the Prison Industry of America

[stillcool]

Over two thirds of the felons convicted in State courts were sentenced to prison or jail.

http://www.engaged-zen.org/articles/Kobutsu-Investing_in_Slavery.html
The Prison Industrial Complex in America: Investment in Slavery
by Venerable Kobutsu Malone, Osho
The United States Constitution Permits Prison Slavery and Involuntary Servitude
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The secure housing, minimal support, minimal medical care and feeding of 2.2 million people is a costly endeavor consuming billions and billions of dollars of taxpayer's money every year in America. Corporations are lined up to receive a portion of the public funds used to support the self-perpetuating incarceration industry. States such as California spend more public funds, tax dollars, your money, my money, on prisons than for education and schools
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Indeed, the correctional-industrial complex has been in such an accelerated boom cycle that J. Robert Lilly and Paul Knepper report that in 1986 Adtech Incorporated spun-off two subsidiary operations, the Correctional Development Corporation and American Detention Services Incorporated, and then in 1988 acquired Steel Door Industries, with the end result that profits rose from $10.3 million in 1987 to a remarkable $21.6 million in 1989. This doubling of profits is dwarfed by the 500% profit-growth over a five year period shown by Space Master Enterprises Incorporated (builders of pre-fabricated prison cells), which leapt from $12 million in 1982 to $60 million in 1987.

The largest network of prison labor is run by the Federal Bureau of Prisons' manufacturing consortium, UNICOR. While paying inmate laborers entry-level wages of 23 cents an hour, UNICOR boasts of gross annual sales (primarily to the Department of Defense) of $250 million.

The correctional-industrial complex therefore relies on a sobering "joint venture" directly relating profits to increased incarceration rates for four kinds of "partners," only the first of whom are those seeking opportunities in prison construction. A second kind of partner stocks these prisons with stun guns, pepper spray, surveillance equipment, and other "disciplinary technology," corporations such as Adtech, American Detention Services, the Correctional Corporation of America and Space Master Enterprises. A third partner finds a state-guaranteed mass of consumers for food and other services in the prisoners themselves, such as Campbell's Soup and Szabo Correctional Services. The fourth partner can be any private industry or state-sponsored program that stands to gain from paying wages that only nominally distinguish captive forced labor from slavery. In this last category, an example of the former is Prison Blues and of the latter is UNICOR which uses prisoners to produce advanced military weaponary.

Captive Labor
America's Prisoner's As Corporate Workforce
By Gordon Lafer The American Prospect, 1 September 1999
http://www.postcarbon.org/node/2244
When most of us think of convicts at work, we picture them banging out license plates or digging ditches. Those images, however, are now far too limited to encompass the great range of jobs that America's prison workforce is performing. If you book a flight on TWA, you'll likely be talking to a prisoner at a California correctional facility that the airline uses for its reservations service. Microsoft has used Washington State prisoners to pack and ship Windows software. AT&T has used prisoners for telemarketing; Honda, for manufacturing parts; and even Toys "R" Us, for cleaning and stocking shelves for the next day's customers.

During the past 20 years, more than 30 states have enacted laws permitting the use of convict labor by private enterprise. While at present only about 80,000 U.S. inmates are engaged in commercial activity, the rapid growth in America's prison population and the attendant costs of incarceration suggest there will be strong pressures to put more prisoners to work. And it's not hard to figure what corporations like about prison labor: it's vastly cheaper than free labor. In Ohio, for example, a Honda supplier pays its prison workers $2 an hour for the same work for which the UAW has fought for decades to be paid $20 to $30 an hour. Konica has hired prisoners to repair its copiers for less than 50 cents an hour. And in Oregon, private companies can "lease" prisoners for only $3 a day.

But the attractions of prison labor extend well beyond low wages. The prison labor system does away with statutory protections that progressives and unions have fought so hard to achieve over the last 100 years. Companies that use prison labor create islands of time in which, in terms of labor relations at least, it's still the late nineteenth century. Prison employers pay no health insurance, no unemployment insurance, no payroll or Social Security taxes, no workers' compensation, no vacation time, sick leave, or overtime. In fact, to the extent that prisoners have "benefits" like health insurance, the state picks up the tab. Prison workers can be hired, fired, or reassigned at will. Not only do they have no right to organize or strike; they also have no means of filing a grievance or voicing any kind of complaint whatsoever. They have no right to circulate an employee petition or newsletter, no right to call a meeting, and no access to the press. Prison labor is the ultimate flexible and disciplined workforce.

All of these conditions apply when the state administers the prison. But the prospect of such windfall profits from prison labor has also fueled a boom in the private prison industry. Such respected money managers as Allstate, Merrill Lynch, and Shearson Lehman have all invested in private prisons. As with other privatized public services, companies that operate private prisons aim to make money by operating corrections facilities for less than what the state pays them. If they can also contract prisoners out to private enterprises—forcing inmates to work either for nothing or for a very small fraction of their "wages" and pocketing the remainder of those "wages" as corporate profit—they can open up a second revenue stream. That would make private prisons into both public service contractors and the highest-margin temp agencies in the nation.
http://www.postcarbon.org/node/2244

Toxic Recycling
by ELIZABETH GROSSMAN
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20051121/grossman
Research support for this article was provided by the Investigative Fund of The Nation Institute.

About ten miles northwest of Merced, amid the dairy farms and orchards of California's San Joaquin Valley, sits the Atwater Federal Penitentiary, its tower and low-slung buildings the same mustard yellow as the dry fields that stretch out beyond the chain-link fence and concertina wire toward the Sierra Nevadas. Inside this maximum-security prison, inmates smash computer monitors with hammers, releasing dust that contains lead, cadmium, barium and other toxic substances. These inmates are employed by the electronics recycling division of Federal Prison Industries (better known as UNICOR). With sales that have nearly tripled since 2002, electronics recycling is UNICOR's fastest-growing business. But according to reports from prisons where this work is being done and interviews with former inmates employed by UNICOR, it's taking place under conditions that pose serious hazards to prison staff and inmates--and, ultimately, to the rest of America and the world.
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"UNICOR's program is labor intensive, so capital machinery and equipment expenses are minimized, this helps keep prices low," says a company brochure. With a captive workforce UNICOR's electronics recycling program can afford to be labor intensive. Because it is run by the Bureau of Prisons, UNICOR does not have to pay minimum wages--recent wages were $0.23 to $1.15 an hour--or provide benefits. Though UNICOR is not taxpayer supported, its pay scale would not be possible without taxpayer support of the inmates.

Key financials for Federal Prison Industries, Inc.
Company Type Government Agency
Fiscal Year-End September
2005 Sales (mil.) $833.6
1-Year Sales Growth (5.2%)
2005 Net Income (mil.) $64.5
1-Year Net Income Growth 1.4%
2005 Employees 19,720
1-Year Employee Growth 2.0%

CEO Harley G. Lappin
COO Steve Schwalb
Controller Bruce Long

HARLEY G. LAPPIN
DIRECTOR
FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS
Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons on April 4, 2003. He is a career public administrator in the Federal Bureau of Prisons and the seventh Director of the Bureau since its establishment in 1930. He is responsible for the oversight and management of the Bureau’s 114 institutions and for the safety and security of the more than 193,500 inmates under the agency’s jurisdiction.

http://www.unicor.gov/
The Services Business Group has a full range of services to meet your labor needs. Our goal is to be the #1 source for services to Federal Government, federal contractors, and commercial firms.
Fleet Management & Vehicular Components
Federal Prison Industries provides a full array of customized fleet modernization programs ranging from tactical vehicle & vehicular components remanufacturing (RESET), commercial vehicle upfitting and de-retrofitting to web-based fleet asset services for fleets ranging from fifty to thousands of vehicles.FPI has been a premium provider of fleet management and vehicular components remanufacturing services to the federal government since 1997. It has a unique understanding of the federal environment working closely with Armed Services, Defense Department and Homeland Defense agencies and broad experience across DoD and civilian agency fleets.
The Industrial Products Business Group provides a diverse product offering.

The Office Furniture Business Group offers a full range of office furniture options,
from reception areas to executive suites.

UNICOR's unique, full service recycling program is an integrated part of a national e-scrap solution. UNICOR's commitment to the environment extends to its vendors, who are required to sign no-landfill certifications, follow a restrictive export policy, and agree to site inspections.
The Clothing and Textiles Business Group provides a wide assortment of products from a variety of materials. These include products for medical, military apparel, law enforcement, and lodging needs.
UNICOR/FPI Electronics Group
UNICOR/FPI's nationwide network of factories are fully equipped and staffed to manufacture electronics and electrical products for the most demanding military, federal agency and commercial us

Blockhouse/UNICOR Partnership
Blockhouse Inc.- A manufacturer and marketer of dormitory and quarters furniture, will be UNICOR's agent for sales and marketing, field representation, customer service, delivery coordination and scheduling, invoicing, performing installation, GSA packaged room, and collaboration on advertising and ongoing product development for dormitory and quarters furniture.
Filtration Services, Inc.Filtration Services is an industrial filter distributor and filtration service company. We have over 10 years experience representing 6 major manufacturer's product lines. In addition to servicing offices, schools, medical facilities, manufacturing and painting operations; we recently teamed with UNICOR to provide federal government facilities throughout the U.S. with office and commercial air filter services meeting requirements unique to federal government sites
Nightingale - Since 1928, Nightingale's mission is to design and manufacture office seating solutions that are extremely comfortable, ergonomic, affordable, and are build to last with quality materials and workmanship. The design award winning XO Series of office chairs offers a new standard for ergonomic mesh seating.
HumanScale - Their mission is to design and manufacture products that encourage computer users to adopt low-risk body postures - creating a healthier, more comfortable and more productive work environment. The freedom office chair offers a revolutionary advancement in the area of ergonomic seating.
OEI - Office systems furniture specialists, offering product lines from basic workstations to designer components, in up-to-date fabrics and privacy paneling.
Titmus Brand Prescription Eyewear Frames Titmus is the largest manufacturer of prescription protective eyewear in the world. Since 1958, Titmus has produced prescription and safety prescription frames in fashionable, yet durable styles. UNICOR manufactures prescription lenses and then assembles lenses and frames. Various quality checks are completed before shipping prescription glasses. Titmus also maintains a nationwide network of over 5,000 Optometrists which is available to UNICOR's customers for selecting frame styles and fitting.
Systems 290 Signage-2/90 Sign Systems is the flexible response to the demand for modular interior and exterior facility signage.

This is from a dated Congressional Hearing, sorry...I forgot to add the date but thought the mandated Board of Directors was interesting

STATEMENT OF JOSEPH M. ARAGON, CHAIRMAN, BOARD OF DIRECTORS, UNICOR, FEDERAL PRISON INDUSTRIES, PRESIDENT, ProServ CORP., AURORA, COLORADO

Mr. Aragon. Good morning, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the opportunity to be here to provide the Federal Prison Industries Board of Director's perspective on these matters.
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Again, thank you very much for the opportunity to speak here today. I want to offer particular thanks to two Congressmen from my home state of Colorado. Mr. Schaffer, and Mr. Tancredo, who I am proud to say is my Congressman, thank you for being here, sirs. Mr. Chairman, I will refer to Federal Prison Industries as either FPI or our trade name, UNICOR.

I serve as the Chairman of FPI's Board of Directors, a board that the President of the United States appointed me to approximately 6 years ago. By way of introduction, let me first provide with you a brief overview of the Board of Directors. Pursuant to Federal statute, FPI's Board of Directors is composed of six members representing industry, labor, agriculture, retailers and consumers, the Secretary of Defense and the Attorney General. The board consists of a wide variety of accomplished individuals each of whom have been appointed by this President and serve without compensation.
http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/edu/hedo&i6-133.000/hedo&i6-133.htm

A Report on the Injustice System in the USA
Written by: Pauline (a contributing writer to IPFG’s Publication; Payaam Fadaee)
Published in Payame Fadaee, Spring edition 2002
http://www.ashrafdehghani.com/articles-english/on%20prison.htm
The US ruling class has established the largest forced labour sweatshop system in the world. There are now approximately 2 million inmates in US prisons compared to 1 million in 1994. These prisoners have become a source of billions of dollars in profits. In fact, the US has imprisoned a half million more people than in China which has 5 times the population. California alone has the biggest prison system in the Western industrialized world. It has more prisoners than France, Germany, Great Britain, Japan and Holland combined while these countries have 11 times the population of California. According to official figures, Iran incarcerates 220 citizens per 100,000, compared to US figures of 727. Overall, the total "criminal justice" system in the US, including those in prison, on parole and on probation, is approaching 6,000,000. In the last 20 years, 1000 new prisons have been built; yet they hold double their capacity.

Prisoners, 75% of who are either Black or Hispanic, are forced to work for 20 cents an hour, some even as low as 75 cents a day. They produce everything from eyewear and furniture to vehicle parts and computer software. This has lead to thousands of layoffs and the lowering of the overall wage scale of the entire working class. At Soledad Prison in California, prisoners produce work-shirts exported to Asia as well as El Salvadoran license plates more cheaply than in El Salvador, one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere. A May/99 report in the Wall Street Journal summarized that while “more expensive private-sector workers may lose their jobs to prison labour, assigning work to the most cost-efficient producer is good for the economy.” The February/00 Wall Street Journal reported “Prisoners are excluded from employment calculation. And since most inmates are economically disadvantaged and unskilled, jailing so many people has effectively taken a big block of the nation's least-employable citizens out of the equation.”

Federal Prison Industries (FPI) whose trade name is UNICOR exports prisoner-made products as well as selling them to all federal agencies as required by federal law. FPI manufactures over 150 different products in 99 factories in 64 prisons (with 19 new ones on the way) in 30 states. It is the federal government's 35th largest contractor, just behind IBM and is exempt from any federal workplace regulations.
FPI's prison workforce produces 98% of the entire US market for equipment assembly services, 93% of paint and artist brushes, 92% of all kitchen assembly services, 46% of all personal armour, 36% of all household furnishings and 30% of all headset/microphone/speakers, etc. RW. Feb/00 FPI consistently advertises for companies "interested in leasing a ready-to-run prison industry" especially following congressional testimony in 1996 that reported a "pent-up demand for prison labour." Meanwhile, shareholders profiting from prison labour consistently lobby for the legislation of longer prison sentences in order to expand their workforce. At least 37 states have legalized the contracting out of prison labour to private corporations that have already set up operations inside state prisons. Prisons' business clients include: IBM, Boeing, Motorola Microsoft, AT&T Wireless, Texas Instruments, Dell, Compaq, Honeywell, Hewlett-Packard, Nortel, Lucent Technologies, 3Com, Intel, Northern Telecom, TWA, Nordstrom, Revlon, Macys, Pierre Cardin, Target Stores, etc.
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California, with the third largest penal system in the world after China and the US as a whole, spends more on prisons than on the entire educational system. In recent years, California's university and college system cut back 8,000 employees while its Department of Corrections added 26,000. CA has built 19 prisons vs. 1 university in the past 10 years. The state spends up to $60,000 per year to incarcerate a young person, while only spending $8,000 per year to educate the same youth. Politicians in the state debate whether the death penalty should be applied to 13-year-olds or whether it should be applied "only" to those 14 and up. And new proposals to construct mega-prisons that would hold up to 20,000 inmates each is ‘justified’ by David Myers, West Coast regional president of the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the largest private prison corporation in the US. He told a reporter that he is building 3 new prisons entirely on speculation because "If you build it in the right place, the prisoners will come. RW. Dec/00 In 1994, California passed a "three strikes and you're out" law. That law alone led to the need for 20 new prisons just to handle the increase in inmates. Over 30,000 people in CA have been sentenced to double the normal sentence under the "second-strike" provision of the law and the California Department of Corrections has published statistics documenting 62% of third-strike convictions are for non-violent offences. During the 17 years leading up to 1994 (when three strikes went into effect), the California legislature passed more than 1,000 bills lengthening sentences or defining new crimes. Not surprisingly, these same years showed a 600% increase in California's prison population - from 19,000 to 159,000 where over 70% of the prisoners are Black, Latino or of other oppressed nationalities. The law rules that two prior felony convictions mandates 25 years to life for a third conviction no matter what the prescribed sentence for that third offence. Third offenders have been given that sentence for shoplifting a pair of pants, stealing a bicycle or merely a piece of pizza. Between 1994-95, 24 states and the federal government itself followed CA’s example by also legislating the new "three strikes" laws. Among the victims of this relatively new law are 80% of the women in California's prisons who are there for non-violent offences including those at the prison complex at Chowchilla which according to California Prison Focus, is the largest women's prison in the world. In Dec/96, Human Rights Watch released a 347-page report documenting the sexual abuse of women in state prisons.

Prisoners Under State or Federal Jurisdiction
12/31/2004--U.S. Total ,"1,496,629"--Federal ,"180,328"--State ,"1,316,301"
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/p04.htm
Northeast ,"170,982
Connecticut,"19,497"
Maine ,"2,024"
Massachusetts,"10,144"
New Hampshire,"2,448"
New Jersey ,"26,757"
New York ,"63,751"
Pennsylvania ,"40,963"
Rhode Island,"3,430"
Vermont,"1,968"
Midwest ,"250,599"
Illinois ,"44,054"
Indiana,"24,008"
Iowa,"8,525"
Kansas,"8,966"
Michigan,"48,883
Minnesota,"8,758"
Missouri,"31,081"
Nebraska,"4,130",
North Dakota,"1,327"
Ohio,"44,806"
South Dakota ,"3,095"
Wisconsin,"22,966"
South ,"599,080",
Alabama,"25,887"
Arkansas,"13,807"
Delaware ,"6,927"
Dist. of Columbia/a,2004,2003,2002,2001,(2000-"7,456")
Florida,"85,533"
Georgia ,"51,104"
Kentucky ,"17,814"
Louisiana,"36,939"
Maryland ,"23,285"
Mississippi,"20,983"
North Carolina ,"35,434",
Oklahoma,"23,319"
South Carolina ,"23,428"
Tennessee,"25,884"
Texas ,"168,105",
Virginia ,"35,564",
West Virginia ,"5,067"
West ,"295,640"
Alaska ,"4,554"
Arizona,"32,515"
California,"166,556"
Colorado ,"20,293"
Hawaii,"5,960"
Idaho,"6,375",
Montana ,"3,877"
Nevada,"11,365"
New Mexico ,"6,379"
Oregon ,"13,183"
Utah ,"5,989",
Washington ,"16,614"
Wyoming,"1,980"
"Note: Definitions of terms and notes pertaining to individual jurisdictions can be found in ""Prisoners in 2004"" which can be located at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/p04.htm .",,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
--Responsibility for sentenced felons was transferred to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

In 1985 one out of every 320 Americans were in jail.
In 1995 one out of every 167 Americans were in jail.
Between1980 and 1994, the number of people in federal and state prisons increased 221%.
Today, 2 million Americans are in prison.
1.2 million are African-American men.

While there is debate over their underlying causes, these staggering statistics are generally thought to result from rigid drug laws, mandatory minimum sentences and increasingly tough legislation— such as California’s "three strikes" law. One fact remains undisputed: prisons have become big business.
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Prison Partners
In the tiny town of Lockhart, Texas a private prison run by Wakenhut (a for-profit private corporation) does business with a company called LTI. In this partnership the prisoners assemble circuit boards bound for hi-tech corporations. For LTI, moving manufacturing to the Lockhart prison was a no-brainer. There they found a captive workforce that did not require benefits or vacation pay, major tax incentives and a brand new assembly plant rented for only a symbolic fee. As a result, LTI’s plant in Austin, Texas was shut down and 150 people lost their jobs. In Michigan, through a similar arrangement, the majority of Brill Manufacturing Company’s workforce lost their jobs to state prison inmates.
http://www.itvs.org/shift/prison.html

Army Regulation 210–35
Installations
Civilian Inmate
Labor Program
AR 210–35
Civilian Inmate Labor Program
This rapid action revision dated 14 January 2005--
o Assigns responsibilities to Headquarters, Installation Management Agency
(para 1-4j).
o Makes administrative and editorial changes (throughout).
o Provides Army policy and guidance for establishing civilian inmate labor
programs and civilian prison camps on Army installations.
o Discusses sources of Federal and State civilian inmate labor.
http://www.illuminati-news.com/pdf/prison_camps.pdf