China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

[Thailandnotes]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

Much of the organically grown food in the US is grown or harvested by prison labor for instance.

I would appreciate a link for this. I'm aware of Whole Foods "prison tilapia," but can't find an article claiming widespread use of prison labor in organic farming. Thanks.

[oddlots]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

Gulp. Thanks. Will check it out.

[mesyn191]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

I would appreciate a link for this.

Can't find it now sorry, was an article from early 2010 I think, so it'd be reasonable to be skeptical about that.

Found this though while searching for it.

Prisoners earning 23 cents an hour in U.S. federal prisons are manufacturing high-tech electronic components for Patriot Advanced Capability 3 missiles, launchers for TOW (Tube-launched, Optically tracked, Wire-guided) anti-tank missiles, and other guided missile systems.
...
Prison labor — with no union protection, overtime pay, vacation days, pensions, benefits, health and safety protection, or Social Security withholding — also makes complex components for McDonnell Douglas/Boeing’s F-15 fighter aircraft, the General Dynamics/Lockheed Martin F-16, and Bell/Textron’s Cobra helicopter. Prison labor produces night-vision goggles, body armor, camouflage uniforms, radio and communication devices, and lighting systems and components for 30-mm to 300-mm battleship anti-aircraft guns, along with land mine sweepers and electro-optical equipment for the BAE Systems Bradley Fighting Vehicle’s laser rangefinder. Prisoners recycle toxic electronic equipment and overhaul military vehicles.

Labor in federal prisons is contracted out by UNICOR, previously known as Federal Prison Industries, a quasi-public, for-profit corporation run by the Bureau of Prisons. In 14 prison factories, more than 3,000 prisoners manufacture electronic equipment for land, sea and airborne communication. UNICOR is now the U.S. government’s 39th largest contractor, with 110 factories at 79 federal penitentiaries.
...

Long article but worth looking at.

[wayiwalk]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

I'm looking at the link in the post above, and it just doesn't pass the common sense test. Just 3,000 employees, much less 3,000 prisoners, turning out such a wide variety of sophisticated equipment? How could that actually take place? Are there 200 or 300 engineers and plant managers, clean room operators, etc, willing to work side by side with such folks?

[mesyn191]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

The prison labor is probably used as assembly line workers following a work plan with some specialized training. Same way iPods, Xbox's, and laptops are put together in a plant in China essentially. It may take rocket scientists to design and test the stuff but that sort of brain power isn't required to put the stuff together. Common sense, right?

[wayiwalk]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

FYI - I'm not suggesting you lacking common sense, sorry if that seemed implied, it wasn't intended. I'm looking at the link, it is a bit over the top and ties in many common left attacks on business, and is overlooking the costs added by trying to manufacture in such an environment. I don't think that it is really efficient to manufacture that way, particularly high tech products that have a short life cycle.

Lesser goods, like flooring of the Shaw industries, yes, that seems feasible. Nonetheless, this is an awful trend. I'm not bothered by manufacturing of items that only the state should be offering (like license plates, the classic example, or helping keep the roadside free of debris).

That said, I'd hate to see that I'm wrong. I would like to see a 60 minutes type of story on how these prison operations are set up, the nature of the facilities, the quality of health/safety (does OSHA inspect?).

I sure don't buy the notion that this provides training for these prisoners so they can enter the job market when they get out of prison.....are there really that many manufacturing jobs looking to hire them? Doubt it....but a convenient cover story.

This is just ugly.

[mesyn191]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

I'm looking at the link, it is a bit over the top and ties in many common left attacks on business, and is overlooking the costs added by trying to manufacture in such an environment.

Well apparently prison labor costs UNICOR around 5% a year most years, you can see for yourself in their financial report for 2010, it includes some info. from 2009 too. Even if they have to pay some of the management staff a bit more they more than make up the costs when they can pay most of their "employees" $.23 an hour and offer no benefits or anything at all really. If you read the article and see "common left attacks on business" than maybe that is just your bias effecting your perceptions.

I don't think that it is really efficient to manufacture that way, particularly high tech products that have a short life cycle.

Efficiency has nothing to do with it. Its all about profits. No one cares because its being done to prisoners who of course "deserve" punishment.

I'm not bothered by manufacturing of items that only the state should be offering (like license plates, the classic example, or helping keep the roadside free of debris).

One of the more subtle reasons why prison labor is bad is because it is usually used to under cut the rest of the work force. How the hell is anyone supposed to compete with a corporation that has a captive labor pool that can be paid hardly anything at all?

[Wharf.Rat]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

How about prisoners having access to your personal private information? From today's DHS Daily report...

January 31, Baltimore Sun – (Maryland) Auditors claim inmates had access to patient Social Security numbers. A Maryland corrections division that provides inmate labor has backed out of a data entry contract with the health department after state auditors found that prisoners had access to some patients’ personal information, which was supposed to have been redacted from documents, but occasionally was not. The findings were included in a Legislative Services report made public January 31, 3 months after Maryland Correctional Enterprises, an industry arm of the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services (DPSCS), ceased providing the services to the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DHMH). According to the report, DHMH used inmate labor to enter physician Medicaid reimbursement claims into a state database. Social Security numbers that appeared in the proper spot in the upper right corner of the forms were automatically redacted or "blacked out." But "infrequently, Social Security numbers for the recipient and/or the provider appeared in other locations on the form" and "remained accessible to the inmates," the report said. A DPSCS spokesman said in an e-mail that this occurred in roughly 3 out of 3,000 cases reviewed, when doctors’ offices mistakenly used a patient’s Social Security number as the account identifier. He said there was no evidence to suggest inmates even noticed the numbers, and he stressed that there was "strict security in the room where this data entry took place," including four cameras and supervisory staff. Source: http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2012-01-31/health/bs-md-inmates-medicaid-20120131_1_data-entry-inmate-labor-social-security-numbers

[Thailandnotes]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

Vermont Inmates Hide Image Of Pig On Police Decals

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/...decals?ps=cprs

[mesyn191]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

What does any of that have to do with prison labor abuse? C'mon guys stay on topic.

[Dave Stratman]

Re: China scolds US for use of prison labor, Or: Buffet/Berkshire squeaky clean image takes a hit from prison labor

What does any of that have to do with prison labor abuse? C'mon guys stay on topic.

My wife and I watched an excellent movie last week available from Netflix called "American Violet," based on a true story. In a small town in Texas in 2000, police SWAT teams, complete with helicopter, raid a black housing project. A large number of young men and some women are rounded up and charged with selling drugs near a school yard. A young mother of four small children is caught up in the raid, charged and jailed. Though she is quite innocent (as it seems are the others), the DA threatens her with 25 years in prison unless she accepts a guilty plea. She refuses to plead, though others do. It happens that the ACLU is looking for someone willing to risk all by challenging the DA. She does and eventually and dramatically wins.

The movie makes clear that the federal government makes its grants to the police force based on the rate of successful felony convictions; plea bargains are used to exert unbearable pressure on people who, though they may be quite innocent, feel trapped into pleading guilty. At the closing credits, the film states that at least 90% of the US prison population has been plea-bargained into prison and has never had a jury trial. (Doing some quick research, I found this piece by Paul Craig Roberts that puts the figure at 95% America's Injustice System Is Criminal by Paul Craig Roberts. ) This is all very sick, and seems to get us back to the slavery issue.