

Prison Economics Help Drive Ariz. Immigration Law - jadence
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130833741

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izendejas
If legislators really wanted to reduce illegal immigration they would also go
after the demand, implementing tougher penalties against those who hire
illegal immigrants^^ or outsource to companies that do. Of course, this will
never happen as the walmarts, mcdonalds, big tech corps^, etc will never allow
it because surely their costs would go up and so would their prices.

Edit: ^ work at a big tech company? A decent percentage of the janitors and
cooks are illegal (and, for the record, are not just Hispanic)

Edit2: ^^Including themselves--because they do.

edit3: (sorry I was on my smartphone before). If the supply of jobs for
illegal immigrants goes down, so does their influx. It's true in the US--and
it's true in Europe and it's true in Asia: <http://www.eubusiness.com/news-
eu/1247156221.99/> [http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/01/93137/recession-
enforc...](http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/01/93137/recession-enforcement-
driving.html)

But then, of course, in a global economy, cutting the influx of illegal
immigrants (and immigration in general) would lead to more jobs shipped
north/south/overseas.

So in the end, many of these legislators are really just pandering and
contributing to the fear-mongering here and everywhere as people are, in many
cases, naturally xenophobic.

~~~
scrod
And in fact, companies that hire illegal immigrants benefit greatly from
stricter immigration enforcement; the more pressure from the state that's
applied to immigrants, the easier it is for employers to lower their pay,
subject them to dangerous and harsh conditions, and occasionally even refuse
to compensate them altogether. If they refuse, ICE will deport their families.

~~~
rdtsc
If we cared about human rights, we should flip the situation on its head and
impose heavy (in the 6 or 7 figure range) fines for hiring undocumented
workers. If any of the workers are mistreated they should be able to turn in
their employer.

That will give the workers an upper hand and would prevent them from being
taken advantage of. Now the employer can live in fear of being exposed.

------
defen
This strikes me as ridiculous fear mongering. The point of the law is
"attrition through enforcement" - the idea being that illegal immigrants will
leave Arizona if they see that the state is serious about enforcing
immigration law. Are we to suppose that people will continue to live in
Arizona illegally, given the knowledge that there are now real penalties? The
article also uses scare language like "The law could send hundreds of
thousands of illegal immigrants to prison in a way never done before" to make
it sound like there's some grand plan to hunt down and lock up every illegal
immigrant, so that the prison companies can charge the state for their upkeep.
And yet the bill only provides for a maximum of 20 days in jail for a first
offender, and 30 days in jail for subsequent offenses.

~~~
credo
>> _The point of the law is "attrition through enforcement"_

It is much more than that.

If you're a US citizen and you're not carrying proof of citizenship, you could
get thrown in jail for not having your "papers".

Now, I'm sure many citizens feel that their accent or their skin color or some
other attribute protects them from sent to jail and that they don't need to
carry their papers with them. However, if a cop thinks that you might be a
Canadian, they could throw you in jail for not proving otherwise. .

~~~
defen
> If you're a US citizen and you're not carrying proof of citizenship, you
> could get thrown in jail for not having your "papers".

...if you are lawfully stopped, detained, or arrested, you _may_ be held until
your immigration status is verified. I don't see why this is a big deal. There
is no grand scheme to sweep the countryside and round up everyone with brown
skin or a Canadian accent.

~~~
kjhgfkjmhng
Good job the police don't have any sort of history of arresting people on
spurious charges due to their skin color.

------
guelo
Private prisons are an abomination and should not exist.

~~~
jacoblyles
Why?

~~~
jackvalentine
It creates an industry of private businesses that have but one motive: a
profit motive.

They are therefor motivated to do everything they can to increase
incarceration rates to create demand for their services of imprisonment. This
article illustrates that pretty clearly. It also creates situations like the
corrupt judge/private prison kickback scheme in Pennsylvania recently.(1)

We don't need profit-driven companies who profit from increased rates of
incarceration, they have no reason to really rehabilitate people - they want
them back in the system ASAP.

(1)
[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/13/us/13judge.html?_r=2&h...](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/13/us/13judge.html?_r=2&hp)

~~~
yummyfajitas
This problem is not limited to the private prison business. In California, for
example, the prison guard union is similarly motivated by profits to increase
incarceration rates.

In fact, organizations like prison guard unions have _stronger_ motives than
multiple private prison corporations. A non-monopolistic prison corporation
could easily let their competitors waste money on lobbying and reap the
benefits, so any prison corp with small market share has no motive to lobby.
The prison guard union reaps all the benefits since they have 100% market
share.

~~~
Natsu
> This problem is not limited to the private prison business. In California,
> for example, the prison guard union is similarly motivated by profits to
> increase incarceration rates.

I happen to think that you're both right. I'd rather not see union-owned _or_
for-profit private prisons due and I'm not convinced that we really have to
choose one or the other.

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julius_geezer
I guess one question is whether the bulk of the illegal immigrants in Arizona
at any one time are using it as a residence or just passing through. This
would definitely make it less attractive as a residence, but its advantages
for transit are considerable.

The prison business has had some curious effects elsewhere a judge went to
jail up around Scranton for abusing his power to send kids to jail for
offenses that ordinarily might've rated probation before judgment; he was
compensated by the company that ran juvenile prisons up there.

------
johngalt
Unchecked undocumented immigration is a problem. There are a lot of people
that want to come here for the right reasons and some that want to come here
for the wrong reasons. The goal of any immigration reform should be to parse
those two groups. Make it easier to be here legitimately to avoid the ongoing
exploitation of the people that are here to work. Then focus enforcement on
those that are not here legitimately because they are now not hiding among the
crowds of people that just want to feed their families. This is what most
people in AZ want, but the only lever they have is enforcement, it's not like
Arizona can decide to unilaterally grant amnesty.

The idea of "papers please" is reprehensible, but where is the anger at the
federal border patrol checkpoints between AZ and CA? An AZ cop asking for a
drivers license during a traffic stop is supposedly "draconian fascist evil",
but stopping people for no reason driving between two states is considered ok?

Imagine that after 9/11 the rest of the country said "good luck dealing with
that terrorism problem NY. We're going to put checkpoints up to make sure
those problems stay in your state and not ours."

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hnal943
What an absurd hit piece. The Arizona law simply states that the authorities
in Arizona will enforce existing federal law.

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xtho
Interestingly I recently attended a talk by Loic Wacquant[1] about prisons in
the US, the US as penal state. This somehow fits.

[1] <http://sociology.berkeley.edu/faculty/wacquant/>

