Today prisoners in at least 24 states are set to participate in a nationally coordinated strike that comes on the 45th anniversary of the prison uprising at Attica. Much like the prisoners who took over New York’s infamous correctional facility in 1971, today’s prisoners are protesting long-term isolation, inadequate healthcare, overcrowding, violent attacks and slave labor.

Source: Democracy Now

I can’t look at the figures below and not see this as a form of slavery.

The U.S. Census for 1920 counted just over 106 million in 1920. The census projections for 2015 put as at just over 320 million in 2015. So while the population of the general public tripled, the prison population increased more than ten fold (mostly between 1980 and 2006).

It would be interesting to see how this has changed over time, but it’s damning as a standalone figure.