Creating Serfs in the New Serfdom

The old Aristocracy had an entrenched way of keeping their field-hands, maids, and servants in their position for life. In 2012, how can the wealthy 1% of Americans keep a class of people from whom they rely on for operation & profit without letting them become anything more than what they are now? The United States never wants to admit we have such a class of people with little hope of advancing their station in life, but we do. Individuals in this class may be there due to poor decision making such as a drug or gambling addiction which prevents them from getting ahead. There are individuals that never get above impoverishment due to a variety of uncontrollable external environmental events, such as a child losing their family in a terrible accident.

What's society to do with these individuals? Profit from them of course! Enter the Prison system. Prisons have quietly become Big Business for the States, Federal Government, and Contractors. Prisons provide big returns on investment for local, state, and federal governments.

For example, the Wall Street Journal published a special section called The Journal Report: Investing in Energy on December 5, 2011. One article, "Energy Boomtown Tries Not to Blow It" highlights a small town called Fallon in Nevada's Churchill County investing wisely in its future. One of the first capital improvements the City of Fallon made to this town of 25,000 people was to spend $3.5 million to build a new juvenile detention center. The article reads "Besides meeting a demand for a local place to house at-risk youth rather than send them to other counties, Churchill County's 16-bed facility has enough extra beds to accommodate juveniles from other parts of Nevada......the juvenile center not only is bringing in new revenue but also has created 12 jobs, with the potential for more, says County Comptroller Alan Kalt."

I've read several articles where incarcerated men are trained to specialized work that used to be valid tradesman, such as restore classic cars. These classic cars are then sold to prison contractor executives for pennies on the dollar. If that isn't the beginning of a new Serf class, I don't know what is.