[verall]

They are "forced" to work at below minimum wage rates both for the government and individual firms in public-private partnerships.

I use "forced" in quotation marks, because although prisoners are no longer forced chain-gang style, these jobs can be a prisoner's only source of money, which is required to purchase communication with the outside world.

[jasonhansel]

In some states (e.g. Texas) prisoners aren't even paid any wages--they're just punished if they refuse to work.

An article about this: https://truthout.org/articles/unpaid-labor-in-texas-prisons-...

[fighterpilot]

Is this work economically valuable/worthwhile to whoever is employing them? What are the profit margins that their employers make from their prison labor?