years ago. This costs taxpayers an estimated $18 billion each year. More than two thirds of the states are facing serious overcrowding problems, and many are operating at least 50 percent over capacity. (Joel, 1988)” Private prisons may be for profit, but if they can solve the issue of cost then it may be a