Private Prisons

Currently when you go to jail and receive a felony your chance at a good life is gone. By receiving a felony which ranges from minor possession of drugs to murder you are unemployable by most companies. California as of 2010 according to The International Center for Prison Studies is the world leader in “incarcerated population and the highest per-capita incarceration rate in the world, with 748 inmates per 100,000 residents” of that it is mostly in the twenty through twenty four age group. These people will in most cases never have a chance at advancement in life quality having to either survive from minimum wage jobs or join the military which will only accept people with a felony or lower in special cases. Since the change in American society …show more content…
The state of California is required to provide prisoners for the private prisons that taxpayer money has been spent on building. For each unfilled cell the state of California owes that private prison an agreed sum for failing to provide them with someone to fill it. This system encourages keeping as many people in jail for instance according to the prison policy initiative “1 in 5 incarcerated people are locked up for a drug offense” these people then go on to have a conviction were they will probably plea bargain out for months to a year in jail. Their lives have been disrupted and their chances at meaningful employment severely limited due to the conviction on their record which may not even be true due to most people taking a plea bargain which is “the defendant agrees to plead guilty to a particular charge in return for some concession from the prosecutor” instead of taking it to court were they would most likely lose and given harsher sentence. The system for prisons is currently biased to providing prisoners for prisons will damaging their life instead of quotas to meet we need to encourage people becoming a successful member of society which higher education has shown to be …show more content…
Xavier Mcelrath-Bey was an accomplice to murder for which he was jailed for 13 years. He was under fourteen when he entered the prison system. He found that “the power of education” was a self motivator a tool to improve himself. He achieved his GED and moved onto the provided college courses were he met Zaric his teacher who “introduced us to things I didn’t realize applied to my daily life.” This opportunity allowed Xavier to realize who he was and gave him a purpose or in his words “inmates receiving an education start to realize they can be agents of social change.” which allowed him to strive above what he once knew. Xavier became a field researcher who studies the violence of inner city Chicago and the mental health needs of juvenile deliquents. Soon after we as a nation became tough on crime which defunded all higher education. Without the chance for inmates to better themselves we as a society lose out in the work they would have provided and the lose of role models for people in similar