Educational Media Reviews Online

In the United States, three 500-bed prisons are built every week. Incarceration has become a booming business! To pay for these prisons, those who fund and administer them have become increasingly interested in turning them into profit making enterprises, or at the very least, far less expensive ones. Inmates are often denied basic rights and services as a result. This film examines this trend, and identifies how it started and what sustains it.

Many prisons are now run by private companies, which can provide incarceration services to the various governments they contract with at a relatively low cost. These companies are usually paid per prisoner they incarcerate. The more inmates they have the more they make! As a consequence, inmates are often transferred from a facility in their own state to one in another state, so as to fill empty beds there. That makes it difficult, if not impossible, for inmates to keep in touch with family members at home. More importantly, this preoccupation with filling beds encourages these companies to delay the release of eligible prisoners for days or weeks, just to keep their inmate counts high. Delays are usually blamed on “lost” paperwork. To increase profits inmates are often denied essential goods and services, including access to medical facilities. Such abuses are also common in publicly run prisons that are anxious to cut costs. In one county run jail, inmates live in spare, prison camp like conditions, and are actually charged for their incarceration! They leave jail owing money to the county, which they must eventually pay or face imprisonment again. Other government run prisons allow inmates to work for private companies, in the prison itself. Prisoners are paid minimum wage and have no benefits. The companies involved make great profits from this cheap labor, as does the government, which is paid for the inmate’s services. As a consequence however, many of the other employees of these companies lose their jobs. They’ve been replaced by inexpensive prison labor!

The United States has the highest rate of incarceration in the world. Prison building and imprisonment have increased, based on a belief that the nation’s crime rate is rising. That belief is mistaken however, as crime has actually dropped over the last several years, and is not statistically much different than it was 20 to 30 years ago. The makers of this film maintain that this misperception has been perpetuated by the various vested interests that profit from it. These include private prison companies, and politicians who woo voters by promising to “get tough” with criminals. They encourage an irrational fear of crime in the public mind, which results in more prisons being built and higher incarceration rates. This garners support for the politicians in question, and puts money into the pockets of private prison companies. This contention will no doubt be controversial, and some many argue it is one sided and unfair. Nevertheless, this film gives the viewer an interesting and disturbing insight into prison privatization, and other profit making enterprises in the American penal system.

This film is both well structured and well paced. It’s sound and picture qualities are good. There is no narration, but the viewer is kept well informed by many insightful interviews. All conversations are in English, and there are no subtitles. It will be useful to high school, undergraduate and graduate students, especially those studying criminal justice, political science or sociology.

Highly Recommended