The Chain Gang Analysis

Due to the tight labor market, companies are relying on prisoners to provide them with labor. As of now, private prisons have become one of the largest powers in the “prison-industrial complex.” There are approximately 18 private prison corporations, which guard 10,000 prisoners, and more than 37 states have legalized the contracting of prisoners by private companies (Prison Slave Labor: Fascism U.S. – Style). For both the prisons, and the companies, it’s a good deal. Whyte and Baker list the benefits for those who utilize prison labor: no unions, strikes, health benefits, unemployment

The industrial prison complex has divided America into two groups; those who are oblivious to the industry and prison abolitionists who are advocating for reform or the complete abolition of the industry. With prisons being so integrated in American society, it is hard for oblivious citizens to see the problems with the prison industry. The media uses television shows such as Orange is the New Black and Prison Break to normalize prisons in America. Prison abolitionists want the industrial prison complex abolished for an array of reasons that end in true equality for citizens. The social injustices explained earlier are reason enough to call citizens to action against the industrial prison complex.

In recent decades, low-income Americans have been facing the consequences of living in a country whose criminal justice system is greatly influenced by skewed prosecution dynamics, and whose structural discrepancies continue to encourage the mass incarceration phenomenon that affects millions of individuals today. At rates higher than Russia and China, the U.S is incarcerating an entire portion of its population based on irrelevant criteria such as affluence and race. The harsh reality that both, poverty-stricken individuals and prison inmates face today, indicate a dire need for systematic change, and should encourage citizens to become informed members of society. As citizens have come together, and government officials become involved, many reforms have been introduced and passed which are conducive to a more restorative approach to justice.

The author discusses the price that US minority communities pay and the mass incarceration and the ideologies that fuel them. Interestingly, the author believes that mass incarceration only affects a certain group of people. Mass incarceration targets minority groups. These minority groups are characterized as low-income people. The author believes, that action has been taken to rectify the percentage of incarceration, because their low power compared to the majority. In addition, the authors go into percentages that depict that African American and Hispanic are targeted. Furthermore, the author looks at the ideologies that pertain to mass incarceration. Due to social injustice in the low-income communities presents negative ramifications

“The United States imprisons a larger percentage of its black population than South Africa did at the height of apartheid. In Washington, D.C., our nation’s capitol, it is estimated that three out of four young black men (and nearly all those in the poorest neighborhoods) can expect to serve time in prison” (Alexander, 2012). The numbers tell the story better than words can: black people are more likely to go to prison than any other race in the United States, shown by the fact that more than 60% of the prison population is composed of people of color (The Sentencing Project, 2016). These statistics can be traced back to several different cause, including the Era of Jim Crow and the War on Drugs, both of which led to higher policing in minority areas.

The book Are Prisons Obsolete? By Angela Y. Davis, Davis talks about the prison system and whether or not they are useful. Having to put a person in the prison seems to be the right to do; however, people forget to look at the real consequence of the existence of the prisons. The creation of the prisons seems to be the good solution in regarding of securing social safety; yet, there are many bad consequences that appear to affect the prisoners the most, which those effects involve exploitation of the prisoners’ labor, wasted capital resources that can be used to do other things that can help improve the community, and the way the prisoners are treated is similar to the way slaves were treated.

“African Americans are more likely to be arrested, if arrested more likely to be charged, if charged more likely to be sentenced, and if sentenced more likely to suffer more intense punishment than the rich or the white.” says a writer of the “why are African Americans the face of poverty in the United States ("Why Are Black Americans the Face of Poverty in the United States? Is This View Supported by Evidence?).It 's a serious question to ask. African Americans are usually represented as the lower class and in this case the main ethnicity dealing with poverty. They are used as the display of poverty programs and to show how poor people live.Government funded Poverty Programs should not have African Americans as the face of their assisted people because; they are not the main race dealing with this problem, it builds white resentment, and it enforces stereotypes of african americans. Poverty itself is a worldwide problem. For the past six years america 's wealth has increased by 60 percent but so has the amount of homeless children(“The Numbers Are Staggering:US Is ‘World Leader’ in Child Poverty, 1). Living on 26 dollars a day is what it means to be living in poverty in the us. this makes up 35.9 million people in the us which makes almost one out of every eight citizens a person living in poverty(Seager, 1). If you go to India or you go to any number of other Third World countries, you have two problems: You have greater inequality of income and wealth. You also have

This becomes a problem because this means there are many people in jail who have been involved in nonviolent crimes yet are incarcerated as if they have been involved in a crime that had been violent. For example, “Federal law stipulates five years’ imprisonment without possibility of parole for possession of 5 grams of crack or 3.5 ounces of heroin, and 10 years for possession of less than 2 ounces of rock-cocaine or crack. A sentence of 5 years for cocaine powder requires possession of 500 grams – 100 times more than the quantity of rock cocaine for the same sentence” (Paleaz Blog). However, private enterprise using prisoners is just like legal slavery. “Prison labor has its roots in slavery. After the 1861-1865 Civil War, a system of “hiring out prisoners” was introduced to continue the slavery tradition. Freed slaves were charged with not carrying out their sharecropping commitments (cultivating someone else’s land in exchange for part of the harvest) or petty thievery – which were almost never proven – and were then “hired out” for cotton picking, working in mines and building railroads” (Paleaz Bloh). During this time prison labor had a negative affect on the inmates because they felt as if they were still enslaved because of the way they were

Inhumane treatment of inmates and poor living conditions seem to be reoccurring issues within the private prison system. Oddly enough the United States government continues to allow the privatizing of prisons when as it stands private companies already owned and/or operate over more than half of the U.S correctional facilities (Mason , 2010). Privatization of prisons was initially expected not only relieve the overcrowding of prisons but also to house inmates for a lesser cost. Yet until this day there is no tangible evidence that private prisons have met these goals. It seems that time and time again private prison companies are costing society much more than they are helping while simultaneously exploiting inmates to make a greater profit. It is evident that the privatization of prisons has created a multi-billion dollar industry at the expense of taxpayers and with the enslavement of prisoners.

According to our reading, it stated that male and minorities are largely overrepresented within the Criminal Justice System. The Bureau of Justice Statistics reports African American (Blacks) constituted about 13% of the United States population and 37% of that population are convicted of a felony. African American is 51% Caucasian (White) 45% of being convicted of felonious murder and 59% to 39% when it comes to robbery and 50% to 47% to weapon charges. Although these numbers are not a direct result of discrimination in the criminal court system or in the court system practices. It does generate a great debate on whether it is a possibility of differential treatment of groups especially minorities in the justice system. (Quote) Now, the

Efforts to reform the prison system and make it less racist, for example, have been enacted and have enjoyed some measure of success in a similar fashion as efforts to reduce racism in other societal institutions have (Walker, 2006, p. 251-252). At the same time, studies have shown that the criminal justice system tends to punish crimes committed by professionals and people from upper classes at a lower rate than those committed by those who come from more limited economic backgrounds (Walker, 2006, p. 250). Both instances also point to the fact that the criminal justice system, criminals, and prisons do not operate in a vacuum outside of the larger dynamics of

The privatization of today’s prisons and the companies involved are much different than those depicted by the ‘chain gang’ and ‘Cool Hand Luke’ movies of the past. These private companies operate based on the contracts they signed with the local, state and federal governments. These contracts do provide measures or incentives to insure that the food, care, conditions and services provided are of quality and humane. (White, 2001) Since the local, state and federal governments have not been able to keep up with the increased prisoner population explosion, the rising construction and health costs, nor provide the necessary upkeep on the out-of-date and eroding current correction facilities, so they have turned to private companies to provide it all. (Duitsman, 1998) A total of 158 private prisons operate in over 30 states. Most fall in the South and Western states with Texas leading all states (43), followed by California (24), Florida (10), and Colorado (9). (Austin &

The social problem is poverty, a risk factor that predisposes disadvantaged groups to incarceration. Data shows that the incarcerated majority are minority groups like African Americans and Latinos. In today’s society, one can argue that both the state and people tend to place the blame solely on the individual. The poor are often stigmatized, associating them with an undesirable stereotype that reduces their value as an individual. Furthermore, people tend to think that those in poverty engage in unlawful activities more often than the White population. As a result, African Americans and Latinos are more likely to be associated with crime and are more likely to be subjected to policing than the White population. There is a racial bias

I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang is a film directed by Mervyn LeRoy, from 1932. The film is about a soldier, James Allen, who returns home from WWI with the aspiration to be an engineer. Unfortunately, his family wanted him to return to his prewar job, working at a factory. James decides to travel around the United States looking for a job and gets mixed up with the wrong person, which lands him on a chain gang. Throughout the film, various metallic sounds can be heard. One example, of metallic sounds in the film, is the pickaxe clanking as the calendar changes. A second example of metallic sounds in the film is the triangular bell that the wardens of the chain gang use to wake up the prisoners. A third example of metallic sounds in the film is the warden checking all the prisoner’s chains after the end of the workday. A fourth example of metallic sounds in the film is the clanking of the pickaxe, while James is working for the Tri-state engineering company in Chicago.

Over the past couple of decades, imprisonment in the United States has increased explosively. Imprisonment in the U.S. is higher than any other country in the world. Mass incarceration in private prisons occur because the private runned companies pick and choose prisoners that are less costly than others (Times). Studies from the University of Wisconsin have shown that prisoners who are being held in private prisons may serve sentences that are up to 7% longer than prisoners who are in public prisons serving a similar sentence. Which is directly correlated to the profit-potential that each prisoner provides the company that is overseeing the incarceration. Private prisons take in prisoners who are less costly and make them do cheap labor. The current incarceration rate “deprives record numbers of individuals of their liberty, disproportionately affects people of color, and