"What we've got here is ... failure to germinate"
May seem to be a good idea, but I’ll bet that the prisons are full of slackers. It would probaly take three of them to do the work of one Mexican.
There is no shortage of farmer workers, there is a shortage of farmers who wish to hire honest legal labor. There are 14 different federal programs to allow legal imported labor, but then that costs more than off the book illegal labor.
They built roads and stuff back in the 1920’ didn’t they? If there are any union jobs though watch them squeal. “We don’t want to do that work but then neither can you”
As if they all HAVE permanent jobs.
And at night the chain gangs can have egg eating contests. Great stuff!
When I was a kid we lived in a house that was surrounded by Southern Michigan prison farms. It wasn’t unusual for us to play in the yard just a few yards from inmates baling hay. There was a guard with a shotgun leaning against the fence talking to my dad.
There were no problems till they started trusting the inmates to go out and work with no supervision. Then a man and his wife died at the hands of a man named Harden Bey who took what he wanted, stepped back over the fence, finished his workday and went back to his cell.
We use prisoners for roadwork here in Florida. They are non-violent offenders and are closely supervised. However, those are state projects.
But farmworkers would be working for private businesses, and IIRC, convict leasing was outlawed several years ago.
In any case, immigrants don’t require state officers to supervise them (which is necessary if you have prisoners) and they usually have a better work ethic than our domestic criminal population.
That said, IMHO, the solution for farm work is short-term visas - lots of them - for people from the continental Americas.
As for prisoners, I think they could be used more heavily in state projects, because they might actually learn some skills and think about doing something other than making meth. But this would require changes in state laws.
Prison labor on certain state projects works well in Florida and throughout the South, and I’ve never understood why it’s not done in other states.
You don’t want convicts scoping out your place...bad idea for private enterprise. Use them on public projects, closely supervised.
Prisoners should work, but it should be to reduce the cost of their upkeep - laundry, meals, landscaping, etc.
The last thing we want is to create a situation where profits can be made from incarcerated labor. Imagine what would happen - in terms of lobbying, and corruption - if GE, or Monsanto, for example, could use convict labor. It would be a slippery slope. We’d slide down it fast.
"What we've got here is ... failure to germinate"
Warden Burl Cain in Louisiana has the Angola facility almost self sufficient. The inmates raise cattle and crops, with much of the production processed and consumed there, but surplus is sold to pay for what must be purchased.
This is all on the facility as Angola has Louisiana’s hard cases, but the principle works.
Prison Labor: It's More than Breaking Rocks (how about letting prisoners pick our lettuce)
Hmmmm....in the 1940’s-50’s my husband’s grandfather would go to the closest major city and hire guys to pick apples....needless to say, it didn’t work out too well...he’d find them drunk in the orchard.....in the early 60’s...he found people who would work...Mexicans....who would come just for the season and then leave. The problem now is...they don’t leave....
I suppose if they handle it like they do prison road/project crews (CHAIN GANGS), with someone standing over them for the whole time, it MIGHT work...but, me thinks pretty soon there might be some pretty HUNGRY people willing to do a little more work...we’ll see. And, like someone else said...having convicts hanging out on a 100 acre orchard doesn’t probably make sense...too easy to “get lost and cause trouble.”
“The director of the American Probation and Parole Association told Bloomberg that the temporary nature of agricultural work makes it unsuitable for people on criminal probation who need to rebuild their lives in a more permanent job”
They have trouble getting jobs at all so not a bad idea.
Think it’s a great idea as well.
ACLU and the professional grievence & racism mongers won’t like it at all.
Anytime a “minority” would be involved, they would yelling that it’s slavery time.
Watched a very funny movie last night called LIFE. Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence.
“You mess with me there’s gonna’ be consequences and repurcussions.” - Ray Gibson
Um, not.
Though I don't support illegal-immigrant labor, the Confederacy was illustration enough that forced labor was not a good economic model. Now, all that said, having prisoners perform actual work may be worthwhile; just don't expect it to replace what we call the "free" market for good reason.
I do too.
The ag dept rep said on the news these cons will be paid $12 to $15 per hour.
I find it incredulous in this economy the farmers in S Ga can’t get all the labor they need for those kind of wages.