Whole Foods To Stop Profiting From Prison Labor

[proverbialwisdom]

Source: ThinkProgress

BY CARIMAH TOWNES
SEP 30, 2015 11:42AM

By April 2016, Whole Foods will no longer sell food, including goat cheese and tilapia, produced by prisoners. The new policy will end the franchise’s working relationship with Colorado Correctional Industries.

<>

Meanwhile, the Colorado Department of Corrections rakes in 85 cents per pound of tilapia, while Whole Foods sells the fish for $11.99 per pound. And a state audit found that the program’s earnings have not been used to fund prison maintenance or operating costs, as intended.

Taking into account all of the working inmates in the U.S., prison labor yields $2 billion per year. Jobs include shoveling giant piles of snow for 20 cents a day, fighting fires for $1.45 to $3.90 a day, and scrubbing bathrooms, showers, and toilets for $1.

While Whole Foods will no longer profit from inmate labor, big-name corporations will still continue to reap the benefits of the prison industrial complex, including McDonald’s, Wal-mart, and Victoria’s Secret.

Read more: http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/09/30/3707359/whole-foods-to-stop-profiting-from-prison-labor/

[SoapBox]

1. I have never heard of this?

[retrowire]

2. Woah whatt???

Whole Foods uses prison labor?!

[Cheese Sandwich]

3. This is great news. And credit goes to the people who took these actions:

Protesters call out Whole Foods for prison labor
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10249756

[jalan48]

4. Or, Whole Paycheck, as it is referred to by some of us.

[mopinko]

5. sorry, i support jobs and job training for prisoners.

fair pay, yes. that is non-neogtiable. but prisoners need work opportunities.

[proverbialwisdom]

6. I support jobs and job training for inmates, too. Miss this? In what universe is that legitimate?

But many of the inmates participating in CCI labor programs earn 74 cents a day for hours of labor. Others put the number at 60 cents. The CCI website notes that the labor program is designed to equip inmates with on the job training, skills development, and a sound work ethic. But the extremely low wages make it nearly impossible to afford prison services and basic necessities.

“(We) are charged by DOC three dollars for every medical request and ten dollars for any emergency,” one inmate who supports job expansion and higher pay explained to Westword News. “We are rationed three rolls of toilet paper each month, which requires extreme conservation, or forces us to purchase at least one fifty-cent roll from the canteen each month. Which leaves us very little for canteen necessities such as basic hygiene, a few stamps and a pen and a tablet and envelopes.”

[mopinko]

10. no.

"fair pay, yes. non-negotiable."
humane conditions also, of course.

[Peace Patriot]

13. They charge prisoners for meds & toilet paper, while paying them 74 cents a day?!!!!!!

That is...



...the kind of workforce that Wall Street prefers.

Shouldn't surprise us, I guess. But it does. It is jaw-dropping. It is cruel beyond belief. And it is where we are all headed in this Money Oligarchy.

[Dustlawyer]

7. But I am sure you don't support the abuse. This is more like the Warden in the movie,

Shawshank Redemption!

[ohnoyoudidnt]

8. This has far more to do with exploitation than job training.

Shoveling snow isn't exactly a job that requires a lot of training and neither is cleaning bathrooms. I doubt even the ones fighting fires will have the training to land a position at an actual station since they are only fighting wild fires and their work is mostly supervised intense labor. Training inmates in ares like auto mechanics that does involve a lot of training and could provide a good living when they are released would be better. Of course, we have way too many people behind bars as it is for crimes that shouldn't even be crimes or at least only punishable by fines or community service.

[mopinko]

11. making cheese and raising fish

are great jobs for them to learn.

and yeah, end the stupid war on drugs.

[Lychee2]

12. Comments in this thread are typical of DU.

Everyone feels sorry for the prisoners. No one even thinks of the impact of this kind of labor on the working class as a whole.

[Peace Patriot]

15. Don't slam everybody, please! That's the first thing I thought of...

See my reply (#6) above. This is what our Oligarchs want to do to all workers--and I will add here, ARE doing, with NAFTA and other "free trade for the rich" agreements, where entire countries are enslaved to shit wages in Dickensian working conditions with no rights whatsoever--not to mention gravely deteriorating pay, rights and working conditions here, in nearly all job sectors.

Also, please don't knock sympathy for the prisoners that is short of political consciousness. Sympathy is a beginning. You don't educate people by telling them how stupid they are. You have to build on what they already feel and know. Those of us who "get it"--who see the parallel here, and understand the bigger picture--have an obligation to educate, not berate, especially in a situation of 4 to 5 decades of non-stop propaganda from the Oligarchy's media monopolies.

Educate, don't berate. Build, don't bully. Please!

[Lychee2]

16. Point taken. nt

[CreekDog]

17. No one even thinks of the impact of this kind of labor? WTF

you have no idea what you're talking about.

getting off to a great start here huh?

[Brickbat]

14. Prison labor is slave labor.