Hazardous Jobs

Did you know that in the USA prisoners are involved in highly hazardous Jobs?

From Fighting Wildfires to Digging Graves, Incarcerated Workers Face Danger on the Job | Vera Institute

A family member was in prison for a DUI. He trained to be and worked as a wildland firefighter during some of the most horrific fires that hit California that year.

He did this dangerous work because he was promised a job when he got out.

Guess what happened when he got out?
There were no jobs for him.

Yeah... He fell into a deep depression and died of a drug overdose.

And somehow I'm not seeing many people stepping up to express a problem with employing prisoners this way.

What do you think about this topic?
Want to chat about it?

 

Unfortunately for decades, centuries and millennia, nations and groups have used prisoners for indentured servants, if not outright slave labor.
We're actually doing better these days altogether than the past.

For example, the movie, Brubaker...a Robert Redford movie where he plays a new warden finding out the abuses in a prison in the deep south of the US.

Just a easy victim to many, and the prisoners often have no choice...or the choices given to them are incredibly poor...a no win situation, other than a ounce of pay and get out of the jailcell. (maybe a chance to escape too, to be real)

It's just like the famous speech by the boss in Cool Hand Luke...a sardonic turn of phrasing, if one has ever heard it...and says it all, inbetween the lines.

It's a topic worth talking about.

At least, if people do talk...then it makes them aware and reminds them...and something better can happen in the future, if even just to vote reformers in or put them in office.
Baby steps...even to this day.

Hell, much of the American prison system is setup to be a "for profit" entity, literal and LEGAL by current laws.
Who do you think they're making the $$$ off of? Businesses using "cheap labor".

This is the dark side of humanity.

 

Yes, it's disgusting that Goodwill does this.

 

I'm not so interested in the incarcerated having to work to pay their costs, which just keeps them poor.

I am a fan of companies that get extras (tax breaks and other incentives) to hire former incarcerated folks to help them get started outside the prison. My uncle's garment factory had lots of felons who worked for them and they were some of the best workers because they understood the opportunity given them.