http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/54/US_...
But that's not all; prison labor is now used as cheap labor to compete with foreign countries, instituting a new age of under-the-radar slavery.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwT6CisM0mU
The more you look at this cyclic process, the more disturbing it becomes.
This is BS IMHO. Would you rather see prisoners set free or do nothing all day?
Do you really think that a person will come out of a 6 year prison sentence (without working a day) and then start working and be a productive member of society?
In the old days in my country there was a sentence called "hard labour" - which meant that criminals got a shorter sentence and learned valuable life skills (if they were co-operative) or learned how to make big rocks smaller (if they were uncooperative).