But not as a 1:1 replacement. And certainly not for a fee. It's asinine for someone to have to pay for this and I hope someone drops a lawsuit on them for this obvious travesty.

You see, this isn't just a data connection. Somebody must be paid to observe the video, making sure that it isn't being used for crime. That person must understand the accent, slang, codewords, and everything else. That person must be trustworthy. That person won't be cheap.

Without an observer, prisoners will get up to all sorts of mischief. They will order witnesses and judges killed. They will continue to operate organized crime. They will pass along threats.

But that's the point.

>These services are ludicrously expensive. Video calls cost 40¢ per minute in Newton County, 50¢ per minute in Lowndes County, and $10 per call in Allen County.

The use of the video system is now compulsory, in person visits are banned, and another at-cost for families of criminals is seemingly tacked on because... ...freedom? Capitalism?

At what point do we agree tapping the families of inmates (note: not the inmates, themselves) out of money is going too far?

IIRC only ~10% of prisoners are held in privately run prisons. It's kind of a red herring.

The bigger (and much harder to solve issue) is that all prisons, public or private, work with a slew of private companies in order to run (think food, phones, etc.) who have big incentives to keep the prison population high. And they can easily prey on prisoners, who are generally much poorer than the general population, because of America's concept of "justice".

But these huge costs of, say, video calls, are borne by the families of the incarcerated, who, like the prisoners that they're supporting, skew poor. As you pointed out, it's a vicious cycle.

I would argue most "very liberal people" would argue that both should be free. Granted, I'm not in the US, but free college is quite favourable nation-wide in the US in polls over the past few years -- let alone among progressive circles.

Video-only options are inhumane, but the family gets screwed either way.

Prisons are built way out in the country and not easily accessible. These same poor families can end up commuting for four hours, burning through a tank of gas and hours of their time just to see a loved one for 30 minutes.

It takes its toll on them and eventually they stop coming to see you anyway. Video should have solved that problem as an alternative but of course, human nature being what it is...

It also means someone with a competing product, that is better, and cheaper, won't be looked at seriously, if it doesn't include kickbacks.. (or do we call it something else now?)

"incentive schemes" to "encourage prisoners to use video visits over personal visits".

I disagree. Even if only 10% of prisoners are held in privately run prisons, the corporate leadership of those prisons has a disproportionate effect on policy-making for all people. CCA and GeoGroup are the largest recipients of federal contract award grants (for ICE), and they collectively make over 1bn / year from these contracts. They also sponsor legislation that _increases recidivism_ and makes it easier to put undocumented immigrants in their own jails. Just because a small % of the population is housed in private prisons, doesn't mean that private prison's have no impact on our society's relationship between profit and punishment.

Prison officials and guards have financial incentive in keeping the imprisoning people business booming even when they work in public prisons.

Sure you can, it's just no one is doing. The private market is very efficient at finding the most efficient way to provide the things they are paid for. In this case they are paid to house people where house has a specific minimum definition. They figure out how to provide that stuff and nothing else.

If instead we paid in a way that encouraged reducing recidivism they would find a way to do that instead. For example today (according to google) the average prissioner costs $30K per year per inmate. let's say we paid $10K per year as a base, but then paid another $10K every year a former prisoner didn't commit a new crime for 5-7 years after they got out. Then these companies would be looking for ways to ensure that people don't reoffend because that means they lose out on the vast majority of their pay. I would expect the greedy selfish private prison companies to start providing lots things that prisoners will need to be successful when they leave for example behavior management strategies, life skills classes, GED programs, diagnosis and treatment for mental illness, even providing free post release things like job placement, or family counseling. All because these are things the will prevent recidivism and get them that sweet yearly payout.

The thing about greedy capitalists, is they are very easy manage, if you are the one paying them. If they are the ones paying you... well we call that corruption.

Really I think the fact we don't see more of this type of pattern suggests that city and states that run prisons care more about punishment than rehabilitation.

Then you'd have a private corporation with agents with direct access to people with criminal backgrounds and connections with a direct financial incentive to ensure that an ex-prisoner was not identified as the perpetrator of any crimes in a certain period.

This might not work out exactly the way you hope.

Because then prison officials would have incentives to aid ex-prisoners in avoiding being identified as perpetrators of later crimes.

I don't agree with the policy change; but is it known that video-chat and equivalents don't have a similar effect?

That's no longer the goal. Prison contracts are usually billed flat rate. If JD locks up more prisoners, they get a better deal.