The Modernized Slave Labor System: Also Known as the Prison Industrial Complex

The United States prison system is not only a machine for mass incarceration, but a machine for modernized slave labor.

The United States has 5% of the worlds population, yet we have 25% of the world’s prison population. Land of the free, right?

It would seem the statistics say otherwise: since the official drug war president Nixon announced in the 70′s, our prison population has grown over 700%! Recent estimates put our prison population to well over 2.4 million inmates. 50% of the federal prison inmates are in for nonviolent drug offenses. All the while, 20% of state prison inmates are drug-related.

Is this making Americans safer, or is there an entire industry making money off of imprisoning human beings? It is estimated that nearly 1 million convicts fill the ranks of Unicor. Unicor is the government-owned corporation that handles the labor of inmates! It’s no doubt the federal government sees an opportunity in prison labor, as they have used Unicor to have $100 million worth of military uniforms made for as little as $2 an hour. The government has no problem with using prison labor, and Unicor is estimated at raking in over $900 million a year.

McDonald’s, Walmart, AT&T, Chevron, and IBM are just the names of a few companies that support the use of prison labor. Now, these companies obviously endorse the modernized form of slave labor, and are benefiting off of it. It’s no surprise to find out that the Correctional Vendors Association, a lobbyist group that represents companies that use prison labor, has spent well over $200 thousand this year alone in shaping bills that affect the prison system, mainly the mandatory minimum sentencing. Maybe these companies want people to remain in prison for their practically free modernized slave labor?

Joseph Lemieux owns Politically Exhausted TV.