Hacker News Reader

Comment by silassales | Hacker News Reader

You acting like those inmates didn't put themselves there? Oh I feel so bad for them that they made the choice to break the law.

View on HN

The law isn't some fixed thing that we, as a society, have no control over. If you read the history of the War on Drugs, we essentially criminalized a good chunk of what African Americans do, with the very thinly veiled purpose of oppression.

Okay and I very much agree that this is a problem, but that is an entirely different problem that needs to be addressed with a less corrupt law system. Not related to using prisoners to work instead of letting them rot in a cell.

No, it's highly interrelated. The ability for the judicial system to extract rents via prison labor alters the incentives for having and enforcing oppressive laws. Currently, forcing people to work on goat farms through threatening to imprison them is limited by economics - the police, prosecutors, etc only have so much resources, and the marginal prisoner costs the system money. When that's no longer true, things can end up dystopian in a hurry.

Sure, the inmates may "deserve" to be in prison but they're also human beings and NOT slaves.

It is morally unacceptable that anyone can profit from slave labor in a free country. Moreover, it also hurts honest businesses who are required to pay their workers normal wages.

What about the argument that they are provided "free to them" food, shelter and clothing? And therefore them working for very small amounts of money, is really them paying for those things.

If the people don't want to provide things to folks imprisoned, the state should look into ways to keep folks from being imprisoned. It won't stop all of it - but at that point, prison is more of a public service.

Change laws and punishments so that fewer crimes result in jail time or removal from the workforce, for example. Especially for non-violent crimes. Improve conditions for poor folks, the mentally ill, and so on.

Who is profiting here?

Haystack Mountain, every business in its sales channels and whoever else buys goat milk made by people earning $1/day.

No, the prison uses the money they make from the sales for the prison, that was in the article. Haystack would still have bought the milk for standard price, and sell their cheese at standard price. The extra money from the cheap labor when into the prison itself.

No, I think crispyambulance is right. The article said every other local supplier closed doors, so Haystack couldn't have bought the milk at that price.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com