
California bans private prisons - anigbrowl
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/sep/12/california-private-prison-ban-immigration-ice
======
55orolder
I find it fascinating that private prisons draw such ire while the prison
guard union draws so little, when the prison guard union has all the exact
same incentives and is drastically more powerful.

California would have had legal marijuana a decade sooner except for lobbing
by the union, they're a major force for mandatory minimum sentences and
tougher sentencing in general.

This seems like a trivial easy-PR win for some legislators that does very
little to meaningfully address the problems with criminal justice in the US.
Private prisons are a tiny little piece of a much bigger problem and there's
still a lot of real work to be done.

~~~
philwelch
Going after public sector unions at all is extremely difficult. The most
successful attempt to do so that I'm aware of was Gov. Scott Walker's in
Wisconsin. And even he didn't go after the law enforcement unions. (It might
be possible to split off the police unions from the prison guard unions, but
it's not clear to me that it is.)

Law enforcement unions are one of the few American institutions with
completely bipartisan protection. Democrats don't go after them because
Democrats are pro-union. Republicans don't go after them because Republicans
are pro-police. Furthermore, you really don't want to pick a fight with police
unions. What happens if police officers and prison guards go on strike? It's
against the law in many places, but if _the police are on strike_ , who's
going to enforce that? There is a very significant risk that you'd have to
call up the National Guard just to maintain public order. And even then, how
many National Guardsmen does California have? How many LEOs? And most of those
National Guardsmen are not actually trained in law enforcement. In effect you
would be declaring martial law. It's not worth it.

~~~
js8
"Law enforcement unions are one of the few American institutions with
completely bipartisan protection. Democrats don't go after them because
Democrats are pro-union. Republicans don't go after them because Republicans
are pro-police."

Perhaps your "democracy" needs more than 2 parties.

"What happens if police officers and prison guards go on strike?"

The American culture is very antagonistic. In democratic societies, which are
less antagonistic, this would become a matter of new public consensus much
sooner before they would go on actual strike (there are many forms of strike
and some of them do not involve stopping all work, for example, work-to-rule).

~~~
PorterDuff
"The American culture is very antagonistic. In democratic societies, which are
less antagonistic, this would become a matter of new public consensus much
sooner before they would go on actual strike"

Like France?

~~~
js8
I think France is kind of odd because yes, they do strike a lot, but usually
the public approval of the striking is quite high. So it is less antagonistic
in this sense.

I live in Europan country with
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tripartism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tripartism),
and that's one option how to make things less antagonistic. There is lot of
negotiations going on before the strike happens, and it mostly gets averted.

~~~
baud147258
In France most of the strikes come from the public sector. And I'm pretty sure
the public approval for the strikes depends if it affects them: if you'd poll
people living in Paris about the current public transportation strike, I don't
think you'd see a lot of support.

------
warent
> Private prison companies used to view California as one of their fastest-
> growing markets.

This is such a bizarre and twisted sentence to hear without a hint of irony.
It's like dream/nightmare logic except in real life. In 100 years private
prisons are going to be a hideous stain on our history and this is such a huge
step in the right direction that it really makes me proud to be living in
California and supporting the state with my tax dollars.

~~~
lovehashbrowns
Isn't it? Companies that probably lobby for stricter and longer sentences,
looking at a populated state as a "market," with caged human beings as their
product. It's the most absurd concept to me, and it's even more disgusting
when it's put in such an innocent manner. "Private prison companies used to
view California as one of their fastest-growing markets." It just gets more
disgusting the more you look into it, and the statistics around incarceration
in the US.

~~~
tenkabuto
Just to throw it out there: the idea isn't absurd; it's evil.

~~~
lovehashbrowns
You're completely right on that. Absolutely evil.

------
thatswrong0
Honestly, it's a bit of a red herring.. nothing is going to change from a
criminal justice perspective. Less than 10% of incarcerated people are held in
private prisons. But even more importantly, there are still so many private
contractors / unions in the (public/private) prison industry that this ban
won't really affect policies or outcomes going forward.. private interests
will almost always exist in it that have perverse incentives that are contrary
to what's actually good for crime and recidivism rates. [0]

An example would be the prison phones / video visitation industry. It's
absolutely abhorrent what's going on there (removing in-person visits,
replacing them with stupidly expensive phone calls that prisoners can hardly
afford).. and yet public prisons / jails are using their services just the
same. [1]

[0] -
[https://worthrises.org/picreport2019](https://worthrises.org/picreport2019)

[1] -
[https://www.prisonpolicy.org/phones/state_of_phone_justice.h...](https://www.prisonpolicy.org/phones/state_of_phone_justice.html)
Just look at how expensive those phone calls are :(

~~~
addicted
Public jails are doing the same things because companies that provide those
services lobby them to do it. The FCC under Obama had capped the amount they
could charge which was promptly undone with government changes.

This also ignores known stories such as an example where a judge had a stake
in a private prison company (or was bribed outright?) And as a result was
sentencing school kids to prison for things which probably needed detention at
worst. And this went on for a decade.

The prison system in the US is not good to begin with. Largely because the
citizens look at prison as retribution rather than rehabilitation. But the
private nature only adds to and exacerbates issues.

~~~
hanniabu
> The FCC under Obama had capped the amount they could charge which was
> promptly undone with government changes.

We see this time and time again. There really needs to be a better protocol
for this. It takes so much time and effort to make these laws, yet they can be
undone in a heartbeat. It's an inherently flawed system.

~~~
mrguyorama
These things COULD go through a functioning legislature. Functioning being the
key word. When you have one party who outright states that they will stop any
and all work in the legislature just because Obama is president, and the
citizenry continues to re-elect that party, what else do you do? What else
SHOULD you do?

~~~
dragonwriter
> These things COULD go through a functioning legislature

Which would just make them subject to switching when the legislative majority
changed, rather than actually fundamentally changing the situation.

But I'm not sure either is really a problem: otherwise, bad laws would be
impervious to change, too. If you want good laws, you have to keep electing
good government.

~~~
mrguyorama
True but there are multiple levels of law "inertia", and stuff passed through
congress at one point carried more of it

------
arcticbull
I'm so happy about this. Private prisons are the scum of the earth. They're
totally antithetical to a free society that values human life. They often
lobby for minimum occupancy levels in law (effectively requiring by law a
certain percentage of citizens to be marked as criminals). Any profit they
skim off the top is money that should be spent rehabilitating criminals and
making them functional members of society. Next up should be criminalizing
charging huge quantities for prisoners to video call / phone call and the
usurious fees on commissary.

I'd wager $1 in their pockets costs society easily 10X that.

[EDIT] Surprise surprise, when Canada experimented with private prisons, they
found measurably better outcomes in public prisons [1] and took the private
prisons back over.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prison#Canada](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prison#Canada)

~~~
coryrc
The public sector isn't any better.

The Price of Prison Guard Unions [https://capitalresearch.org/article/the-
price-of-prison-guar...](https://capitalresearch.org/article/the-price-of-
prison-guard-unions-2/)

PORAC's contribution to California's prison crisis
[http://www.cjcj.org/news/5423](http://www.cjcj.org/news/5423)

~~~
jvm
Classic to see the correct take get downvoted.

If anyone's interested in actually learning about the causes of mass
incarceration, I'd strongly recommend John Pfaff's _Locked In_:
[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01L6SLKK8/ref=dp-kindle-
redirect?...](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01L6SLKK8/ref=dp-kindle-
redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1)

In short: a) It's not the war on drugs. b) It's not private prisons. c) It's
not sentencing laws.

You could get rid of all of those and America would still lead the "free"
world in incarceration.

~~~
dougmany
For the lazy:

Pfaff is convinced that aggressive prosecution is the biggest cause of over-
incarceration. His argument here is compelling. He notes that while
incarceration rates began to climb in the 1980s as a response to rising crime,
those trend lines continued through the Nineties, even though crime was
steadily falling. Why did that happen? Examining all the relevant variables
(crime reports, arrests, charges filed, and convictions), Pfaff found himself
looking squarely at the prosecutor’s office. As less crime was reported,
arrests dropped proportionately, and among those who were charged with a
crime, conviction rates held steady. But prisons continued to fill, because
prosecutors were filing felony charges against ever-growing percentages of
their dwindling arrestees.

From [https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2017/02/20/john-
pfaf...](https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2017/02/20/john-pfaff-locked-
in/)

~~~
jimclegg
The change in monetary system caused a cascade of despair.

[https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/](https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/)

~~~
jimclegg
More specifically here is the incarceration rate change when the monetary
system changed.

[https://wtfhappenedin1971home.files.wordpress.com/2019/09/in...](https://wtfhappenedin1971home.files.wordpress.com/2019/09/incarcerationrate.jpg?w=780)

PS. Don't downvote me if you don't know economics morons.

~~~
jimclegg
Something that isn't intuitive about our monetary shift is that as we debase
the USD, we also debase the most desperate/marginalized of our population.

It is a feature of our system that is only accelerated by income inequality
and labor price suppression.

------
charlescearl
The first public academic to my knowledge to begin crystalizing the problem of
private prisons and the prison industrial complex was Angela Davis [1] -- I
first remember hearing her address this in a 1998 lecture at Northwestern.

Ruth Wilson [2,3] has worked for years analyzing and working to end the
expansion and privatization of California's prisons, through both academic and
grass roots efforts [4]. Her "Golden Gulag: Prisons, Surplus, Crisis, and
Opposition in Globalizing California" [5] book is both accessible and
rigorous, I highly recommend it. I am a bit shocked that their and
foundational work were not mentioned in the piece.

There's a discussion between Davis and Wilson here [6] where they surface the
mass incarceration/private prison issue, and detail the pathology of
California's prison system.

[1][https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1583225811/ref=dbs_a_def_r...](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1583225811/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0)

[2][https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/magazine/prison-
abolition...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/magazine/prison-abolition-
ruth-wilson-gilmore.html)

[3]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTPjC-7EDkc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTPjC-7EDkc)

[4] [http://criticalresistance.org/](http://criticalresistance.org/)

[5] [https://www.amazon.com/Golden-Gulag-Opposition-
Globalizing-C...](https://www.amazon.com/Golden-Gulag-Opposition-Globalizing-
California/dp/0520242017/ref=pd_sbs_14_6/140-9692660-6198769?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0520242017&pd_rd_r=967d5b8c-466b-4fec-9974-b0ffa782f3e5&pd_rd_w=dsvaO&pd_rd_wg=nl4CJ&pf_rd_p=d66372fe-68a6-48a3-90ec-41d7f64212be&pf_rd_r=E6HJNZAF3HPJE5KMQ3MK&psc=1&refRID=E6HJNZAF3HPJE5KMQ3MK)

[6]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGPVPrJGXsY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGPVPrJGXsY)

------
llarsson
Good riddance.

The whole premise of private, for-profit, prisons has always seemed deeply
troubling to me. The focus of a healthy prison system should be to
rehabilitate people and help them turn their lives around so that they
contribute positively to society. That can take years of hard work by the
individual, and require assistance from professionals (therapists, teachers,
...).

A for-profit company by definition seeks to maximize profits. Expensive
rehabilitation is therefore immediately off the table, or given at the minimum
allowable level. That is just not in the best interest of neither the
individuals in the prison system, nor the rest of society.

~~~
pepega_chgo
The purpose of imprisonment is to punish criminals by depriving them of their
liberty. As a side-effect, society benefits because a criminal has been
forcibly removed from visiting further misery on law-abiding people.

Imprisonment is and should be a deterrent punishment - it is not a support
group.

One can both be in favor of abolishing for-profit prisons and also in favor of
severe deterrent sentences for law-breakers. Profiteering private corporations
naturally seek to maximise the number of prisoners in their facilities,
because they are paid per inmate - so they have every incentive to ensure
future "custom". This motive naturally conflicts with deterrent imprisonment -
the whole idea is to forcibly prevent criminals from breaking the law again.

~~~
tathougies
Exactly. Statements like the commenter above are not universal truths.
Certainly, some people believe the purpose of prison is rehabilitation. That
is neither a universal belief however, nor the focus of our legal system. Many
people believe the point of prison is punishment, just as the point of fines
(like a speeding ticket, for example) are to make someone hurt financially,
not to recoup costs (one person speeding typically costs the state nothing).

~~~
raxxorrax
It can be both at the same time. A step of the reformation process is for the
inmate to understand the need for the punishment. It doesn't mean that there
is no punishment, just that blind retribution is insufficient to form a
perspective for the inmate and society. Most inmates are not going to stay in
prison for their whole life, so of obviously you try to maximize
rehabilitation.

I do believe it to be a universal truth that a reformist approach is superior.
Treating it as opposed solution is certainly short sighted.

~~~
tathougies
> I do believe it to be a universal truth that a reformist approach is
> superior.

Exactly. This is your belief, and clearly not everyone believes it.

It sure could be both at the same time. Many people believe that too. It could
also only be one or the other. Lots think those ways. There is no universally
accepted truth here, and pretending like there is is not fruitful.

------
chroma
I think private prisons could work if:

\- Convicts could choose whether to be sent to a public or private prison.

\- Private prisons had financial incentives for post-incarceration behavior.
Eg: If their prisoner recidivism rate after 3 years was 10% lower than the
average public prison, they would get a 20% bonus.

Those changes would create enough competition and align incentives such that
we could see some real innovation in the criminal justice system. Sadly, I
don't think these sorts of experiments will ever be tried. If someone ever
proposes such a system, they'll be branded a supporter of "private prisons".

~~~
the-pigeon
Ah I see you've never implemented an incentive program before.

EVERY SINGLE SYSTEM GETS GAMED. NO MATTER WHAT YOU MEASURE.

Every metric you could possible think of can be manipulated in ways you can't
imagine. But give private companies the incentive and someone in them will
figure it out.

IMO the only way to run things like prisons is to hire people that strongly
care about the public good to run them. Hire people who want to run a good
organization that accomplishes the organization's goals. Which for prisons
should be rehabilitation and safety.

~~~
chroma
If you look at my comments throughout this thread, you'll see that I am aware
of the potential for incentives to have undesirable higher-order effects. Many
people in this thread have suggested certain concrete undesirable
consequences, and I've replied to them.

In contrast, you are putting forth a fully general counterargument to any
incentive structure. But clearly financial incentives work in many cases. It's
what sports teams use for their athletes and coaches. It's what businesses use
for their leadership teams. When we need the best people possible to perform
at their best, we tend to pay them money and pay them more money if they meet
certain goals.

> IMO the only way to run things like prisons is to hire people that strongly
> care about the public good to run them. Hire people who want to run a good
> organization that accomplishes the organization's goals. Which for prisons
> should be rehabilitation and safety.

Yes, ideally we'd have every job staffed people who are wise, kind, competent,
and hard working. But we don't have nearly enough of such people and we judge
traits inaccurately. So instead we have to make do with less effective but
more practical methods. Financial incentives are one of those options.

~~~
wwweston
> a fully general counterargument to any incentive structure.

A general counterargument is worth considering. Any incentive sufficiently
powerful to draw forth extra resourcefulness in its legitimate pursuit is
quite likely to also draw forth extra resourcefulness in its illegitimate
pursuit.

> It's what businesses use for their leadership teams.

This is may help your case considerably less than you think if you look
closely. Various forms of the principal-agent problem pop up all the time.
Pink and Kohn have also forwarded some research suggesting that extrinsic
incentives have diminishing returns or run counterproductive in some cases.
And Goodhart's law is a proverb in the business world for a reason.

Aligning incentives is still important, but getting optimal performance is
rarely as simple as tying rewards to a goal. Hell, half the time _defining_
optimal performance is a project.

And when the underlying issues involve social safety and significantly
curtailing someone's liberties via imprisonment (and the already fine tension
between them), it's an especially tricky topic.

~~~
ShorsHammer
How exactly can a private prison "illegitimately pursue" having a lower
recidivism rate?

Simply handwaving it away with incentives being gamed seems to complete ignore
that you are suggesting that there will be widespread systemic corruption of
the entire nation's judicial system. Perhaps the general counterargument could
really take a moment to focus on the details.

Prisoners not being convicted of more crimes down the line seems to be a no-
brainer in societal benefit, or does the line of generalised argument
presented here think that's not the case with some more handwaving about
optimal outcomes?

~~~
tlb
For instance, they could teach prisoners how not to get caught.

EDIT: what does it mean that I love thinking about ways of gaming systems like
this?

~~~
chroma
> what does it mean that I love thinking about ways of gaming systems like
> this?

That you might be a good security researcher? From
[https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/03/the_security_...](https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/03/the_security_mi_1.html):

> Uncle Milton Industries has been selling ant farms to children since 1956.
> Some years ago, I remember opening one up with a friend. There were no
> actual ants included in the box. Instead, there was a card that you filled
> in with your address, and the company would mail you some ants. My friend
> expressed surprise that you could get ants sent to you in the mail.

> I replied: "What's really interesting is that these people will send a tube
> of live ants to anyone you tell them to."

------
themodelplumber
Does it really remove the profit motive from incarceration? There are still
thousands of vendors of various types making probably billions of dollars off
of prisons, private facility or no.

~~~
colecut
Progress is better than no progress.. Removing profit motives can only happen
by reducing profit motives

~~~
elicash
They're still making a great point. Yeah it's progress but I think most people
aren't aware of the extent of the problem, making further progress impossible.
There's some really terrible abuses happening, like replacing visitors with
video chat that you have to pay for.

More info:
[https://www.prisonpolicy.org/visitation/](https://www.prisonpolicy.org/visitation/)

Another example: getting rid of donated books and libraries in favor of paid
tablets that also restrict the books you can buy, both for political and
monetary reasons.

~~~
colecut
True... the outrageous telephone call fees being just one completely
unjustifiable thing that comes to mind.

------
creaghpatr
>Servin said that while the new law was a significant victory, there was one
other thing immigrants rights groups were concerned about. When several
sheriffs’ departments canceled their contracts to house Ice detainees last
year, instead of freeing the detainees, Ice moved many of them to prisons in
Colorado and Hawaii.

Is this something that people against private prisons believe...that they just
release all the prisoners when they close the prison?

~~~
danaliv
_> Is this something that people against private prisons believe...that they
just release all the prisoners when they close the prison?_

There are a few different strains of thought when it comes to opposition to
private prisons, but I believe the common denominator is that they create a
perverse incentive. They turn prisons into businesses—the more prisoners, the
better.

So while there are definitely people who want these prisoners freed
immediately, and even people who want prisons abolished altogether, getting
the profit motive out of prisons would be a significant win regardless.

~~~
vkou
> There are a few different strains of thought when it comes to opposition to
> private prisons, but I believe the common denominator is that they create a
> perverse incentive. They turn prisons into businesses—the more prisoners,
> the better.

The same criticism can be applied towards forced prison labour, and yet, it is
explicitly permitted by the thirteenth amendment. (And is commonly used in
state prisons.)

Just because a profit incentive falls in the hands of the state's coffers, as
opposed to some corporation, does not mean the incentive is not perverse.

~~~
Analemma_
Forced prison labor should _also_ be outlawed. Just because we haven't fixed
every problem yet doesn't mean we shouldn't cheer improvements like this.

------
bzbz
This is incredible. I can't believe it's happened so soon, putting people
(especially such a stigmatized group) above profits really gives hope for the
future of the country. Thanks for leading us in this, California.

------
cjensen
The cynic and me sees this as a win... for the prison guards union.

It seems to me that whether public or private, prisons should have good,
independent oversight. Pretending that the "profit motive" is the biggest
issue overlooks the horrific abuses committed by guards in California's public
prisons.

~~~
SilasX
You're right. People scream bloody murder about "omg! This means a financial
incentive for imprisonment" and then ignore how the exact same thing happens
with public prisons, in particular how prison guard organizations pushed for
Three Strikes to pad demand for their work -- same dynamic.

[http://www.cjcj.org/uploads/cjcj/documents/the_undue_influen...](http://www.cjcj.org/uploads/cjcj/documents/the_undue_influence_of_californias_prison_guards_union-
californias_correctional_industrial_complex.pdf)

And IMHO is bizarrely inconsistent outrage.

Want to make a profit from supplying prisons? Activists see no problem with
that!

Want to make a profit from hiring felons, who are cheaper due to having
limited options? Activists give you the thumbs up!

Want to make a profit for your private corporation from building a public
prison? AOK!

But _run_ it for profit? No matter how much oversight or regulation is
applied, it's somehow inherently evil.

It feels like a distraction.

~~~
rtkwe
Wow bad faith all over the place... People do see problems with all of those,
but the only solution to people making a profit from supplying prisons is for
there to be no prisons (or for the government to make all the food and
clothing soup to nuts, but that'd be crazy). Same with the others the issue
with post prison jobs is that they're not enough so hiring them is good and a
step down the road to a solution.

Reform is a step by step process, getting people used to the idea of thinking
of rehabilitation and reintegration instead of the gut instinct to punish
takes a lot of time and in the mean time address the worst abuses of the
system. In the mean time make sure you're not setting up systems that will
fight for their own survival and demand (in some cases by contractual
obligations for the state to fill X number of best!) to be fed.

~~~
SilasX
It's deeply confused to see a farm selling food to a prison as some kind of
evil. It seems you've dove head-first into an anti-market position that sees
_any_ for-profit production as bad, which should be a big red flag.

Hiring a felon should not be regarded as evil, either; just the opposite.

I don't see how it's bad faith to assume activists don't advocate full
abolition of markets. If you want to take the position that all profit is evil
(or at least is evil if it ever touches any part of the prison system), that
just makes your position harder to defend.

------
ulzeraj
Here in Brazil criminals riot to be transferred to private prisons because the
ones ran by the state are inhuman.

------
olivermarks
Next we have to remove all for-profit 'prisoner support' services such as the
staggeringly expensive communications firms that are bleeding prisoners and
their relatives dry.

------
lacker
This applies for four prisons. But, from the article:

 _The contracts for these four prisons expire in 2023 and cannot be renewed
under AB32, except to comply with a federal court order to reduce crowding in
state-run facilities._

That court order is still in effect and doesn't seem likely to go away any
time soon. So... the contracts _can_ be renewed? It's not clear to me if this
law is going to make a difference.

------
cameronbrown
I'll be the first to admit I'm not the biggest fan of California (housing &
homeless crisis spring to mind) but this is great.

------
sandworm101
So does this also ban private companies from operating inside prisons? Most of
them don't care who holds the actual keys so long as they can take advantage
of the prisoners. They may not be the warden, but they can still control the
purse strings.

------
lanevorockz
It is very silly to be happy about something you not yet know the results,
it's interesting and can be a case study. As long as the government doesn't
fiddle with the numbers to manipulate voters.

------
KingMachiavelli
> The contracts for these four prisons expire in 2023 and cannot be renewed
> under AB32, except to comply with a federal court order to reduce crowding
> in state-run facilities.

Hmm, something tells me these will end up being renewed considering getting
budget approval and completing construction in 3 years is basically impossible
so unless Californa has some prisons with spare space or in-progress new
construction. OR, even better, reduces it's prison population... we may still
have some private prisons for a while.

Still fantastic news.

~~~
jedberg
The next step is for the Governor to pardon all the people who are in for
possession and other "lesser crimes" and the release them over the next there
years, alleviating the need for additional prison space.

------
Hex-3-En
Fun thing, I just watched this a couple days ago:

[https://youtu.be/wtV5ev6813I](https://youtu.be/wtV5ev6813I)

spoiler: no private prisons in Germany

------
frankbreetz
California has been busy the past couple weeks, they passed the rent control
law, a labor law about contract workers(mainly about Uber and Lift drivers),
and now this.

~~~
thoughtpalette
I was thinking the same once I noticed this headline on the front page.
California has been busy.

------
oomkiller
Reforming private prisons is just a small part of criminal justice reform.
This is a good step but it seems like many are unaware or are ignoring the
impact that labor unions have on overcriminalization. Police and corrections
unions exist all across the country and share many of the perverse incentives
that private prisons do.

~~~
anigbrowl
Very true. The California Correctional and Peace Officer's Association is one
of the largest unions in the state and exercises a good deal of political
power, albeit less than it used to.

Part of the problem is the division into _trade_ unions, in which different
economic sectors have their own unions and can then be rolled over or pandered
to as is convenient for business or state interests. Syndicalism is an idea of
people in different businesses and employment sectors to combine their labor
power more efficiently by avoiding the fragmentation problem.

~~~
dragonwriter
> The California Correctional and Peace Officer's Association

There is no “and”, just “California Correctional Peace Officers Association”
(and, as the absence of the “and” suggests, it is just prison guards, and not
other law enforcement.)

~~~
anigbrowl
A careless mistake on my part. Thanks for the correction.

------
Animats
California's prison population is declining. Especially in juveniles. So
there's less need for prison space.

------
PorterDuff
I was busy doing God's Work (upvoting any downvoted posts) and was considering
the article.

So far as I can tell, the point of the article is that this is another salvo
in the war between California and the federal government in terms of who gets
to run immigration law, not some sort of newfound distaste for private
prisons.

Curious that all the posts are about private vs. public prisons. I did poke
around a bit and the private prisons don't appear to be cheaper, and it's
rather surprising that they even exist given the amount of power public unions
have.

Perhaps someone in the biz could pipe up, just what is the point of a private
prison? All that occurs to me is the opportunity to ramp up a facility quickly
or perhaps just the need for a law enforcement organization to park people
when they don't want to be in that business. Dunno.

------
Paul-ish
In "Locked In" John Pfaff makes the point that private prisons are not the
problem. It is a more nuanced problem, but prosecutors play a large part in
our national incarceration problems. Definitely recommend the read (or listen
as an audiobook as I did).

~~~
throwawayjava
_> but prosecutors play a large part in our national incarceration problems_

The problem is pro-punishment politicians. Singling out any particular
office/position misses the point.

Even when judges practice discretion, pro-punishment legislators step in and
introduce mandatory minimums.

And even when prosecutors practice discretion, pro-punishment judges will step
in and force them to prosecute cases that the prosecutors don't want to
prosecute [1].

[1] See Suffolk County for a recent example

~~~
Paul-ish
Pfaff has pretty good data to back up his claim. He looks at legislation. He
looks at mandatory minimums. Everyone plays their part, but prosecutors have a
lot of power over sentencing. Plea deals play a role here.

And in many places prosecutors _are_ politicians in a sense, because they are
elected. One recommendation is to go back to appointing prosecutors rather
than electing them.

So no, singling out prosecutors doesn't miss the point. It is an important
point.

~~~
throwawayjava
Yes, but it's become in the past couple years an out dated point in major
cities (Boston, Philly, LA) where activist prosecutors attempting to prosecute
fewer crimes and hand out lighter sentences are now being stymied by
(appointed!) judges.

The problem with focusing on any particular role is that the other parts of
the system will step in to force punishment.

------
domnomnom
While probably a good idea, I fear somehow the execution will be butchered by
incompetence and then blamed on cops or racism. Issues have a tendency to go
left unsolved when maintaining a narrative takes precedent over actual problem
solving.

------
tlobes
Are there any private prison models that were shown to be more effective than
their peers or public counterparts?

While I agree that the vast majority (if not all) of private prisons, and
those who participated in profiting from them, are ugly spots on the progress
of modern humanity, I'm weary about an overall ban on the concept altogether.

Rather than creating rules against an evil business model or incentives to
promote a beneficial one, this "unabashedly California" move cuts off any hope
of someone with an ounce of morality to disrupt and ideally create a prison
system that truly aims to reform inmates.

------
superbaconman
I heard a very interesting take on this topic on local radio. Basically, on
average private prisons are no worse than public prisons as both make many of
the same mistakes. The only difference is that public prisons are invulnerable
to reform. [https://wfhb.org/news/kite-line-september-6-2019-the-
busines...](https://wfhb.org/news/kite-line-september-6-2019-the-business-of-
incarceration-a-conversation-with-craig-gilmore/)

~~~
einpoklum
> The only difference is that public prisons are invulnerable to reform.

None are invulnerable to legislative reform. However, _private_ ones are
closer to it, since they're, well, private.

> No worse

If you mean they're both terrible, exploitative, have guard violence, don't
provide reasonable facilities, don't provide opportunities for personal
development and education, and underfunded - maybe you're right. (although
frankly I doubt it.)

Mass incarceration in general is a perverse US government sport / poor people
population management/behavior shaping mechanism, anyway.

------
aazaa
> “We have to worry about all the people who are detained right now,” said
> Servine. “Where will they end up?”

Along those lines, what's the plan for dealing with the inmates from other
prisons that this legislation will make ineligible?

For example, there's a private correctional center in California City:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_City_Correctional_C...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_City_Correctional_Center)

------
randiantech
Wondering from where it comes the optimism in this thread for this ban. Ive
traveled to more than 40 countries, and lived for some time in 5, all of them
with public prison monopolies. In all of them the prison systems turn to be
terrible. And by terrible, I mean that the US prisons look like 5 stars hotels
compared to them. For reference, I was in most south american and caribbean
countries, Spain, Portugal among others.

~~~
9HZZRfNlpR
What is it with Spanish prisons? I live here and have heard about the problem
of foreigners from UK and US not wanting to serve time in their owne country.
They prefer here, but overpopulation is a problem, hence the articles about
the cases.

------
gigatexal
Wholly supported. There’s no way a private prison would be incentivized to
lower recidivism but is instead incentivized to increase it. Here’s to hoping
we foster rehabilitation over punishment in our prisons and put an end to what
is effectively slave labor (inmates making things for pennies on the dollar).

------
alfiedotwtf
The sad and bitter truth: as the anecdotal Silicon Valley startup CEO is a
closet right leaning Republican donor, and with the amount of military money
up for grabs, I'm surprised to not see a flurry of startups "disrupting"
prisons yet /0.5s

------
stefek99
I find it fascinating how incentives shape human behaviour:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison–industrial_complex](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison–industrial_complex)

------
subroutine
California prisons are pure hell. Listen to a few min of this interview; it's
eye opening (warning: prison language)...

[https://youtu.be/2I4imzTOpQM](https://youtu.be/2I4imzTOpQM)

------
daheza
I'm pretty happy about the laws california has been enacting recently, this
plus the uber / lyft law both align with my views. I'm glad that politicians
are actually doing what we vote them in todo.

------
maxcan
I've always wanted to see a lambda school model for private prisons. they get
some share of an inmates future tax revenue but pay a significant penalty if
ex-inmates re-offend.

I've reached out to Austen..

------
jquery
What's going to happen to the existing private prisons? I assume this involves
tearing up very expensive contracts. Will the government purchase them and
convert them to public ones?

~~~
jedberg
The law says that current contracts can run until expiration, which is a few
years from now. They'll have to either release prisoners, move them, or
incarcerate fewer people (or a combination thereof) otherwise they'll have to
renew the private contract, which is also allowed under the law if necessary
to alleviate overcrowding.

------
t34543
Great news! I first learned about private prisons over a decade ago and since
then I am in disbelief by how many people aren’t aware there are for profit
prisons.

Really good move. Bravo.

------
lr4444lr
Hope they soon go after privately run homeless "shelters" as well, another
huge pit of waste and corruption in dereliction of public duty.

------
jossmexico
Am listenning to the dem debate now where kamala (?) mentioned (promised) to
ban private prisons. Coincidence?

------
thecleaner
Calif seems to be on fire these days (no pun intended). They are passing one
great legislation after another.

------
jorblumesea
It's frustrating that most reform and change is happening at the state level.
It just means a completely fractured political environment where some states
are progressive around data and prisons, whereas others are regressive. As a
company, how do you even enforce things like privacy standards at a state
level instead of national? Seems like a terribly complicated and inefficient
system.

------
supsep
I am looking at all the other major news publishers, and none of them have
this on their front page.

------
mud_dauber
This is the best news I've seen all month. Maybe all year. Props to
California.

------
univalent
Great job CA legislators. Prisons for profit were an abomination. Good
riddance.

------
luhn
Why have the past couple days seen several high-profile California laws
passed?

------
sabujp
GOOD, if we can start rehabilitating prisoners, giving them skills to succeed
outside of prison then there might be a chance. Yes, I know many have
psychological issues and they can't be fixed without a complete brain rewire
or hard drugs but many are non-violent and poor.

------
baby
Rent control, and now this? California is turning into a good state!

------
ropiwqefjnpoa
California passes a sane law, what is happening to this world?

------
pruthvishetty
Wow, didn't know there were private prisons!

------
SomeHacker44
If the government does not want to run prisons, don't send so many people to
prison. Prisons and other core governmental services should never be
outsourced.

------
I_am_tiberius
I thought such things only exist in movies.

------
bluecalm
One thing that shouldn't really be controversial. Incentives are misaligned
with private prisons. It really hard to find an argument for them.

------
nickstinemates
A great day for California.

------
newnewpdro
Can we do something about Betsy DeVos and the efforts to privatize our public
school systems next?

------
vajaya
I watched an episode of last week tonight in which John Oliver covers issues
of private prisons. Basically it's inmates being exploited by extremely low
paid labor and various unreasonable charges for necessities. But I don't see
how government run prisons can solve or mitigate the problems.

------
tectonic
This is such good news.

------
magwa101
FINALLY

------
artur_makly
These John Oliver docs were very illuminating:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjqaNQ018zU&t=2s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjqaNQ018zU&t=2s)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJtYRxH5G2k](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJtYRxH5G2k)

------
droithomme
Banning private prisons is good.

Public prisons though are not necessarily good.

I remember when a good friend was forcibly sterilized without consent by
California state official directed medical staff. Eugenics and genocide has
been a fundamental part of the Golden State's agenda for over a century.

------
celticmusic
I've never understood how we, as a society, accept private prisons.

I've also understood why police hiding behind bridges was considered
acceptable.

Or how the hell a debate about waterboarding could ever happen when it's
clearly immoral.

At some point in my life I just decided we suck shit as a society and move on.

~~~
mike741
i think you just answered your own question there at the end

------
bnt
California is on a roll this week, it seems. Can someone local explain what’s
going on?

~~~
synaesthesisx
Maybe if they’re ambitious they can do something about the homeless crisis
next.

~~~
blackflame7000
Hahaha yea right, that problem is actually hard. Cleaning up straws is much
easier.

~~~
bdhe
That sort of cynicism is needless. Considering that this thread is about
private prisons, a very serious issue, bringing up a literal straw man is
disingenuous and completely unnecessary.

~~~
blackflame7000
It's not a strawman argument if that's really what they are spending time on
that should be spent addressing far more important issues like homelessness.
They shouldn't spend 1 second talking about an issue so meaningless on the
list of issues they need to tackle. If you can't see that they are grabbing at
low hanging fruit so that they can say they accomplished something then I
think you might be a bit naive. A ban is literally the easiest cop-out for
legislatures to do. No deep thinking required to blanket ban everything you
don't like or perceive as problematic.

------
etaty
Just for fun, same sentence on health care.

> I'm so happy about this. Private health care insure are the scum of the
> earth. They're totally antithetical to a free society that values human
> life. They often lobby for minimum health care coverage in law (effectively
> requiring by law a certain percentage of citizens to be marked as clients).
> Any profit they skim off the top is money that should be spent on research
> and education. Next up should be criminalizing charging huge quantities for
> basic health care by private hospitals and the usurious fees on drugs.

I'd wager $1 in their pockets costs society easily 10X that.

~~~
arcticbull
Yes, I'm also in favor of socialized medicine for basically exactly these
reasons. Shocker, I know. The system works!

I grew up in socialized medicine, and you get sick, you go to the hospital,
they treat you and you leave. There's no step 4. Why Americans continue to
willingly subject themselves to these torturous systems is beyond me. It's all
in y'alls control.

~~~
archie2
There is a step 4: pay exorbitant tax rates.

~~~
Joakal
Is there a story of poor people getting bankrupted by taxes anywhere in the
world that has socialized healthcare?

~~~
archie2
Different systems have different problems. In Canada, some people die due to
wait times for treatable conditions, or are forced to wait so long that their
condition worsens to be beyond repair and they are permanently debilitated.
Over 50k people leave Canada per year to get their healthcare in the United
States instead.

~~~
rosser
The trope that wait times are materially worse in single-payer systems is
precisely that: a trope. You do not have to dig hard to find examples of wait-
times measured in _months_ to get _diagnostic_ procedures scheduled, and where
I live — the San Francisco Bay Area — the wait time for an _initial
consultation_ with, e.g., a dermatologist has been about the same, for as long
as I've lived here. I know _doctors_ who work in _hospitals_ who've had to
wait _months_ for a _breast cancer scan._

A thing that sucks in both systems _can not_ legitimately be used to argue
against only one of them.

~~~
archie2
That's because California is a terribly run state, and one third of your
population is on Medi-Cal. You literally have the same problems as Canada.

~~~
FireBeyond
Here's me in Washington where I had a severely injured wrist after a car
accident, was advised to get PT immediately...

... and had no PT within the county with a <10 week wait time.

I guess we're close to Canada though, so maybe it's contagious?

~~~
archie2
People wait 6 months or more in Canada.

------
Dedi9688
I'm so happy about this

------
wind0w
Great news! Let's work on abolishing public prisons next.

~~~
randiantech
So no prisons at all? So murders should be free, for example?

~~~
wind0w
Exactly. Crime is a social and economic problem that prisons and police do
little to solve, with great harm to society. Our resources would be better
spent elsewhere.

------
make3
wow! awesome!

------
amatecha
Dude this is great news. Keeping people in prison should never be a for-profit
initiative.

------
sambull
Private prisons is how you get kids sold our by corrupt judges

------
blancheneige
>Two of Ice’s largest immigrant detention centers in California

Can somebody explain to a legal immigrant why The Guardian keeps omitting the
_illegal_ part over twelve times throughout the article?

~~~
clarkevans
Many immigrants (especially those from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras)
in ICE detention facilities presented themselves at the border and _legally_
requested asylum. For more information on "northern triangle" and why these
immigrants are fleeing their homeland, read
[https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/central-americas-violent-
no...](https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/central-americas-violent-northern-
triangle)

This is an ongoing and growing challenge for our immigration system. _In FY
2017, as instability in Central America’s Northern Triangle showed few signs
of ending, immigration judges decided over 30,000 asylum cases, a considerable
increase over the roughly 22,300 asylum cases decided in FY 2016, and the most
[since] FY 2005._ (source: [https://immigrationforum.org/article/fact-sheet-u-
s-asylum-p...](https://immigrationforum.org/article/fact-sheet-u-s-asylum-
process/))

~~~
jacobush
Wow.

20,000 granted asylum to the US in 2016.

70,000 granted asylum to Sweden in 2016.

------
countryqt30
Sounds like California is entering an ERA OF MASSIVE OVERREGULATION. Goodbye,
startups, goodbye investors :(

------
papito
$3 per day per inmate on average for food, keep the wig, leave us with a wreck
of a human, covering his/her medical bills until end of life.

------
charlescearl
It's a start. Thank you Ruth Wilson, thank you Angela Davis

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/magazine/prison-
abolition...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/magazine/prison-abolition-
ruth-wilson-gilmore.html)

[https://books.google.com/books/about/Golden_Gulag.html?id=zT...](https://books.google.com/books/about/Golden_Gulag.html?id=zThPAQAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false)

------
acd
Well done California.

\- Private prisons has no incentive of getting rid of its income source the
prisoners.

\- More emphasis should be put into preventive nature. Ie to stop people from
becoming criminals. This most likely involves more instruction on how to raise
children.

If analog was to computer program it is cheapest to do things correct at the
design phase, once late in the phase the issue hits production it is very
expensive to mitigate. Thus we should as society do maximum effort into
supporting young children and parents. Once the person has turned into a
criminal it is very expensive for society to correct the issue if at all
possible.

------
ineedasername
I'm sure there's at least a few free market purists that will decry this move
as it removes competition from the market, but this happens to be one instance
where public prisons actually cost _less_ on average than when outsourced to
the private market [0]

[0] [https://www.criminaljusticeprograms.com/articles/private-
pri...](https://www.criminaljusticeprograms.com/articles/private-prisons-vs-
public-prisons/)

~~~
tathougies
I really doubt it, most libertarians and free market purists object to the
idea of anyone but government being able to violently deprive someone of their
rights without repercussion. The reaction on forums like /r/libertarian is
mainly positive.

