PRI Chapter 24: $4.89 Million in Profits

The atmosphere in the prison at year's end was much more relaxed than usual.

Because the warden had specifically instructed that on New Year's Eve, the cafeteria TV volume should be turned up, while the prison's speakers continuously played music from the afternoon onwards.

The prisoners only worked half a day today. After lunch, they could freely walk in the exercise yard, work out in the gym, and participate in the evening's New Year activities.

And when evening dinner came, everyone could additionally enjoy Texas-style meat patties.

In fact, even though Lind wasn't used to celebrating New Year's Day and preferred Spring Festival, it didn't prevent him from adapting to local customs.

Especially since this was the millennium New Year.

After all, it was extraordinarily meaningful.

Although the prison couldn't be like New York's Times Square where everyone gathered to wait for the crystal ball drop, they had their own way of celebrating.

Such as drinking, dancing, and having a good meal.

Meanwhile, Angelina and some guards were even given the afternoon off, allowed to go home and celebrate with their families.

However, Angelina declined this offer because she had no family in Val Verde County.

In the evening, she and Lind stood on the unopened third floor of the prison block, overlooking the scene on the second floor.

The second floor was now bustling with activity. The usually vicious criminals were all participating in the prison's New Year activities.

Simply put, several different mini-game areas had been set up. Prisoners could get 1 point just by participating in each, and 5 points if they won.

After game time ended, they could use points for a lottery.

Every 5 points got one draw. Prizes included major rewards like free bed space and free headphones, with durations ranging from one day to one month.

The prisoners played happily. Except for a few antisocial types, everyone basically tried all the games.

Evan was naturally among them. With his excellent strength control, he won the game of throwing ping pong balls into beer bottles.

Combined with points from participating in other games, he could draw prizes twice.

However, after drawing two prizes, he wasn't very satisfied.

Because he got 1 day free bed space and 3 days of roasted chicken leg meals.

Although roasted chicken legs weren't bad, they paled in comparison to the major prizes.

Especially when the major prize winner was his new friend from the factory, Woody, who came in for theft.

Evan had to admit he was a little jealous.

Of course, he wasn't the only one.

When they heard Woody had drawn a one-month free bed space voucher, all prisoners showed envious looks.

You should know that in Border Prison, bed space was the most expensive thing at $10 per day. Many prisoners couldn't afford to sleep in one daily despite working desperately hard.

So to sleep in a bed with a mattress, prisoners either spent their savings or signed loan contracts with the prison.

They would pay back the money when they had the ability in the future.

So being able to sleep in a bed for free for one month was equivalent to saving $300.

This money might not buy much outside, but in prison, it was enough for a prisoner to eat and drink well for quite a while.

Watching the lucky winners who drew major prizes cheer excitedly, Lind standing upstairs was also very satisfied.

He didn't expect prisoners to have any sense of belonging or cohesion. He did this just to make prisoners more motivated.

If the prison atmosphere always remained serious and deadly, then prisoners would only think about escaping.

So on designated holidays, giving these workhorses some relaxation time not only made them work harder in the following period but also let them see some hope for the future.

People, as long as they had a little hope, could convince themselves to keep living.

You should know that suicide rates in prisons were very high. Many prisons spent considerable medical and public relations fees dealing with prisoner suicide issues every year.

Lind didn't want Border Prison to fall into such a vicious cycle, so maintaining good prison atmosphere was very important.

Additionally, although such activities couldn't increase prisoners' fear values, they could increase guards' loyalty.

After all, everyone liked working for a boss with human touch.

Lind took a rough look. Currently, the guard with the highest loyalty in the prison was Andy, followed by James, Carter, Cohen and others.

As for Angelina?

He glanced at the busty woman beside him. Her loyalty was still stuck at 30, very stable.

Feeling Lind's gaze, Angelina also turned her head, "What's wrong, Warden?"

"A New Year gift for you." Lind took out a small pink package from his pocket and handed it to her.

"What's this?" Angelina excitedly opened it directly and found it was Dior lipstick.

"Thank you, Warden!" She showed a big smile.

"No need to thank me." Lind looked at the loyalty value on the panel.

Even though her weakness clearly stated she liked cosmetics, it only increased by 1 point. He didn't know if she truly liked it or was just being perfunctory.

Anyway, extracted employees wouldn't decrease loyalty for any reason.

He'd send a little something every day from now on. Sooner or later he'd feed this little bitch with cosmetics until her loyalty was maxed!

After the New Year mini-activities ended and prisoners returned to their cells to sleep, Lind also returned to his office to check the technician's work.

Although the New Year was worth celebrating, the Y2K problem also needed vigilance.

Lind had specifically hired a technician to safeguard the prison's systems.

Fortunately, everything went smoothly. All data transitioned smoothly after the New Year.

Except for the prisoners' wages.

According to regulations, prisoners in the prison earned $1.25 per hour.

The government would pay a wage fee monthly based on the prison's prisoner count.

Like Lind's Border Prison, which currently had 64 prisoners, if all prisoners worked 8 hours daily, the monthly wage payment would be $20,000.

After Lind secretly altered the prison wages, each prisoner's hourly wage became $12.5.

As soon as the government transferred December's wage settlement in January, he could make a bloody profit of $100,000.

As for the government later realizing and pursuing repayment?

No problem. Lind could always find reasons to drag it out slowly. After dragging it out for several years and slowly repaying, this money wouldn't amount to much.

After the New Year, the prison returned to its bustling work state.

January 7th.

Lind received the December prisoner payment from the government. Thanks to Avery's help, Border Prison's payment calculation was based on half light-sentence prisoners and half heavy-sentence prisoners.

That was $580,000.

Plus $100,000 in wage payments, $100,000 in Y2K technical subsidies, and other small subsidy income, Lind now had over $800,000 in hand.

After repaying $500,000 to the bank, the system's task panel finally updated.

[Task 1: Earn $500,000 within 30 days to repay the first loan installment. Reward: Random production line blueprint]

[Task completed]

[Reward: Electronic ankle monitor production line blueprint]

After seeing the reward blueprint, Lind couldn't help but click his tongue. Making prisoners produce things to shackle themselves seemed a bit too ironic.

However, he really liked this reward.

Because although electronic ankle monitors had high costs, their prices were even higher.

According to the blueprint's production line, manufacturing a basic electronic ankle monitor cost $50, but the selling price was as high as $200.

If manufacturing the high-end version that cost $150, the price could reach over $700.

Moreover, electronic ankle monitors could also provide rental services at $5-20 per day, with costs recoverable in as little as 5 days.

So Lind immediately decided to implement this blueprint.

Later he could open an electronic ankle monitor rental company outside the prison, which would probably make quite a bit of money.

Putting away the blueprint, Lind continued looking at the prison panel.

[Border Prison (BP)]

[Level: F]

[Staff: 18 people (12 guards, 2 cooks, 1 doctor, 1 HR, 1 maintenance worker, 1 secretary)]

[Prisoners: 64 people (50 light-sentence prisoners, 14 heavy-sentence prisoners)]

[Profit value: $4.89 million/year]

[Deterrence value: 34]

The prison's profit value was finally no longer in a deficit state, even reaching over $4 million.

This was all thanks to the headphone production line and government prisoner subsidies.

From this, you could see just how profitable private prisons were. This was still a prison holding only 300 people. If it were a prison holding 1,500 people, Lind would immediately become one of America's invisible tycoons.

After being happy for a while, Lind opened the task list.

He found that all tasks had been completely updated.

As for the rewards...

Lind suddenly widened his eyes, "God, what is this!"

[NEXT CHAPTER]