Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Slave Labor in U.S. Prisons
Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
01 Oct 2018
🖨️ Print Article

Exploitation of prison labor is rampant across the nation, said Romarilyn Ralston, program coordinator for Project Rebound at California State University at Fullerton. “We’re talking pennies that people are getting paid in these cages,” said Ralston, who has herself served 23 years behind bars. “Yet, the very corporations that profit from our labor while we’re inside, don’t hire us when we’re released.”

Mass Black Incarceration

Related Podcasts

Involuntary Servitude in the Prison System
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Involuntary Servitude in the Prison System
24 June 2022
Savannah Eldrige is the founder of Coaliton to Abolish Slave
White Capitalist Law vs “Uncontrollable Blackness”
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
White Capitalist Law vs “Uncontrollable Blackness”
01 September 2020
The United States “criminalizes Black Americans,” but Black men “are not looking to be controlled” by this racist system, said Douglas
 Getting Out the Word: #PrisonsKill
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
Getting Out the Word: #PrisonsKill
25 August 2020
The Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee, IWOC, “is committed to the militant organizing of prisoners that takes its leadership and focus from

More Stories


  • Notes on the Coloniality of Peace
    Nelson Maldonado-Torres 
    Notes on the Coloniality of Peace
    24 Jun 2020
    The “peace” our enemies want is mounted on brutal war and in its continuation in modern/colonial law and order.
  • Who’s a Worker? (for Leo, Clarence, Jack, Trent and ILWU Local 10 Brothers and Sisters)
    Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    Who’s a Worker? (for Leo, Clarence, Jack, Trent and ILWU Local 10 Brothers and Sisters)
    24 Jun 2020
    I’ve prepped produce; bagged bread;  stocked shelves; pulled products for- ward on shelves of several stores. So I bring nothing but love for frontline 
  • Letters from Our Readers 
    Jahan Choudhry BAR Comments Editor
    Letters from Our Readers 
    24 Jun 2020
    This week community control of police, rage in protests, and the black political class were on your minds.
  • BAR Book Forum: Nadine Ehlers and Shiloh Krupar’s “Deadly Biocultures”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Nadine Ehlers and Shiloh Krupar’s “Deadly Biocultures”
    24 Jun 2020
    Market logics, commodification, extraction, and exploitation condition our possibilities for life and expose many to ever-expanding forms of precarity.
  • BAR Book Forum: Lola Olufemi’s “Feminism, Interrupted”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Lola Olufemi’s “Feminism, Interrupted”
    24 Jun 2020
    The political project we are invested in will require long term conviction and must be internationalist in its orientation.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us