[World Side] American Studies: U.S. Prison Labor Working Environment has suffered from bad basic human rights and dignity

Author:China Daily Time:2022.06.21

China Daily, June 21st. The Global Human Rights Clinic (Global Human Rights Clinic) and the American Civil Liberties Union recently released a national comprehensive report by the Global Human Rights Clinic U.S. prison workers create billions of dollars of goods and services each year, but the hourly salary is only a little bit of money, and has not received appropriate training, and there is no chance to train skills for the release of career.

Claudia Flores, director of the Global Human Rights Clinic, said: "As our report described in detail, many American prisons' labor conditions violated the most basic life and dignity of prison workers. The workplace, these are shocking and obvious illegal acts. Many of the prison workers interviewed told us one after another about lack of equipment and training. If they refuse to work, they will be punished. The boss's government agency is very helpless. "

The main survey results of the report include: 65%of those who were imprisoned reported that they needed to work in prisons, and the number of people was about 800,000; more than 76%of the investigated prison workers said that if they refuse to work, they will face punishment, such as separate alone Promotion, deprived of prisoner or family visiting opportunities; prison workers are at the mercy of employers, they cannot control their work tasks, and they are excluded from minimum wages and overtime protection. They cannot set up unions and get enough training and equipment. Although work conditions are often dangerous, they cannot get the safety guarantee of the workplace.

Therefore, 64%of the investigated prison workers said they were worried about their safety at work; 70%said they had not received formal work training; 70%said that wages could not afford basic living expenditures such as soap and communication.

In contrast, prison workers have at least 2 billion US dollars (about 13.4 billion yuan) of goods and $ 9 billion in prison maintenance services each year, and these numbers may actually be higher.

The report pointed out that most states in the United States have paid only a few cents per hour to prison workers, while Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi The prison work does not pay any compensation. The average salary of other states for non -industrial work is 15 cents per hour to 52 cents. However, 80%of the salary of prison workers was deducted on taxation, accommodation and court costs.

The report states that more than 80%of prison workers are engaged in routine prison maintenance work, which saves the cost of prison system in the United States. Less than 10%of other types of work, including public engineering projects (such as road maintenance, natural disaster assistance, forestry work, and maintenance of parks, schools and government offices), state prison work, agricultural work, and work in private companies Task.

"The use of prison workers as a source of cheap labor and subsidizing the cost of the prison system that expands our expansion is a historic issue in the United States for a long time." Said Jennifer · Turner, chief human rights researcher at the Human Rights Project of the American Citizen Freedom Alliance, said, "Prison workers have even been deprived of the minimum protection of labor exploitation and abuse. Although they have created billions of dollars in revenue for the states and federal governments, they only get extremely meager compensation."

The report pointed out that the "exception clause" of the United States' exploitation of prison workers was rooted in the 13th amendment of the United States Constitution (The 13th ADENDMENT), which prohibited slavery, except for those who were convicted. In many states and even the US Constitution, exception clauses are allowed to exploit the prison workers, so that they can not get enough compensation and be excluded from the safety protection law of the workplace. To make matters worse, in the Jim Crow Era, the exception clause in the 13th amendment encourages the criminalization and re -slavery of blacks. To this day, the United States still feels the impact of this systemic racism, that is, in privileges that are not proportioned to members of the black and brown -race communities.

Mariana Olazola Rosenblat, a lecturer at the University of Chicago and researcher at the Global Human Rights Clinic, pointed out that the American prison system said that it was necessary to repair the population, but the prison labor project was contrary to it. Defense, depriving humanity, and weakening the ability of prison workers. " She said: "Many of the prison workers we interview said that they strongly hope to participate in social activities under the conditions of dignity. Now it is the time when the US government and prison department give them this opportunity. in practice."

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