How about them? Is it not a fundamentally flawed system when workers at the bottom of the scale wonder if they wouldn't be better off in prison? How do they feel about having to compete with forced labour?

What entitles consumers to pay sub-living wages in order to benefit from a product? This reminds me of people feeling entitled to pay shit prices for some services because "it's just a student job".

"Also, many people go to prison without any job experience, providing them with some increase their chances of reintegration to society."

yeah, by forming them to a job that can apparently no longer sustain a free farmer.

Or there was a story of a man who robbed a bank then waited for the police to come so he could get some cancer treatment while in prison.

When these things happen there is something very very wrong in a society

Supposedly rehabilitation is a goal of prison; how nice would it be if prisoners walked out with a small nest egg, to help them get settled and survive while they go through the impossibly difficult task of finding a job with a criminal record? Right now, it's very tempting to go straight back into crime or drugs since these are the only career opportunities available. Maybe saving at minimum wage for 5 years would give them enough money to for the first time in their life feel safe, or enough capital to invest in something that could make their lives better, like tools, a business, etc. Maybe they could get some fulfillment and feel like they are part of a social unit by sending money back to their family while in prison. Maybe if they are paid the market value of their labor they will develop confidence that their labor is worth something and a viable alternative to, say, crime.

And yes prison is expensive for the state, but that's the state's problem and provides no justification for exploitation. The state can't do something unspeakable to you like lock you in a cage to be beaten and raped for decades and then make you pay for it. If prison is too expensive, the state should imprison fewer people. There are far more economically efficient alternatives to locking up millions and throwing away the key (like improving conditions for the poor!); the state is making a stupid, cruel, and horrible choice and it should pay the full price for it or it has no incentive to make a better one.

You call these things free? If I shot you in the head, would you consider it me giving you a free bullet?

As it is right now, we have slaves working to enrich CEOs, board members and investors.

Which is exactly what's happening in this case. There's no private corporation, it's a governmental division, yet the inmates are still paid a pittance. Maybe you should review your preconception of private industry vs government.

1) Just because you're in prison, doesn't mean you deserve to be treated like a work animal. Some people are in there for serial murders, while the vast majority are there for theft, tax fraud, smoking marijuana, etc - maybe even for "resisting arrest".

2) Even if what you said made "economic sense", while disregarding any human rights the prisoners might have, the problem is that many (or most?) of the prisoners are now in private prisons. That means those prisons get both the taxpayer money and the free labor. So both the taxpayers and the prisoners lose, while the private prisons score a double-win. Do you think that's how it should work, too?

It's actually around 8%: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/11/u-s-private-...

Prison labor transfers wealth from prisoners by paying them less so that the companies that employ them can save money.

Private prisons are most often jails (ie. short term, not places that do this) and do not represent the majority of prisoners.

Sometimes advocates publish misleading figures about this by focusing on prisoners staying in contracted out facilities. The majority of those are prison beds in county jails. These are used to relieve over crowding, house prisoners closer to trial location or otherwise reduce transport. In some places, counties run these as a revenue generator.

Would you take a wage cut down to $1 dollar a day?

And if so, would you still do that putting yourself into the shoes of the inmates who face grim job prospects as ex-felons when they get out regardless of their work history?

It is morally unacceptable that anyone can profit from slave labor in a free country. Moreover, it also hurts honest businesses who are required to pay their workers normal wages.

Change laws and punishments so that fewer crimes result in jail time or removal from the workforce, for example. Especially for non-violent crimes. Improve conditions for poor folks, the mentally ill, and so on.

Or perhaps make products that either aren't cost effective for market, or solely to serve food-banks or other charities?

I think that's essentially what's happening here.