Socialist Action /November 1999
Factories in the Prisons
By SHIRLEY PASHOLK
Whether from Karl Marx's "Capital" or Charles Dickens' novels
and their many theatrical adaptations, most of us have formed pictures of
the old English work houses. In the United States, 19th century chain gangs
labored in fields and gravel quarries.
Even in the 1960s, it was common to see chain gangs working on Southern
roads. (There's even a rock song still popular on oldies stations about
the men working on the chain gang.) It was in response to the mass civil
rights movement that this practice ended.
During the early part of this century, prison factories making products
for private companies flourished despite complaints from labor and competing
manufacturers. Prisoners were frequently used as strikebreakers-probably
the best known example being the miners' strike in Coal Creek, Tenn. The
labor upsurge of the 1930s pressured Congress and the state legislatures
to pass laws outlawing private use of prison labor.
In 1979, as part of the assault on labor by big business and its bipartisan
political servants, Congress lifted the ban on interstate transportation
of prison-made goods. Similarly, chain gangs have returned in a number of
states in recent years.
The popular notion of prison labor is the manufacture of license plates,
road signs, and items for the prison itself. In Ohio, 200 prisoners, making
40 cents to 72 cents an hour, make 2.5 million license plates and 3 million
temporary 30-day stickers annually.
Prison industry generates over $40 million in annual sales in Ohio. For
an average rate of 47 cents an hour, prisoners recycle laser printing cartridges,
refurbish computers, and make soap, shoes, clothes, office furniture, mulch,
false teeth, and eyeglasses. About 25 percent of these products are used
by the prison system; most of the rest are used by the state of Ohio.
The Nov. 16, 1997, Cleveland Plain Dealer described the scene at one
Ohio prison: "Inside a huge, dimly lit garage, men are fitting shiny
new dump trucks with snow plows and salt spreaders. But these mechanics
aren't your average grease monkeys. They are sex offenders, drug addicts
and armed robbers imprisoned at the Chillicothe Correctional Institution.
"The work they do will save the Ohio Department of Transportation
about $8000 to $10,000 per truck."
Unicor, the federal prison industries, makes road signs, missile components,
military blankets and supplies, mailbags, and executive furniture for government
offices. In Delaware, prisoners making 15 cents an hour helped build a new
prison.
However, customers aren't limited to government agencies. At an April
10, 1997, forum on prison labor in Youngstown, Ohio, Peter Gilmore, editor
of UE News, explained, "Prisons are changing from correctional centers
to profit centers."
In 1997, the Correctional Industries Association projected that within
three years, 30 percent of state and federal prisoners would work, yielding
$8-9 billion in annual sales.
Although Ohio Prison Industries bowed to public pressure and stopped
contracting with Weaster, Inc. to make wipers and lighting switches for
the non-unionized Honda plant, it still makes toys and rakes and provides
such services as data entry and coupon sorting.
Prisoners once again used as strikebreakers
Just as at Coal Creek, prisoners are again used as strikebreakers. In
1986, when TWA flight attendants went on strike, TWA hastily forced ticket
agents into flight attendant training programs. They then contracted with
the California Youth Authority's Ventura Training School for Youthful Offenders
to handle reservations.
In Austin, Texas, Lockhart Inc. closed a plant, laying off 150 people.
Prison labor constructed a new facility for Lockhart inside a Texas prison.
Lockhart leases this facility for $1 per year. In addition, they receive
city tax abatements. Prisoners now perform the work previously done at the
Austin plant-assembling and repairing PC boards for Texas Instruments, IBM,
and DELL.
Brill Manufacturing Co. closed its Michigan furniture plant. It now uses
prisoners making 56-80 cents an hour to fulfill its contract to provide
furniture for Michigan State University dorm rooms.
A Chicago-area Toys-R-Us store replaced its entire third shift with the
use of prisoners to stock shelves and clean the store.
Prisons promise a readily available and cost-effective source of entry-level
labor. They provide reduced transportation costs and more reliable delivery
for those operating on a "just in time" basis than the Mexican
maquiladoras. They also provide a "Made in USA" label for those
concerned about meeting domestic content requirements.
DPAS Inc. moved its maquiladora plant from Mexico to San Quentin, where
prisoners assemble literature for Chevron, Bank of America, and Macy's.
A number of companies with prison factories say they decided to set up these
factories after comparing the costs to those associated with a maquiladora.
Officials call it "job training"
Richard Bazzle, Warden of the Leath Correctional Facility in South Carolina,
states, "The inmate who realizes that an initial assignment in the
kitchen might some day lead to a higher paying job in our garment plant
is more likely to work hard and stay out of trouble in order to get that
better job tomorrow."
At Leath, 40 women prisoners sew, inspect, sort, and package graduation
gowns. Others make a variety of leisure-wear garments and lingerie for Third
Generation, whose customers include J.C. Penney and Victoria's Secret.
Putting the lie to the claim that the primary purpose of such prison
enterprises is to prepare inmates to obtain and hold jobs upon release are
the complaints from some prison contractors of the high turn-over caused
by prisoners being released or moved to a lower security facility.
Chesapeake Cap Co., a division of Lyon Brothers Mfg., solved this problem
by only hiring inmates with at least five years remaining on their sentences.
They manufacture baseball caps at the Connecticut Correctional Institution.
Escod Industries, a division of Insilco Corp., a Fortune 500 conglomerate
based in Columbus, S.C., operates seven U.S. manufacturing plants-including
one in South Carolina's Evans Correctional Facility. In 1996, 250 workers,
working two shifts, assembled $16 million worth of electronic cables purchased
by IBM and Canadian-based Northern Telecom Corp. The latter sells these
cables to several Eastern European countries.
The Hennepin County Adult Correctional Facility in Minnesota operates
a job shop, employing 50 inmates, that provides a variety of light assembly,
sorting, packaging, and warranty repair services for dozens of firms in
the Twin Cities area. In Louisiana, prisoners debone chickens for 4 cents
an hour. In California, they raise pigs for the D.R. Ranch.
In Hawaii, prisoners pick pineapples and macadamia nuts, package papayas
for Hawaiian Tropical Products, carve native wood into dolphins, and sew
brightly colored aloha shirts for Burger King's Hawaiian uniform.
In Nevada, they refurbish rare antique cars for the Imperial Palace and
provided the stained and etched glass windows for New York, New York. From
1981 to 1992, inmates at the Arizona Correctional Facility for Women handled
hotel reservations for Best Western.
Tired of all the annoying phone calls about switching your long distance
carrier? AT&T uses prison inmates for telemarketing.
Many prisoners work in the garment industry. Oregon has its own line
of designer jeans-prison blues. Tennessee inmates produce jeans for K-Mart
and J.C. Penney while Washington inmates produce garments for Eddie Bauer
Clothing. Oregon prisoners make uniforms and electronic menu boards for
McDonald's.
Spalding uses prisoners to pack golf balls. Colorado prisoners craft
hand-tooled leather saddles. Vermont prisoners make metal snowshoes.
Smart and Target are among the customers for 20 models of rough-sawn
cedar bird feeders produced by Minnesota prisoners. South Carolina prisoners
manufacture plastic seating for hotels, restaurants, and hospitals.
Inmates in Washington package and ship softwear for Microsoft. California
inmates produce the logos for Lexus automobiles.
From this partial listing of goods produced by prisoners, it's obvious
that prison labor is being used to exert a downward pressure on wages and
benefits. Or, as Tony Cordova, president of Teamsters Local 377, said at
the Youngstown meeting, "It's simply a question of greed. That's what
it all comes down to."
He explained that he first became aware of prison labor when his local
attempted to organize LAS Recycling. While giving out handbills to workers
entering the plant, he noticed a van from Community Correction Administration
pull up. That's when he realized that 40 of the 125 workers at the plant
were prisoners.
Like their private sector counterparts, government workers' wages and
benefits are also threatened by prison labor. At the Youngstown meeting,
Eva Burris, regional director of AFSCME Region 8, said the same job for
which a unionized public employee is paid $10 per hour is performed by a
welfare recipient for $1.58 an hour or a prisoner for 40 cents an hour.
When the city of Warren, Ohio, was offered free prison labor for community
service jobs, AFSCME negotiated that the prisoners could not perform any
work previously performed by unionized workers. They also got the city to
agree to limit the number of prisoners per work crew.
For the safety of their members, they demanded that any guards accompanying
the inmate workers be unarmed. Finally, they asserted the right of the unionized
workers not to assist in the capture of any of their new coworkers who decided
to walk off the job.
In next month's Socialist Action, Shirley Pasholk will discuss the
privatization of the prisons.
Socialist Action /November 1999 |