Outsourcing: 5 ways corporations grab your tax dollars

Greedy corporations just can't seem to get enough outsourcing, as they take control of public assets like roads, parking meters, schools and prisons.<br /><br />None of this is news to anyone. But it seems the scope of outsourcing is growing and the pace is accelerating. Just in the past few days we note news items about the corporate takeover of our schools, our water, our prisons and our national air space. Corporations even manage to persuade taxpayers to pay for <i>creating</i> assets -- like football stadiums -- that benefit people who are already wealthy.<br /><br />Here's a quick rundown: <br /><br /><b>Charter schools: </b><a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2013/09/10/charter-school-gravy-train-runs-express-to-fat-city/" rel="nofollow">Forbes</a> reported recently on the corporate grab for local education dollars in a story, "Charter School Gravy Train Runs Express To Fat City." The magazine told it like it is:<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">On Thursday, July 25, dozens of bankers, hedge fund types and private equity investors gathered in New York to hear about the latest and greatest opportunities to collect a cut of your property taxes.</blockquote>There are now more than 6,000 charter schools in the United States, 3,500 more than a decade ago, and they're educating 2.3 million children. These corporate schools can pick which students they admit, but local taxpayers pay for them. They're a great way for politicians to reward their cronies. In Ohio, Forbes reports,<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">...two firms operate 9% of the state’s charter schools and are collecting 38% of the state’s charter school funding increase this year. The operators of both firms donate generously to elected Republicans. </blockquote>Sadly, kids in corporate schools don't do any better than kids in public schools.<br /><br /><b>Air traffic control: </b><a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-23/talks-on-private-air-traffic-control-turn-serious-in-u-s-.html" rel="nofollow">Bloomberg</a> tells us "Discussions about removing government management of the U.S. air-traffic control system are the most serious in two decades."<br /><br />"Privatization is not the answer," responded a commenter identified as Exctyengr:<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">Most of these knuckleheads never served in the military nor flew in the air traffic system. ... We privatized much of the military and we got Blackwater and Halliburton and Kellogg, Brown and Root and how did that work out?  Did we get our money's worth?  Were there scandals? </blockquote><b>Prisons, of course: </b>The <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/09/private-prisons-profit-scheme.html" rel="nofollow">Center for Media and Democracy</a> reports <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16.890625px;">prison industry giants like </span><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Corrections_Corporation_of_America" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: white; color: #336699; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16.890625px;">Corrections Corporation of America</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16.890625px;"> are making big profits by locking states into occupancy quotas and “low-crime taxes." Some states </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16.890625px;">state are by the corporation to keep prisons full or pay a fee for unused beds.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16.890625px;"> Cost-cutting by private prisons companies "</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: 'Lucida Sans', 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;">has led to numerous lawsuits and litigation, fines, and increased need for federal oversight, at great cost to taxpayers, communities, inmates and their families." Instead of taxpayer money going to safer communities, it goes to CEO salaries: <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/09/GEO-group-rap-sheet.html" rel="nofollow">GEO Group </a></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16.890625px;"><a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/09/GEO-group-rap-sheet.html" rel="nofollow">CEO George C. Zoley's compensation</a> was an eye-popping $22,315,704 from 2008-2012, almost all paid for by U.S. taxpayers.</span><br /><br /><b>NFL Football:</b> Gregg Easterbrook at <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/10/how-the-nfl-fleeces-taxpayers/309448/" rel="nofollow">The Atlantic</a> argues:<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">Taxpayers fund the stadiums, antitrust law doesn't apply to broadcast deals, the league enjoys nonprofit status, and Commissioner Roger Goodell makes $30 million a year. It's time to stop the public giveaways to America's richest sports league—and to the feudal lords who own its teams. </blockquote>Well, at least the players are allowed to belong to unions.<br /><br /><b>Water: </b>In Fryeburg, Maine, a local taxpayer named Bruce Taylor doesn't want Nestle getting a sweetheart deal from state regulators to buy water for its Poland Springs bottled water business. Maine's Public Utilities Commission members all have financial ties to the corporate giant (no surprise there). Taylor told <a href="http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/the-stream/the-stream-officialblog/2013/9/27/conflict-of-interestclaimspersistinmainesnestlewatercase.html" rel="nofollow">al-Jazeera America</a>,<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">“They’re buying a commodity at a cheap regulated rate from a monopoly they own and are reselling it for a high profit in the form of bottled water you find in your local 7-11,” Taylor said. </blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq">Taylor believes Nestle is paying too little for water and making too much profit off of Maine. He suggested “an inverted water rate for any commercial water that leaves the state of Maine.”</blockquote>For more about the perils of outsourcing, read the Center for Media and Democracy's series on <a href="http://www.prwatch.org/projects/outsourcing-america-exposed" rel="nofollow">Outsourcing America Exposed</a>.

aviation safety charter schools football outsourcing private prisons water privatization Outsourcing: 5 ways corporations grab your tax dollars

Greedy corporations just can't seem to get enough outsourcing, as they take control of public assets like roads, parking meters, schools and prisons.None of this is news to anyone. But it seems the scope of outsourcing is growing and the pace is acce…

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Private prison rap sheet: Violence, abuse, death

Teamsters are fighting private prison companies that try to take over the government's job of punishing inmates -- and do it for obscene profit. In Florida, for example, <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2012/02/make-or-break-fl-prison-privatization.html" rel="nofollow">Teamsters from Local 2011 persuaded lawmakers</a> that it was a very bad idea to turn a third of the state's prisons over to Boca Raton-based GEO Group. Yesterday, <a href="http://www.teamster.org/content/teamsters-private-prison-quotas-rob-taxpayers" rel="nofollow">Teamsters denounced private prison companies</a> that negotiate contracts linking inmate population to profit. The union represents 30,000 correctional officers.<br /><br />Our friends at the <a href="http://prwatch.org/" rel="nofollow">Center for Media and Democracy</a> -- the ones who exposed <a href="http://alecexposed.org/" rel="nofollow">ALEC</a>, the corporate dating service for lawmakers -- are now exposing the predatory corporations that are trying to take over our government. They're doing a 12-part series at "<a href="http://outsourcingamericaexposed.org/">OutsourcingAmericaExposed.org</a>" in which they're outing the worst corporate outsources. Today CMD reveals the horrors of prisons run by GEO Group.<br /><br />Among their findings:<br /><ul><li>CEO George C. Zoley's compensation was an eye-popping $22,315,704 from 2008-2012, almost all paid for by U.S. taxpayers;</li><li><a href="http://www.privateci.org/private_pics/GEO_suit2.pdf">Hundreds of lawsuits</a> have been filed against GEO Group, many of which were settled before trial. The suits range from allegation of inmate death and abuse, excessive force, medical neglect as well as allegations of employment discrimination;</li><li>An audit by the state of Texas found in 1999 that GEO Group (then known as Wackenhut) barely kept the minimum number of guards required in its contract to run a jail in Travis County. The company was fined $625,000 for chronic staffing shortages; </li><li>GEO Group was sued by inmates at East Mississippi Correctional Facility for "barbaric and horrific conditions." The facility, designated for special needs and psychiatric problems, denies patients the most rudimentary mental health services and many committed suicide; </li><li>GEO Group settled a <a href="http://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/downloads/case/cb_v_walnut_grove_complaint.pdf" rel="nofollow">lawsuit</a> that charged its Walnut Grove Correctional Facility (WGYCF) juvenile prison in Mississippi perpetuated violence and corruption. A <a href="http://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/downloads/case/walnutgroveDOJ.pdf" rel="nofollow">U.S. Department of Justice investigation</a> found 'deliberate indifference’ in failing to protect youths from harm in seven major areas, including sexual misconduct between guards and inmates and use of excessive force by guards;</li></ul><br />Horrified yet? If not, read the whole thing <a href="http://www.prwatch.org/news/2013/09/12255/violence-abuse-and-death-profit-prisons-geo-group-rap-sheet" rel="nofollow">here</a>.

ALEC exposed private prisons Private prison rap sheet: Violence, abuse, death

Teamsters are fighting private prison companies that try to take over the government's job of punishing inmates -- and do it for obscene profit. In Florida, for example, Teamsters from Local 2011 persuaded lawmakers that it was a very bad idea to tur…

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Private prisons’ profit scheme: lockup quotas and “low-crime taxes”

<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKngdUrVaaMFr5ZUn4zq8ZtmjIPorCH020-CUUhp39DMnAfdtQjoQhxuBvvU7R3eDcJmW_RVL-6_i3lkCJ4QXGPsIqsSsJtcwGwOxWJS79JlAm2rEvIq2fvbBzN4OSuvEWdBkDYAJQt7bv/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-02-04+at+11.43.09+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKngdUrVaaMFr5ZUn4zq8ZtmjIPorCH020-CUUhp39DMnAfdtQjoQhxuBvvU7R3eDcJmW_RVL-6_i3lkCJ4QXGPsIqsSsJtcwGwOxWJS79JlAm2rEvIq2fvbBzN4OSuvEWdBkDYAJQt7bv/s1600/Screen+Shot+2013-02-04+at+11.43.09+AM.png" /></a></div>It would be a good thing if crime levels dropped to historic lows, right? Well, not if your business model relies on high incarceration rates. A <a href="http://www.inthepublicinterest.org/article/criminal-how-lockup-quotas-and-low-crime-taxes-guarantee-profits-private-prison-corporations" rel="nofollow">new report</a> from <a href="http://www.inthepublicinterest.org/" rel="nofollow">In The Public Interest</a> (ITPI) explains how prison industry giants like <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Corrections_Corporation_of_America" rel="nofollow">Corrections Corporation of America</a> are making big profits by locking states into contractual occupancy quotas and “low-crime taxes”:</div><blockquote class="tr_bq">65 percent of the private prison contracts ITPI received and analyzed included occupancy guarantees in the form of quotas or required payments for empty prison cells (a “low-crime tax”). These quotas and low-crime taxes put taxpayers on the hook for guaranteeing profits for private prison corporations.</blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq">Arizona, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Virginia are locked in contracts with the highest occupancy guarantee requirements, with all quotas requiring between 95% and 100% occupancy. Though crime has dropped by a third in the past decade, an occupancy requirement covering three for-profit prisons has forced taxpayers in Colorado to pay an additional $2 million.</blockquote><div>When the big house is big business, low crime hurts the bottom line, so private prison corporations have cooked up all kinds of schemes to keep their jails full. The ITPI report, titled “Criminal: How Lockup Quotas and 'Low-Crime Taxes' Guarantee Profits for Private Prison Corporations,” says three private prisons in Arizona are administered by contracts that require 100 percent capacity. That's right – the state is obligated by the corporation to keep these prisons full or pay a fee for unused beds. <br /><br /></div><div>Hmm, do you think this kind of system would encourage or discourage criminalization? Well, it doesn’t matter – as long as corporate profits are high.</div><div><br />That’s why CCA pitched the idea to dozens of states last year:</div><blockquote class="tr_bq">In 2012, Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the largest for-profit private prison company in the country, sent a letter to 48 state governors offering to buy their public prisons. CCA offered to buy and operate a state’s prison in exchange for a 20-year contract, which would include a 90 percent occupancy rate guarantee for the entire term. Essentially, the state would have to guarantee that its prison would be 90 percent filled for the next 20 years (a quota), or pay the company for unused prison beds if the number of inmates dipped below 90 percent capacity at any point during the contract term (a “low-crime tax” that essentially penalizes taxpayers when prison incarceration rates fall). </blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq">When policymakers received the 2012 CCA letter, some worried the terms of CCA’s offer would encourage criminal justice officials to seek harsher sentences to maintain the occupancy rates required by a contract inserting occupancy guarantee provisions into prison privatization contracts.</blockquote>Ya think! And even as they work to force states to keep their prisons full, private prison companies push for more draconian sentencing laws. <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2013/09/private-prisons-occupancy-quota-cca-crime" rel="nofollow">Andy Kroll writes</a> in <em>Mother Jones</em>:<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">Private prison companies <a href="http://www.justicepolicy.org/uploads/justicepolicy/documents/gaming_the_system.pdf" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">have supported and helped write</a> "three-strike" and "truth-in-sentencing" laws that drive up prison populations. Their livelihoods depend on towns, cities, and states sending more people to prison and keeping them there.</blockquote>Occupancy quotas protect the private companies from changes in the prison population and fluctuations in the crime rate. Meanwhile, they put taxpayers on the hook for reduced incarceration rates – all in the name of sustaining an industry that thrives on throwing people behind bars.<br /><br /><div>Michele Deitch, a criminal justice expert at the University of Texas, told <em><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/19/private-prison-quotas_n_3953483.html" rel="nofollow">Huffington Post</a></em>:</div><blockquote class="tr_bq">It's really shortsighted public policy to do anything that ties the hands of the state. If there are these incentives to keep the private prisons full, then it is reducing the likelihood that states will adopt strategies to reduce prison costs by keeping more people out. When the beds are there, you don't want to leave them empty.</blockquote><div>We’ve reported a lot on the <a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2012/01/security-worse-at-private-prisons.html">horrible safety record</a> and criminal mismanagement of privately-run prisons. These contracts show once again why privatized prisons are such a bad idea.</div><div></div><div>Unlike state-run prisons, which are actually accountable to taxpayers and not driven by profit, private prison companies are the worst offenders when it comes to poor safety standards, including low staffing and other violations. They’re not in the business of keeping communities safe. They’re in the business of big business – by locking up more and more people and doing it on the cheap.<br /><br />And that’s why private prison corporations like to claim that privatization saves money. But occupancy guarantees prove they do just the opposite. When the prison companies cut corners, the savings go to private profits, not taxpayers who pay more for prisons that are less safe.</div>

CCA corporate greed prison privatization private prisons Private prisons’ profit scheme: lockup quotas and “low-crime taxes”

It would be a good thing if crime levels dropped to historic lows, right? Well, not if your business model relies on high incarceration rates. A new report from In The Public Interest (ITPI) explains how prison industry giants like Corrections Corpor…

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