Light needs to be shed on the disturbing way that prison systems pay their inmates volunteering as firefighters. With the tragic California wildfires continuing to roar for miles and these inmates being the ones risking their lives doing the treacherous job of helping put out these fires, now is the best time to talk about how drastically low these prisoners end up getting paid.

The volunteering inmates are getting paid a mere $1 an hour and an extra $2 a day, a shockingly low wage for people working in such dangerous conditions and sometimes for up to 72 hours.

Many felons would not even be permitted to become firefighters after being freed due to their record, which why scholars such as Arthur Ritzer, an overseer of criminal justice at the conservative R Street Institute, calls this type of work “comparable to slave labor.”

The opportunity to work as a firefighter requires exceedingly good behavior, excludes those with severe charges, and is voluntary. However, other forms of prison labor throughout the nation penalize prisoners if they do not volunteer and can pay even more meager salaries.

According to the Marshall Project, the average pay for prisoners working in state prisons is 20 cents per hour. While some may point out the fact that giving inmates something to do can help them pass time in a fairly productive manner, they should not be getting paid such unbearably low wages simply because they are incarcerated.

Another issue is that due to black and latino people disproportionately over-representing United States prisons, racial imbalances when paying these already incredibly low fees are prevalent and give more of a reason as to why this cheap, forceful labor is often seen as modernized slavery.

Azzurra Crispino, an organizer for 2016 prison strikes, reported that inmates believe that prisons exist to abuse and use inmates in order to gain money instead of ensuring the safety of others.

The Stewart Immigration detention center in Georgia keeps their cooking and cleaning successfully functioning by depending on the labor of detained immigrants,

By relying on the hard labor of detained immigrants, the Stewart Immigration detention center manages to keep operations such as cooking and cleaning going at a successful rate. It is despicable that the wealthiest, largest prison cooperation relies on the hard work of immigrant inmates because they get to pay them much less than regularly waged workers in order to profit.

When some of these prisoners speak up, refuse to work, or demand their rights, Stewart officials are known to overuse solitary confinement as punishment. This is a complete abuse of power that does not stop there. Prison operations are also known to raise the price on basic living necessities and food in order for the prisoners to pay a ridiculous amount in another attempt for financial gain.

This nation’s prison corporations need to be held accountable for abusing their power and exploiting their inmates in order to enhance their profit. Immigrants or not, inmates deserve a proper minimum wage and to be treated in a non-abusive way.

It is incredible to see how easily money-hungry corporations can forget that prisoners are people, too.

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