At $249 per day, prison stays leave ex-inmates deep in debt • Hacker News Board

Re: At $249 per day, prison stays leave ex-inmates deep in debt

#371

Post by illuminerdy » Mon, Aug 29, 2022, 6:51 PM UTC

TomSwirly wrote: post #347

illuminerdy wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It taught me a serious lesson about the law: They exist only for power and profit. I understand your frustration, but the law does not exist ONLY (or at all, if I'm being honest) for power and profit. The law exists to provide each person with a baseline to guide their interactions, whether it be between them and other individuals, or between them and their government. Now, obviously you have abuses and especially…

> That's just a symptom of a lack of oversight by we, the people (chiefly). So your argument is that it is not the fault of the people who are paid to do this job, out of our tax money, but it is somehow our fault, even though your average person has literally no input whatsoever into any of this? That's just false. I mean, almost 90% of Americans live in a non-swing state where their vote is entirely meaningless.

No post body was provided.

Re: At $249 per day, prison stays leave ex-inmates deep in debt

#372

Post by tastyfreeze » Mon, Aug 29, 2022, 8:43 PM UTC

encryptluks2 wrote: post #345

tastyfreeze wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They already have the education if they are in debt. Time to pay it off like everybody else.

That restricts their options to find work that adequately utilizes their education.

I'm not following. Being in debt restricts what jobs are available?

A student takes a loan to get an education. When taking the loan they agreed to the terms which includes paying it back. There is no stipulation in the loan agreement on what jobs they take to pay back the loan. Being in debt does not change what jobs are available.

Re: At $249 per day, prison stays leave ex-inmates deep in debt

#373

Post by dgeiser13 » Tue, Aug 30, 2022, 2:54 PM UTC

kortilla wrote: post #359

dgeiser13 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe you are wrong about for-profit prisons. It is 100% the reason that the US has so many incarcerated. Any time you can get government to foot the bill for something cottage industries will spring up around it.

> It is 100% the reason that the US has so many incarcerated. Any time you can get government to foot the bill for something cottage industries will spring up around it. That doesn’t make sense. Building a prison in itself doesn’t induce crime nor does it induce prison sentences. Judges and juries have no quotas to fill based on vacancy.

I don't think you realize how corrupt the whole thing is.

https://www.npr.org/2022/08/18/1118108084/michael-conahan-ma...

Re: At $249 per day, prison stays leave ex-inmates deep in debt

#374

Post by michaelmrose » Thu, Sep 01, 2022, 5:22 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #323

michaelmrose wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The people running the prisons give money to politicians, judges, sheriff's who are elected and make and enforce the laws. In one instance 2 judges were being bribed directly to sentence juveniles to maximimum sentences cutting out the middleman and directly selling minority children into slavery like it's 1822 rather than 2022. You actually don't see the moral hazard here?

> The people running the prisons give money to politicians, judges, sheriff's who are elected and make and enforce the laws. under this interpretation you should probably ban police/correctional officers as well, because they have the same moral hazard. Same goes for anyone else that is involved in institutions that profit off human suffering (eg. hospitals).

In the prior example you considered the separation between lawmaker, prosecutor, and jailer sufficient to provide objectivity in theory ignoring while making no study of the actuality where money flows from prison companies directly to lawmakers.

Now you make a spurious connection between prison and hospital because I guess suffering happens in both institutions? Yes in theory EVERY institution may advocate for positions that advance their interests over the populace but none other is so odious as to advocate for more people to be in chains so they may directly trade the hours and years of their lives for gold nor selling the labor of the slaves it has so corruptly acquired by advocating for greater bondage.

It seems to me obvious that police officers, correction officers, and hospital staff are all absolutely necessary for the function of our society. Having private prisons which only house 8% of inmates at this time absolutely isn't.