In one sense this is a distributional issue, hurting the families of the convicted, who are likely to be relatively poor by US (but not global) standards. That would argue against it being high priority, as one might instead lobby for more progressive US policies, which is also not priority for reasons often discussed.
Although I guess you might could make the case that US long term prisoners themselves are among the worst off people in the world?
Anyways there may be an important efficiency issue here: prisoners are charged well above (the near 0) cost per call, so they will “under-consume” communication with families. And these communications might have very large benefits for the psychological well being of prisoners and their families and maybe their reintegration into society?
In one sense this is a distributional issue, hurting the families of the convicted, who are likely to be relatively poor by US (but not global) standards. That would argue against it being high priority, as one might instead lobby for more progressive US policies, which is also not priority for reasons often discussed.
Although I guess you might could make the case that US long term prisoners themselves are among the worst off people in the world?
Anyways there may be an important efficiency issue here: prisoners are charged well above (the near 0) cost per call, so they will “under-consume” communication with families. And these communications might have very large benefits for the psychological well being of prisoners and their families and maybe their reintegration into society?