Trends in US Incarceration

Where the Money Goes: Inmate Wages

Given resurgent private sector involvement in prison industry, questions arise as to the flow of funds: Who profits and where does the revenue go? "All Federal inmates who are able must work and are paid a small wage, a portion of which some inmates use to make restitution to victims through the Inmate Financial Responsibility Program" (emphasis added, Federal BOP, 1997: 4).

Between 1979 and 1996, inmates employed in joint ventures certified by the U.S. Department of Justice earned $75,333,448. During that time, deductions from their wages amounted to: $16,046,714 toward room and board; $ 8,920,495 in Federal and States taxes; $5,516,586 in victim compensation and $4,452,664 toward the support of their families (PIE quarterly report, March 31, 1997: 20). These combined wage deductions represent a return to "society" of $34,936,459. Each jurisdiction has some flexibility as to the size of the deduction taken out for room, board and family support, but the total amount deducted from an inmate PIE worker's wages cannot exceed 80% (BJA, 1995: 2).

The issue of prisoner labor, and specifically, inmate wages and working conditions, fueled the fires of prisoner organizing in the early 1970s. The prison labor movement originated in California at Soledad Prison, spread to Folsom State Prison, where prisoners held a 17-day strike in November 1970. The United Prisoners Union sought the minimum wage and workmen's compensation benefits for inmate workers, who in California were earning between $.02 and $.16 an hour (Zonn, 1978: 621). In 1977 the prison union movement was effectively shut down by the Supreme Court's decision in Jones v. North Carolina Prisoners' Labor Union, Inc. where the Court refused to extend First Amendment constitutional protection to prison unions (Zonn: 614).

Critics of the "full wages" work model, where the prisoner is paid the prevailing wage and then pays back his room and board, restitution, money toward the maintenance of his family, and puts the rest into savings to be tapped into upon release, say it is an idea that "reads better in theory than it works in practice. Since the cost of maintaining a prisoner in 1993 hovered around twenty thousand dollars per year and since no prisoner in a 'full wages' prison could be expected to earn that amount, a highly artificial deduction, much less than that, would have to be assessed. The plan becomes an exercise in bookkeeping rather than economic reality" (Morris, 1995: 247).

Organized labor in the U.S. has supported and, in some cases, organized training programs for inmates, but remains opposed to the use of inmate labor in competition or replacement of ÒfreeÓ labor.

"Increasingly...prison labor is being used in both the states and by the federal government to perform work in both the private and public sectors ordinarily done by "free" workers. Twenty-one states have statutes that compel prisoners to work, and others enforce policies that penalize inmates who refuse to work. Prison laborers are generally denied coverage under minimum wage, unemployment compensation, workers' compensation, collective bargaining and other worker protection laws.

We call on the federal government and the states to end any promotional programs to encourage employers to set up shop in federal or state prisons as an alternative to creating jobs and hiring workers in the general population and in direct, intentional competition with private-sector employers" (AFL-CIO Executive Council, 1997: 1).

"Prison labor is one thing," says Phil Neuenfeldt, legislative director for the Wisconsin AFL-CIO. "But prison labor that provides unfair labor to the outside world and keeps pressure on wages downward is not a good thing." Such a charge of unfair competition was leveled when 150 employees at a Texas electronics company lost their jobs when their work was contracted out to prison inmates (Neuenfeldt, quoted in AP, 1997b: 5C). "Our trade laws result in sanctions when we find other countries using prison labor. Why do we prohibit other countries from using prison labor when we are doing it ourselves?" asks Christopher Cook of the Texas AFL-CIO (quoted in Bryce, 1993: 9).

Indeed, with prisoners now working on export goods, the stage is set for accusations of hypocrisy and double standards. "...Foreign producers will see it as unfair competition, as slave labor," said AFL-CIO economist John Zalusky. "And they'll be right. Retaliation could then be targeted at other product areas, such as automobiles" (quoted in Kameras, 1995: 2).

Some examples of resistance from unions have been documented. Publicity surrounding the use of inmate telemarketers by AT&T in 1993 resulted in the cancellation of that program (Holmstrom, 1994: 2). Honda, the car manufacturer, employed Ohio state prisoners at $.35 per hour through a subcontracting arrangement, until heightened awareness among organized labor and state legislators brought the practice to an end in 1992 (Kameras, 1995: 2).

Summary and Observations

As prisons become a common landmark on the U.S. topography, several trends emerge as significant--decreasing federal oversight of the prison sector and increasing controls on inmates. The imposition of legal fees, limited access to law libraries and other restrictions on access to or the ability to distribute information (via the media or visitors, for example) make it more difficult for inmates to assert their rights or make their conditions/cases known. Charging prisoners to pay for jury trials violates the 6th Amendment (right to a jury trial) and the 14th Amendment (equal protection under the law) and has been challenged by the ACLU in Virginia (Parenti, 1996: 26). Assessing fees for access to medical care also represents an abrogation of inmate rights. In some states such practices have been overturned as unconstitutional, as in the case of Colorado regarding co-payments, and a Louisiana jail regarding medication charges; while others have survived legal challenges, as in Oklahoma where a cancer sufferer only received treatment following a federal lawsuit and Maryland where an asthma sufferer's inability to breath freely without the medication he could not pay for was not deemed "cruel and unusual punishment" (Parenti, 1996a: 29).

At the same time, private business has become a new actor in the sector as ownership and management has been privatized in some instances. Questions regarding the turning over of the public "duty" of incarceration to the private sector have been raised, because the goals of business might be at odds with the mission of a prison and private entities are not subject to constitutional restraints (Smith, 1993: 5), and also in terms of training, safety and the likelihood that efficiency is more likely to come from the private sector.

This chapter also presented information on work programs in prisons. Prison industries exist in a variety of forms and interest exists in expanding such industries to involve private industry. Though organized labor is opposed to the use of prison labor any response to the emergence of an inmate workforce appears tinged with resignation and a hopeless inevitability. The potential for prisoners to participate in a dialogue about prison programs, including prison industries, has been severely curtailed by court decisions. Chapter Four takes a step back to consider the wider context in which these trends have emerged, before returning to prison industries to consider the social construction of a low-cost, flexible inmate work force.

From Resurrecting Prison Industries: New Bondage for Flexible Labor?
by Nina Ascoly
MA Thesis, Institute of Social Studies, The Hague (1997)
Updated and expanded version to be published by Autonomedia