Trade in Everything: Prisoners (Again)
The proposal to send certain California inmates to Mexican prisons doesn't seem to have gone anywhere, but it appears that there is, in fact, a market for trade in prison services, as the Economist reports:
THE border between Belgium and the Netherlands can be easy to miss: a road sign here, a flagpole there, a change in the colour of cars’ licence plates. When it comes to penal policies, though, the neighbours differ sharply. The Dutch prison population has been falling for some years and, with 14,000 cells for 12,000 prisoners, the government last year decided to close eight jails. But in Belgium the numbers locked up keep rising, causing serious overcrowding.
On February 5th this year, the Dutch and Belgian governments drew the logical conclusion, and agreed on a deal. Belgium took possession of the Dutch prison of Tilburg, a modern affair with tennis courts and a football pitch but a chronic shortage of residents.
For a rent of €30m a year, 500 Belgian prisoners now live behind Tilburg’s barbed wire. The governor is Belgian, most of the guards are Dutch. ...