Good day Reader,
The shadow financial system of FPC Morgantown runs on pouches of mackerel. Sure, the fish. Very similar to any fiat, or valuable steel normal there is no such thing as a intrinsic worth to the forex, to the mackerel.
You is perhaps a sensible ass pondering to your self that absolutely you may eat the mackerel if you happen to needed and there’s some quantity of protein that some jail economist has a mannequin for deriving intrinsic worth primarily based on caloric density and protein richness. However alas, no.
A lot of the mackerel in circulation is so outdated that consuming it might most actually end in a go to to the medical station or worse a nasty case of the runs. Belief me after I say the final place you need to have the runs is in a communal rest room block that 100 different guys make use of as properly.
So no, the mackerel – often known as Macks – are actually not for consuming. However why mackerel? Why not rooster, salmon, tuna, or like different prisons, stamps? Stamps look like a extra logical selection, they’ve a number of face worth denominations, they’re a type of authorities tender, they’ve some worth on the skin, they’re arduous to counterfeit, they don’t go rancid after time, and within the phrases of the gentleman I met within the laundry room final evening “doggon thangs scent like pussy that gon’ rotten”.
Earlier than we are able to get into the explanation for “The Mack Customary” at FPC Morgantown allow us to study extra deeply the gray market forces at play by first understanding what the white market seems like.
Every prisoner has two methods to earn {dollars} whereas incarcerated. A pal or member of the family on the skin can “add cash to your books” – This implies they deposit a sum of cash into your prisoner belief fund account held by the BOP in your behalf.
The opposite approach is by incomes the {dollars} by your jail job. Every particular person in a Federal jail should have a job. The pay for these jobs vary from $0.20 to $1.00 an hour, so for sure if you happen to’re relying in your jail job solely to earn cash whereas inside there’s going to must be some creativity in your half.
What’s cash truly used for anyway? The place does one spend the cash they earn or that family and friends ship? Each week there’s a designated day that you’re allowed to “store” on the commissary.
You fill out a sheet such as you would have present in an outdated mail order catalog. You mark what merchandise you need after which amount you need. You then wait in line for over an hour whereas commissary staff collect the objects to be distributed.
You should purchase all types of things to make your keep in jail extra snug. Your sentence goes a lot smoother with restricted creature comforts in your aspect.
For instance, you should buy what prisoners name “greys” which is a gray sweatshirt and gray sweatpants so that in off hours you may take away your stiff uncomfortable uniform you may turn into one thing extra snug.
They promote snug sneakers so that in recreation time you may put on one thing aside from your heavy and mightily uncomfortable jail issued work boots. The commissary additionally sells shelf secure meals objects and snacks.
In fact, a very powerful shelf secure merchandise they promote are pouches of mackerel. One pouch goes for $1.40 – They was a greenback, however that’s inflation for you.
There are a number of different components of the white market jail financial system to concentrate on. These components actually drive the gray market in a jail.
The primary is every prisoner has a spending restrict imposed on them of $360 per thirty days. It isn’t too troublesome to hit that restrict.
A pill for watching rented motion pictures prices $148, a pair of sneakers $70, a pair of extra snug work boots $100. A pouch of Hen $4.00.
It’s important to be fairly strategic about what you purchase and when with the intention to be sure you don’t run over your allotted spending quantity too early within the month.
The second issue is the unreal limits positioned on sure objects. For instance, you may solely purchase as much as 10 pouches of tuna, or only one pocket book at a time, or solely 20 $0.78 stamps, or 10 $1.00 stamps.
Understanding these components of synthetic limits, inflated costs, and suppressed wages we are able to start to find why a gray market exists in each single jail establishment, globally.
There exists two major must prisoners collaborating within the financial system. The flexibility to beat the unreal limits imposed by the administration and the flexibility to earn greater than is feasible by their jail jobs alone.
Fairly frankly, it’s the identical wants and motivations that had been readily obvious and properly studied by economists through the reign of the Soviet Union. It’s the identical components and motivations that guarantee a thriving black and gray market in communist Cuba as we speak.
At any time when these kind of limits and restrictions are imposed throughout the in any other case free and unencumbered market by high down directors, market members discover a work-around.
That’s the reason the black/gray market is the biggest market on earth. It has nothing to do with criminality and all the pieces to do with trustworthy actors being pushed out of the permissioned system.
For the blokes who don’t have assistance on the skin, they should earn a living on the within – to complement the pittance they may earn from their jail job – as such, individuals run numerous hustles.
Some guys will do your laundry for you, working what basically quantities to a wash, dry, and fold service with pickup and supply. This normally runs for 1 mack per garment with some type of quantity low cost for big orders.
Some guys are cooks and can put together sizzling meals to promote proper from their cell like some type of meals stall in a 3rd world bazaar.
You may usually scent the (frankly scrumptious) scents radiating from the cooks makeshift kitchen (by the best way, there’s a type of symbiotic relationship with the chef and the laundry man. The chef hoards the iron to be used in cooking thereby limiting availability to iron your personal garments. The laundry man has the one different iron, so in order for you pressed clothes you should have interaction his companies).
The chef will usually have runners that take the new ready meals from cell to cell, gathering packets of mackerel as fee – a type of jail equal of Uber Eats. I’m positive they get some fee for this job they carry out.
In fact some guys function on the incorrect aspect of the “legislation” and promote contraband objects reminiscent of cell telephones, cigarettes, and vapes although I haven’t seen this personally but, I’ve heard of it throughout the jail.
Apparently the CO’s have heard about it too, as I’ve skilled two shakedowns (all of us are required to go away our residing space whereas a pair of CO’s search our cells and in all places else within the room together with air vents and lighting).
When sports activities video games are on the TV there will likely be bookmakers and gamblers making an attempt out their luck at a mackerel windfall. Identical to on the skin individuals will do what they should do to make a buck – or a mack.
For the blokes who do have assistance on the skin and cash flowing onto their books they’ve barely completely different motivations.
Some simply need to have the ability to buy greater than the unreal limits enable for. Some are required by their sentence to pay fines or restitution and in the event that they place an excessive amount of cash on their books, the quantity they are going to be required to repay every month will improve, so it makes monetary sense for them to maintain their books gentle on money, and deal with solely mackerel. Form of like the best way on the skin a businessman will preserve their taxable revenue as little as doable (assume Jeff Bezos famously being paid a wage of $1.00).
And a few simply need to nook the Keebler Chocolate Cookie market (a very talked-about merchandise, by the best way) and grow to be the go to market maker for that product.
Regardless of the motivations or needs, people make rational choices in their very own financial self pursuits, being institutionalized in a jail is not going to change that. Actually, it can amplify it.
Profitable hustler will accrue a considerable amount of macks whereas in jail. What do they do with it? You might be questioning how they convert a few of that to “actual cash”.
Like each different financial system there are forex converters / cash changers, and in a jail full of extremely educated white collar criminals, it seems to be a reasonably refined operation.
I actually haven’t participated within the hustle and bustle. I’ve solely been right here lengthy sufficient to buy at commissary as soon as, and I used to be in a position to purchase all the pieces I wanted with out breaking the spending limits or merchandise limits. So whereas I have no idea precisely how this half works I’ve some inkling of an understanding.
From what I collect changing Macks to {Dollars} works by the client of the macks getting an affiliate on the skin to ship the vendor of the macks USD by way of Money App or by depositing cash onto their books instantly utilizing one thing like Western Union.
Like all economies there’s a point of barter that happens within the jail system.
Some guys refuse to trouble with Macks and as a substitute will commerce with increased worth rooster, or soda, or flaming sizzling Cheetos, all of it will depend on who you might be coping with and what they need. All the pieces is all the time open to negotiation.
Nevertheless, barter quickly turns into ineffective at scale and forex have to be utilized. Very similar to all economies, what’s used as forex is mostly nugatory – be it paper, steel, or pukka shells – however there’s a type of shared acceptance (or delusion) that the factor we select represents some type of worth that all of us can agree on.
In FPC Morgantown, that’s pouches of Mackerel, and they’re value roughly $1.00
As we shut this letter allow us to return to our unique query. Why Macks? Why not stamps?
The brief reply is I don’t know. I’ve theories however I’m not sure. My greatest principle to date is 1) Most individuals don’t truly need to eat the mackerel, so that they keep in circulation longer than one thing fascinating like rooster which extra individuals need to eat; 2) There seems to be no restrict on what number of mackerel pouches you should buy from the commissary.
From what I collect, stamps are all the time restricted – in truth, most issues are – however not mackerel pouches. I believe these two observations are what lead my forefather prisoners to discovered a whole shadow financial system primarily based on the Mackerel Customary.
As I write this it’s December twenty sixth, The day after Christmas. My eighth evening as a prisoner. It hasn’t taken lengthy to begin seeing the best way issues actually work, the best way the actual financial system capabilities, the best way people will adapt to any scenario we discover ourselves in.
Identical to on the skin there are winners and losers, moguls and paupers, blue collar and white collar.
However in contrast to the skin, there’s a shared camaraderie between the lessons and strata of prisoner, an “us versus them” undertone, prisoner versus cop.
Merry Christmas everybody. I want I used to be there to have fun with my household and with you.
Keonne Rodriguez
Write to Keonne:
Keonne Rodriguez
11404-511
FPC Morgantown
FEDERAL PRISON CAMP
P.O. BOX 1000
MORGANTOWN, WV 26507
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This can be a visitor submit by Keonne Rodriguez. Opinions expressed are fully their very own and don’t essentially mirror these of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Journal.