I volunteer my time at Worth Rises, a non-profit advocacy organization looking to end the exploitation in the prison industrial complex. In recent years, there has been a rise in governments using private contractors to house prisoners. However, that’s not the full picture. There are thousands of contractors that service, and profit off of, this industry, where sectors such as healthcare, construction, commissary, and phone services often go unnoticed.
Graduating from the Urban Justice Center’s “advocacy incubator”, Worth Rises looks to create transparency in this space. To that end, they publish a dataset of for-profit prison contractors to show the pervasive nature of the problem. There are over 3,900 companies that in some shape or form service this industry, and this map highlights where these companies are headquartered along with a sector breakdown.
You can check out their report with an interactive version here.
The above map looks at raw counts of companies, so it’s also informative to adjust the numbers for population:
| State | Population (2018 estimate) | For-Profit Prison Contractors | Contractors / 100,000 people |
| District of Columbia | 702,455 | 15 | 2.14 |
| Virginia | 8,517,685 | 171 | 2.01 |
| North Dakota | 760,077 | 15 | 1.97 |
| Oklahoma | 3,943,079 | 76 | 1.93 |
| Ohio | 11,689,442 | 184 | 1.57 |
| New York | 19,542,209 | 303 | 1.55 |
| Florida | 21,299,325 | 308 | 1.45 |
| Texas | 28,701,845 | 412 | 1.44 |
| Massachusetts | 6,902,149 | 88 | 1.27 |
| Minnesota | 5,611,179 | 70 | 1.25 |
DC, Virginia, and North Dakota have the most for-profit prison contractors when adjusted for population while New York, Florida, and Texas round out the top 10. It’s important to note that these stats are attributed to their headquarters location and that the data was pulled in large part from CA, TX, FL, OH and NY, so they may be over-represented. A further deep dive is warranted to figure out how/if these states create an environment more conducive to these types of businesses.
#PeopleOverProfit
BigTime Stats 