It looks like you're using an Ad Blocker.

Please white-list or disable AboveTopSecret.com in your ad-blocking tool.

Thank you.

 

Some features of ATS will be disabled while you continue to use an ad-blocker.

 

Inside the secret industry of inmate-staffed call centers or how slavery is legal

page: 1
12

log in

join
share:

posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 08:58 PM
link   
Inside the secret industry of inmate-staffed call centers

When you call a company or government agency for help, there's a good chance the person on the other end of the line is a prison inmate.

The federal government calls it "the best-kept secret in outsourcing" — providing inmates to staff call centers and other services in both the private and public sectors.

The U.S. government, through a 75-year-old program called Federal Prison Industries, makes about $750 million a year providing prison labor, federal records show. The great majority of those contracts are with other federal agencies for services as diverse as laundry, construction, data conversion and manufacture of emergency equipment.

For inmates, the appeal isn't the pay, which can be as low as 50 cents an hour.

With high unemployment, especially among the young unskilled labor, ain't this thing neat??

Outsourcing jobs to China? Bad. Outsourcing jobs to India? Bad. Outsourcing jobs to prisons? Apparently it's good.

More jobs lost to prison slave labor = more unemployment = more crime = more people in prison = more jobs outsourced to prison... etc... and the totalitarians win again.

This ain't really ``news`` to most ATSers however.
1998 article : The Prison-Industrial Complex
edit on 12-1-2012 by Vitchilo because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 09:07 PM
link   
Working at all call center is slave labor??? don't be over dramatic. This is how they should earn there keep.



posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 09:11 PM
link   

Originally posted by Fitch303
Working at all call center is slave labor??? don't be over dramatic. This is how they should earn there keep.

Apparently you never worked in a call center.


Well then I suppose you are alright with this business model?

1. Destroy the economy
2. People have no jobs so they turn to crime to make ends meet
3. Lock people up for BS crimes (like drug laws)
4. Use them as cheap labor.
5. PROFIT!

Yeah this will totally end well....

Have you noticed how companies will not hire people with criminal records (like convicted felons) but will hire prisoners? Ain't that interesting?
edit on 12-1-2012 by Vitchilo because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 09:14 PM
link   

Originally posted by Fitch303
This is how they should earn there keep.


And what about those law abiding citizens out there who are looking for jobs? They need to get into the prison system?



posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 09:16 PM
link   
No different than the slave labor we are all a victim of...Getting taxed around 50% of our labor is pretty bad considering raises these days do not cover inflation and the rise of prices on everything we actually need. The real bad thing is putting people in prison in the first place for victimless crimes and ruining peoples lives.



posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 09:19 PM
link   
reply to post by Fitch303
 


no they should sit there bored as shyt with no distractions from what theyve done.. we should have those mundane shytty jobs.. at least its work.. spend that money supporting people who didnt fck up their lives.. (excluding those locked up for unjust or improper reasons or those wrongly accused..
edit on 12-1-2012 by MalusLupus because: grammerish



posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 09:19 PM
link   

Originally posted by Vitchilo

Originally posted by Fitch303
Working at all call center is slave labor??? don't be over dramatic. This is how they should earn there keep.


Well then I suppose you are alright with this business model?

1. Destroy the economy
2. People have no jobs so they turn to crime to make ends meet
3. Lock people up for BS crimes (like drug laws)
4. Use them as cheap labor.
5. PROFIT!

Yeah this will totally end well....
edit on 12-1-2012 by Vitchilo because: (no reason given)


1. That money is left in the pockets of tax payers since the gov won't have to charge them as much since the prisoners bring in revenue
2. Not even sure what the hell your point is what that. Turning to crime to provide ends meet is something only a punk criminal would say. There are plenty of low end jobs people choose not to take.
3. As BS as the laws are they are STILL THE LAWS and people choose to break them......that's there problem.
4. Well derderder should they go look for expensive labor??????
5. And?



posted on Jan, 12 2012 @ 10:07 PM
link   

Originally posted by Fitch303

Originally posted by Vitchilo

Originally posted by Fitch303
Working at all call center is slave labor??? don't be over dramatic. This is how they should earn there keep.


Well then I suppose you are alright with this business model?

1. Destroy the economy
2. People have no jobs so they turn to crime to make ends meet
3. Lock people up for BS crimes (like drug laws)
4. Use them as cheap labor.
5. PROFIT!

Yeah this will totally end well....
edit on 12-1-2012 by Vitchilo because: (no reason given)


1. That money is left in the pockets of tax payers since the gov won't have to charge them as much since the prisoners bring in revenue
2. Not even sure what the hell your point is what that. Turning to crime to provide ends meet is something only a punk criminal would say. There are plenty of low end jobs people choose not to take.
3. As BS as the laws are they are STILL THE LAWS and people choose to break them......that's there problem.
4. Well derderder should they go look for expensive labor??????
5. And?

i agree with prisoners having jobs while incarcerated but nobody should be getting 50 cents an hour give them at least minimum wage for teens



posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 01:01 AM
link   
Slavery is legal for inmates. The 13th Amendment specifically says so:

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

edit on 13-1-2012 by vexati0n because: (no reason given)


The 50 cents they are paid isn't even necessary, really.
edit on 13-1-2012 by vexati0n because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 11:42 AM
link   
The inmates earn money to purchase more items at the prison commissary. Which will require the commissary to restock more often, which will require them to order more items from the vendor, which will require the vendor to order more from his supplier and so on.

And now when we use a call center we'll be talking to someone who can speak english without a heavy, indecipherable accent.

Win! Win!



posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 12:01 PM
link   
I am not one to condone slavery but this ain't it.
But using prisoners for work, especially community services, I am all for it.
They did not help society when they committed the crime, so they deserve to pay.
More than sitting in a cell, becoming a reverend or lifting weights.
Prisoners lose rights when they commit crimes.
Period.

First off, if you are in prison, there's probably a good reason.
You shouldn't get paid to be there but people shouldn't profit off you either.

Secondly, I believe there's absolutely no reason to profit from the prison system.
But it's huge and apparently making money is mankinds only dream.


With that being said, within reason yes this is wrong.
But you have a society hellbent on making a dollar from everything.
This doesn't surprise me one bit.








posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 12:57 PM
link   
well, with all the new 'laws' on the books, there will be a steady labor force
what a win, win for american companies..no more horrid outsourcing to forgien countries, they will keep the jobs right here in amerika....it will be good for the u.s. economy...you need more pole-leaz to round up more possible workers, more judges to sentence them to employment and more jail workers to fullfill the commisary needs of the worker inmates....that 50d cent an hour is gunna buy alot of snickers....you didnt actually think the inmates are saving up for thier release



posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 01:03 PM
link   
That's how they replaced the displaced slave market at the end of the Civil War.

They created mass 'chain gangs', and kept the plantations afloat with tons of cheap slaves through the prison industry.

This isn't about "should prisoners work for their keep", that's a smoke screen to the REAL issue here.

The real issue is : "Should private industry get super cheap slave labor by purchasing chattel from the state prison system?" "Should corporations be allowed to make insane profits by hiring convicts?".

If anyone is going to profit, why is it private business interests with connections?
Shouldn't all of that profit go to the state to support the system in the first place?

See this system is so screwed up they have many folks arguing over the wrong issues.



posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 03:10 PM
link   
I am just wondering....people call in to these call centers (staffed by prison inmates) and many people may not know that they are talking to a prison inmate...and I am thinking...what kind of information is being given to these call in centers? Driver license info...credit card info....a persons address...phone number etc.

Couldn't the inmates be collecting the information to scam or rob people in the future?



posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 03:59 PM
link   
reply to post by Vitchilo
 


I guess TPTB's dream scenario would be to eventually have everyone working from a cell block for a measley .50 cents an hour. When your in prison just about all your rights are stripped.



posted on Jan, 13 2012 @ 04:29 PM
link   
reply to post by vexati0n
 


Way to sum up this discussion sir. And to Fitch you're missing the point. Instead of paying someone like 10-12 an hour or so as that is the going wage for most call centers jobs in NV. They get to force someone else to do the work, while at the same time not giving that money to someone else who could use it. The point the person is making about stealing is just a metaphor for what someone will do if they can't get work and don't want to starve to death. You act like every person without work are just lazy bums. When a lot of instances people went to college worked a relly nice job, got laid off for some reason and minimum wage aint going to work for the family they developed and they're trying to find good work again.







 
12

log in

join