To me if you pay prisoners a normal wage it would seem too much like a reward for breaking crime, given that we pay all their normal expenses as well.
Furthermore, as the article states, prison services are substandard or entirely missing. Either fix that and we can talk deductions above normal taxes or allow the prisoners to earn minimum wage or more and to keep their earnings.
It's not minimum wage. It's minimum wage plus room and board plus shitty food and healthcare. Even for someone young and healthy, albeit uneducated, a few years in prison could yield a nest egg. For someone with a chronic health condition, getting sentenced could be the smart move. (This is true even today, depending on your city and state.)
The price of prison labor, what companies and the government pay for it, should be no less than prevailing wages. Ideally, indexed to the county the prison is in. What the prisoner is paid out of that should deduct some amount, again ideally related to a local cost-of-living index, that goes into a rehabilitation fund.
minimum wage (but not really), shitty room, shitty food, shitty healthcare
Cons:
minimum wage (yeah, not really), shitty room, shitty food, shitty healthcare,
AND
- loss of freedom,
- loss of reputation,
- loss of privacy,
- no prospect of advancement,
- no raises,
- even shittier neighbors (on average),
- holidays without your family,
- almost impossible to get a job when you're out,
- no vacation or other time off,
- no or almost no sex or intimacy with your loved ones,
- being treated like shit every day,
- the threat of solitary,
- being in solitary,
I could go on, but why bother.
It’s crap that’s reality. But it’s true, and between the prison population and those folks, I would argue for prioritising the latter. (Naturally, it’s better to do both.)
You want to trade your freedom and clean criminals record for minimum wage plus room and board?
No sane person would do that.
Prisoners should receive their wages less income taxes. Anything else creates a moral hazard, as we have seen with prisons for profit.
That doesn’t mean wages could not be garnished if there is a judgement against the prisoner.
Then charge them for those living expenses. Pay them a normal wage for outside, and then charge them what it would cost to rent a tiny room you share with another person plus the real cost of a boiled egg plus a peanut butter sandwich. I imagine they'd end up with something like 90% of their wage left.
Truly better and more rewarding than being marginally poorer outside
They are not wards of the state nor are they locked up. That’s a huge win.
The correct solution isn’t to make prisoners more miserable, but to make everybody less miserable.