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I'd add to that list the fact that the US already imprisons more people that any other nation. The last thing we need to incentivize longer prison sentences by granting prisons lucrative contacts for slave labor. It's not just the private "for profit" prisons that take money in exchange for making prisoners work for private companies, public prisons do as well.

> why prisoners?

Offset tax-burden incurred by their incarceration.

Private companies profiteering on prison labor is a different story.

> It is not cool to devalue them by paying them less.

They're prisoners. Society has already devalued them.

> Offset tax-burden incurred by their incarceration.

I don't agree that this is a valid justification. I pay taxes that go to funding the department of education despite never "participating" in any direct department of education activity. We don't make parents "offset" that cost when they send kids to public school (no, we make the teachers do that by forcing them to use their own money to buy chalk), why should we make a prisoner suddenly be more responsible for a tax burden carried by all of society? This is creating a "separate tax class," in my mind, which defeats the purpose entirely. We all pay in, we all benefit, we all use what we can/need/want of the system (minus the glaring deficiencies).

> They're prisoners. Society has already devalued them.

We agree. I think that it's bad to devalue them.

> I don't agree that this is a valid justification. I pay taxes that go to funding the department of education despite never "participating" in any direct department of education activity. We don't make parents "offset" that cost when they send kids to public school (no, we make the teachers do that by forcing them to use their own money to buy chalk), why should we make a prisoner suddenly be more responsible for a tax burden carried by all of society? This is creating a "separate tax class," in my mind, which defeats the purpose entirely. We all pay in, we all benefit, we all use what we can/need/want of the system (minus the glaring deficiencies).

There are a number of separate tax classes as well as fees. Income tax, property tax, sales tax, registration fees, etc. We implement these for policy reasons. I'm guessing that the previous poster believes it's good policy to have the incarcerated pay for themselves where you do not. I think the idea of "separate tax classes" being bad on its own is pretty thoroughly disagreed with in most countries.

I think of it as simply charging them for room-and-board.

Perhaps it would appear less egregious if we paid them a fair wage and then immediately made them pay most of it back?

> We agree. I think that it's bad to devalue them.

I never stated my opinion on that devaluation, and I don't believe we do agree.

And if they refuse to work, and pay?

Does a jail in California require a greater rent than one in Alabama? What if the minimum wage doesn't match, do we make the prisoner go into debt to continue uh, their "lease?" Do they get better conditions if they pay more? Can they just not work and leverage their pre-incarceration assets to pay? Now that they're renters, do they get renter's protection under law? Via what mechanism - who enforces? What if there's cockroaches, they're paying, do they get to Lodge a complaint? Who decides the rent? What's to stop a prison setting a rent price that requires 18 hours hard labor to match?

Why do you think it's acceptable to devalue a human? What measures do you apply to that devaluing algorithm? In your mind, who is the most "valuable," and least "valuable" human?

> And if they refuse to work, and pay?

They find themselves without spare income and a constructive usage of their time.

I do believe some prison systems, I want to say Angola has something along these lines, use work-history as a test for certain privileges and or use punitive measures. These are probably not quite productive, particularly the punitive, but at the same time I think finding a way to incentive work is a good thing.

To be honest, I can't quite understand why something as benign a wage garnishment (tax?) against convicted criminals income is a controversial subject. Is the current system optimal? No, prisoners could probably use a bit of an increase in earnings such that they could establish a reasonable "nest egg" for their return to the real world.

I'm sorry that I don't see this as a moralistic boolean as you appear to, but levying penalties on a criminal is not wrong. Doing so in an overly punitive manner that doesn't serve society's best interest is another matter.

> levying penalties on a criminal is not wrong

The penalties levied on the criminal are encapsulated in the prison sentence itself. Anything beyond that has been added at the whim of the state, not by the legal actions of a judge or jury.

> not by the legal actions of a judge or jury.

You're right, it's not by the legal actions of the judge and jury. It's by the legal actions of the legislature and enforced by the executive branch.

> Offset tax-burden incurred by their incarceration.

Prisoners should be a tax burden. That way, there's no incentive to conveniently round up more prisoners every time the local town needs more free labor.

http://theconversation.com/exploiting-black-labor-after-the-...

> The living conditions of leased convicts are documented in dozens of detailed, firsthand reports spanning decades and covering many states. In 1883, Blackmon writes, Alabama prison inspector Reginald Dawson described leased convicts in one mine being held on trivial charges, in “desperate,” “miserable” conditions, poorly fed, clothed, and “unnecessarily chained and shackled.” He described the “appalling number of deaths” and “appalling numbers of maimed and disabled men” held by various forced-labor entrepreneurs spanning the entire state.

Well they still are a tax-burden. It's just offsetting that burden, so your criteria is still satisfied :)

> In 1883,

I'm not saying the modern penal system isn't without need for reform, but using an example from the 18th Century isn't helping your argument here.

Yes, it very much it is okay. They're living cost-free at the taxpayer's expense because of crimes they committed against society. It's absolutely okay to pay them nothing for their labor since the cost to society they've already incurred greatly dwarfs the value of any stolen wages.

They're not "living cost free at taxpayer's expense," they're being locked in a small room with a vast majority of their autonomy removed. That's the punishment.

They're not the only ones at fault. Society failed them as well, and must carry that burden as well. It would have been more efficient to do so by funding excellent education programs but instead we decided to do so by creating a bloated justice system. So it goes.

What cost to society did the man jailed with 3g of marijuana incur? The one that robbed a Walmart of a flat screen? Enough to justify all the things I illustrated above? Nope, because the jury and judge and legislators set down and handed down the sentence and have no visibility into a further form of punishment arbitrarily set by the prison in the form of lesser wages.

How about this: via what framework shall a prisoner's working hours and pay be set? Let's say the man jailed for a DWI, and the woman jailed for selling marijuana. Shall the DWI be paid 1$, or 2$ per hour, and the dealer 3$ because the "cost to society" was less? How did you calculate that? Oh also, can the prisoners be forced to work? How shall we fit that into sentencing?