McDonald’s uses prison labor to produce and process some of its food, including the beef for hamburger patties, bread, milk and chicken products.

Another fast food restaurant increasing profits through prison labor is Wendy’s, who uses prisoners to process beef for their hamburgers.

While Wal-Mart already gets criticized for the wages it pays employees, the corporation also exploits low-wage workers by using inmates to clean products of UPC bar codes so the items can be resold.

Despite many people seeing Starbucks as a corporation who works to respect employees, a subcontractor used by Starbucks, Signature Packaging Solutions, uses inmates in Washington state to package holiday coffee for the company.

Sprint is already known to outsource many of their call centers overseas, but another way the company keeps costs low is by “insourcing” call centers to inmates who can also provide cheap labor.

Sprint is not alone.  Verizon is another cell phone service provider who uses inmates to provide telecommunication services.

As if using female inmates from South Carolina to sew products sold by the chain was not enough, the store also reportedly uses inmates to remove “made in” tags from other countries from their products and replace them with “Made in USA” tags.

JC Penney sell jeans made by Tennessee inmates.

Kmart sell jeans made by Tennessee inmates.

When you make a reservation with American Airlines, you could be speaking to an inmate hired by the companies to take reservations.

When you make a reservation with Avis, you could be speaking to an inmate hired by the companies to take reservations.