[k_sh]

> It's not like we pay the police $2,000 for each arrest

Not in a direct sense - but civil asset forfeiture and arrest/citation quotas do incentivize individual officers to take actions that benefit their department's budget and their annual review, respectively.

> It's not like we [...] pay the prison $500/night per inmate

In the case of private prisons (which house 8% of the US prison population[0]), a per-prisoner stipend is the most popular[1] business model.

The government quite literally pays the prison company a fixed dollar amount per inmate-night, which the company then turns a profit on.

[0]: https://reason.org/wp-content/uploads/files/comparing_correc...

[1]: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/062215/busin...

[eridius]

I don't understand why for-profit prisons even exist. It just sets up perverse incentives and encourages unnecessary incarceration.

[everdev]

True, but the reference is to Riker's island which is a public prison.