The reductions were prompted by a Federal Communication Commission decision last year that cut prison phone rates by more than 50%. Phone calls: ‘the thread holding the relationship together’“For children and loved ones of incarcerated people, a phone call isn’t just small talk. If her dad didn’t have the money on his books, she often relied on his parents, her grandparents, for phone money. “If phone calls would have been more affordable, it would have made my transition to adulthood much easier.”Without money, phone calls are impossibleThe recent FCC setbacks affect low-income households the most. Even now, activists recall this report’s importance, because it traced high phone rates to the commissions paid to prisons and jails.