History of Prison Work Programs

Inmate work programs have been a part of prison operations since the Walnut Street Jail was opened in 1790 in Philadelphia. The Quakers, founders of the Walnut Street Jail, believed in hard work so work by prisoners became a key component of the operation of the first prison in the United States. Early programs involved inmates laboring in individual cells at spinning wheels, small textile looms, and shoemaking. When the Auburn system emerged, inmates were allowed to work in settings that were more productive for the manufacture of goods that could be sold. Such practices led to the prisoners actually helping to defray a portion of their housing food costs through their labor. Prison industry was gradually recognized to be a mutually beneficial enterprise. Early prison labor also benefited the state by helping prisons to be self-sufficient, rather than benefiting the inmate with rehabilitation.

In the early 1800s, state prisons were leased to the private sector. The company winning a bid for the lease would essentially become the leaseholder and have control of the prison and its labor. The leaseholder could work the inmates in their industrial operations, spending as little as possible to house and feed the inmates. They would try to earn as much as possible through he unpaid inmate work. Such practices continued into the twentieth century, when abuses of the lese system caused most of them end. States then returned to operating their own prison industries to both keep inmates busy and create profit from the production and sale of goods.

During the first 40 years of the twentieth century, the prison population grew by 174 percent. To house this increase, prisons were built with large areas for industrial operations and the main function of the prison became the production of goods. These prison industries became so efficient that organized labor began to complain about the unfair competition. A series of legislation from 1929 to 1940 effectively ended the sale of prison products on the open market.

Prison industries began to produce goods that could be used by the state and federal governments. With the “state-use” system, prison industries began to produce products such as inmate clothing and furniture. They also began to grow food for their own consumption in addition to manufacturing office furniture and products for other state agencies. The U.S. Congress established the Federal Prison Industries (FPI) in 1934 as a wholly owned government corporation that operated the prison industries in the federal prisons. Today, FPI is a major producer for goods for the U.S. government, producing and selling almost $500 million worth of products a year. Although they have gone through several transitions over the past 200 years, in many ways, today’s prison work programs are essentially the same as they were in the first U.S. prisons.