“Bianca Tylek and Worth Rises have spent years exposing the immoral profiteering by companies feasting at the trough of incarceration. Now, in one brilliant, accessible volume, The Prison Industry, they call out the evildoers — naming names, revealing their schemes and bottom lines, while sharing ideas on how to fight back. This is an indispensable volume for anyone ready to tackle the carceral dragon in our midst.”
the prison Industry: How It Works and Who Profits
A meticulous exposé of who profits from incarceration, culminating in a compelling case for abolition
Based on years of research by Worth Rises, The Prison Industry maps the range of ways in which private corporations, often with their government partners, make money off incarceration. It further details the gross extraction of wealth from incarcerated people and their families, who have been brutalized by over-policing, mass incarceration, and mass surveillance.
Chapters on labor, telecom, healthcare, community corrections, and more explore the origin story of privatization for each sector and how much money is in it for the corporations involved. Stretching far beyond private prisons to look at all the sectors that benefit from incarceration, the authors illuminate the methods used to extract resources from public coffers and communities, which corporations are most active and how they partner with governments, and the harms these profit-based approaches to justice cause people, families, and communities.
Ultimately, The Prison Industry makes a compelling case for dismantling the prison industry and prison abolition more broadly. It serves as a tool for the tearing down of our wholly oppressive carceral system — the ashes of which we can use to create a better world built on care, not cages.
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powerful narratives and meticulous analysis
“Many know that corporate interests corrupt the contemporary American prison system, but Bianca Tylek and Worth Rises take an extra step to detail exactly how these interests manifest. With powerful narratives and meticulous analysis, The Prison Industry is an essential read for anyone committed to challenging how American prisons operate and dismantling the industry of oppression that sustains them.” — Dwayne Betts, founder of Freedom Reads and author of Felon
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naming names and revealing their schemes
“Bianca Tylek and Worth Rises have spent years exposing the immoral profiteering by companies feasting at the trough of incarceration. Now, in one brilliant, accessible volume, The Prison Industry, they call out the evildoers — naming names, revealing their schemes and bottom lines, while sharing ideas on how to fight back. This is an indispensable volume for anyone ready to tackle the carceral dragon in our midst.” — James Kilgore, author of Understanding Mass Incarceration
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an encyclopedia of corporate greed
“The Prison Industry is an essential resource for anyone who cares about the human impacts of criminalization. Packed with concise information, charts, resources, and personal narratives, it is not afraid to name names as it calls out the cruelty of corporations and state actors in every aspect of the prison industry. This book is simultaneously an encyclopedia of corporate greed, an exposé of the cruelty of incarceration, and a clarion call for change.” — Jocelyn Simonson, law professor and author of Radical Acts of Justice
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the profiteering at the heart of mass incarceration
“This is an essential resource for those working to dismantle the prison industrial complex and anyone who wants to understand the profiteering at the heart of mass incarceration.” — Alex Vitale, sociology professor and author of The End of Policing
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a blueprint for dismantling the prison industry
“With the election of would-be authoritarian politicians, the stock prices of companies across the carceral state consistently soar. Bianca Tylek peels back the curtain on the U.S. prison industry. She shows how it extracts so much from the incarcerated and their families, leaving devastation in its wake. Her cross-sectoral analysis of the companies that benefit is simultaneously a blueprint for dismantling it.” — Zachary Norris, co-founder of Restore Oakland
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the evil connection between money and the carceral system
“Bianca Tylek, in both her work and her book, has done more to lift the veil on the evil connection between money and the carceral system than anyone. If you want to understand how money drives policy and harms families caught in the maw of the system, read The Prison Industry.” — Vincent Schiraldi, corrections official and author of Mass Supervision
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the profiteering that determines nearly every decision
“This is an essential book. Worth Rises is a small organization, but it has done profound work to help us all understand the scope of the profiteering and corruption that determines nearly every decision in the prison industry. And it is leading the fights against the commercialization of marginalized people’s bodies and families. Everyone should read this.” — Alec Karakatsanis, founder of Civil Rights Corps and author of Copaganda
Book Events
Bianca is currently on a book tour across the U.S. From New York to Los Angeles and Chicago to Miami, Bianca is on the road talking about The Prison Industry.
Looking for a book talk? Check out the Worth Rises event calendar.
If you would like to host a book event and have Bianca speak, please complete the contact form.
This discussion guide provides a starting point for educators, students, and other groups looking to engage in thoughtful reflection and dialogue about the content presented in The Prison Industry: How It Work and Who Profits. It offers critical questions for each sector chapter about what got us to this moment in history as well as how we might envision a new, more liberatory society. Many of the question posed do not have black or white answers or, in some cases, even right or wrong answers, but rather challenge readers to think critically about the world we live in and want to live in.
This guide is designed for ages 12 and up.
Discussion GUide
