The Brokenness of the Prison System

I was so glad to see the topic of today's lesson, because issues surrounding the prison system are numerous and wide-ranging and cause me immeasurable frustration. The prison system itself is clearly broken, but what is worse are the unrealistic expectations of the public. We want the criminals off the street as long as possible, but we hate paying for taxes long and costly sentences. We do not want ex-inmates living or working near us, but we expect them to become productive members of society after release. We think prison should be a way to straighten criminals out, but we consistently disallow ex-convicts to be rehabilitated. These are unrealistic and counterproductive expectations of the prison system and the people who are or were once sentenced into it. From my understanding, the purpose of prison should be two-fold: 1) it should be punitive in that it punishes people for crimes committed (although what are the social forces that sometimes lead to criminal actions? but that's a thought for another time...), and 2) it should rehabilitate inmates so that if/when they are released they can give back to the community, thus fostering a more positive community and reducing crime. By ostracizing ex-inmates and cutting programming for rehabilitation services, we are essentially guaranteeing recidivism and perpetuating the conditions that lead to poverty and criminal behavior.

I recently read an article about the great health benefits given to inmates that I think people in our class might find interesting: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/06/23/need-healthcare-go-to-prison-behind-richard-james-verone-s-thinking.html

The article complements the Massoglia and Schnittker (what a name...) article well, and it goes into the health care that prisoners receive. Although the health of inmates may be poor going into prison and leaving it, they are offered a level of health care that many Americans will never receive. Because they are wards of the state once they become imprisoned, the government is obligated to provide prisoners health care for whatever they may need. This sometimes translates to hospitalizing inmates in top-tier hospitals (which is very costly for the manpower associated with such visits, e.g. guards and restraingts) and even placing them at a higher position on transplant waiting lists, lest the prison or government get in trouble. Additionally, patients in prison receive all of their medications at no cost. When such people are released, however, it becomes extremely difficult to find insurance that will cover your needs or even a job that will allow you to pay for medication. What kind of a system is it that provides above-average healthcare in prison but not for those same people, or even people in the same type of communities, who are released from it? No wonder recidivism rates can become so high, if most of your needs are not being met outside of prison. Is that not a worthwhile trade?