have you ever asked yourself, where do all the taxes i have paid go? well the answer is quite simple. the government uses our money to fund for schools, government employees, and prisons. but is it right that i should pay for the feeding and shelter of the people who have committed crimes? no, some people argue that the prisons should not use taxpayers money to provide health care for the inmates.
since some prisoners have life sentences of 20 years or more, it could cost up to 1 million dollars to keep the criminals off the streets. but this is our money, couldn't we use this money for our selves? we could buy a car, a house, pay for college etc...
this argument has been going on for a while now, and from the time that many states banned execution as a form of punishment, the prisons have been getting over populated, and some inmates must share cells with others. the cost of keeping the inmates has risen due to the fact that more facilities are being built, and more guards are being hired to operate these facilities.
however, the other side of this argument is that keeping life sentenced prisoners could help society. prisons through out the country have now established a working program for their inmates; this is where private companies use the inmates to do their work for them. for example, some inmates are payed 25c an hour to build license plates, chairs, hand bags, etc...
some inmates are given community work like mowing grass, cleaning the high ways and streets. as far as jobs go, the states are doing an excellent job for making the prisoners give something back to the society. but the question still remains, do you want your money to be spent on criminals??
I simply do not agree with the idea that prisoners should be stripped of their health care. While it may appear to be a fiscally irresponsible practice, prisoners are still people. And in the case of many non-violent drug offenders, they are innocent people. Why should an inner city drug dealer be put in a cell for 10 years with no health care while drug-war enthusiast lawmakers such as John McCain can make millions off of Budweiser sales?
ReplyDeleteThe more we privatize our prisons in this country, the more lobbying we see for stricter criminal law. Prison populations go up every year while crime rates remain relatively the same. $.25/hr wages may promise you a bag of chips and a soda, but it certainly will not cover private health care expenses. I believe that stripping our current 2.5 million prisoners of their mediocre health care would be inhumane and would hinder our world appearance (once again.)
Unfortunately, we cannot strip healthcare from prisoners. Besides being inhumane, prisoners become property of the state so if the state left people in a cell to rot, they would be held liable. I would argue that there isn't enough money spent on our prisoners. Granted, the US has one of the largest prison populations in the world. But there have been studies that show how long term prisoners who receive their GEDs and continue to higher education have more opportunities when they get out of prison. This lowers recidivism and in turn lowers crime overall.
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