From a Scandinavian viewpoint, the US prison system looks like the 19th century in many ways. I have no problem with that, longer sentences for repeat offenders with many crimes would be better than rebates(!) on prison time, like in Sweden.
Point is, I'm not that judgmental and still I say: Not trying to rehabilitate prisoners so they have good job skills is obviously insane. And totally immoral.
More of the prisoners will fail when released; do drugs, commit crimes and end up back in prison. This costs an insane lot of money (prison costs, people not working, health bills, etc). Even worse, it will also destroy the lives of innocent people -- e.g. crime victims and relatives of the prisoners.
I can only see two reasons for not putting an emphasis on rehabilitation for job skills: Pure incompetence -- or some economic interest in getting repeat offenders back into prison.
tl; dr: No rehabilitation of job skills hurts the economy and innocent people as much as the prisoners. Add extra time to the punishment if more punishment is merited, instead of shooting society in the foot.
> Some economic interest in getting repeat offenders back into prison.
Interestingly enough, this actually exists in the US. As crazy as it sounds, there are private prisons that are paid on a per-inmate basis. These corporations typically put their political donations behind candidates who are "tough on crime" to fill their jails and line their pockets. It would be terribly interesting to see what kind of impact these companies have had on the justice system in the US.
"In 2012, [the Corrections Corporations of America] sent a letter to 'prison officials in 48 states offering to buy prisons from these states in exchange for a 20-year management contract and a guaranteed occupancy rate of 90%.'"
As a fellow Scandinavian I agree. Not rehabilitating prisoners is insane from an economical standpoint and for protecting the innocent. This is true no matter if you believe in harsh or lax punishments.
Point is, I'm not that judgmental and still I say: Not trying to rehabilitate prisoners so they have good job skills is obviously insane. And totally immoral.
More of the prisoners will fail when released; do drugs, commit crimes and end up back in prison. This costs an insane lot of money (prison costs, people not working, health bills, etc). Even worse, it will also destroy the lives of innocent people -- e.g. crime victims and relatives of the prisoners.
I can only see two reasons for not putting an emphasis on rehabilitation for job skills: Pure incompetence -- or some economic interest in getting repeat offenders back into prison.
tl; dr: No rehabilitation of job skills hurts the economy and innocent people as much as the prisoners. Add extra time to the punishment if more punishment is merited, instead of shooting society in the foot.