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Zubon comments on A Proposal for Defeating Moloch in the Prison Industrial Complex - Less Wrong Discussion

23 Post author: lululu 02 June 2015 10:03PM

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Comment author: Zubon 04 June 2015 12:50:57AM 2 points [-]

It's not that easy to get data about this but as far as I understand prison workers unions are a significant political player in the US.

An incomplete accounting suggests that prison guard unions outspend private prisons, which could reverse "This incentive is strong for public prisons and doubly strong for private prisons." So whatever negative effects one expected from private prison political advocacy, at least double that. (The important part isn't "sides" on that but rather the magnitude of political lobbying.)

(I feel I should note that public unions will spend effort lobbying to increase workers' share of the prison costs, not just to increase the number of prisoners or guard jobs. I could not tell you the breakdown between advocacy for "tough on crime" and for more pension protection.)

Comment author: ChristianKl 04 June 2015 10:53:02AM 0 points [-]

I feel I should note that public unions will spend effort lobbying to increase workers' share of the prison costs

Workers that are union members. I don't know whether a CBT therapist would be included. If a prison suddenly starts hiring all sorts of specialists that aren't prison guards and pays it's money to them, the prison guard union might not like that.

To make the whole proposal more target, we might switch from paying the full bonus to the prison and pay half of it to the prison and the other half to the employees directly.