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Comment by thifhi | Hacker News Reader

I just checked the official annual budget for all of the penal institutions in Turkey. The 2022 budget is 3.2 Billion Liras[1] ($180M) for about 300.000 inmates in total. Dividing, you get about $600 per inmate per year! (and honestly it doesn't even sound that absurd considering the low cost of living here)

[1]: https://www.sbb.gov.tr/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/2022_Yili_...

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Incredible. Almost all of the money saved could be either returned to the taxpayer, or used to build houses for the poor on the 127 prison sites.

I’m pretty sure most British courts would consider it illegal to house prisoners in such conditions as are prevalent in most Turkish prisons.

And if reducing costs is your only goal. Well there are other options to get rid of criminals..

Or you could just them as free labor to build those house for the poor.

Turkey was an example, as was Greece, of a cheaper provider. The dividend would not be purely financial. It would be almost 130 large sites upon which to build housing for the poor. Conditions in UKs prisons have been internationally condemned. It would be an opportunity to improve conditions for the incarcerated, save money, and provide housing for the poor on reclaimed sites.

Turkish prisons are famous for abuses: https://stockholmcf.org/gross-human-rights-violations-contin...

Better example would be Norway or Netherlands: more expensive prisons, but least prisoners per capita: https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2014/04/the_netherlands_has_ex...

The point of prison system should be rehabilitation not keeping prisoners down for life.

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