Abstract
With the explosion of mass incarceration since the 1970s, millions of Americans, particularly American of color, now hold a criminal record. This work investigates how a matrix of institutional restrictions racially restrict employment opportunities for those with a criminal record. Combining institutional analysis with field interviews it examines how misinformation spread by parole officers, driver’s license revocation laws, criminal background checks, employer’s socially constructed unwillingness to hire ex-offenders, criminal history-based employment and licensing restrictions, and negligent hiring statutes systematically exclude the criminalized from the mainstream economy. It then adopts a historical approach to investigate how this “lock out” system functioned in the 1960s, before the growth of information technology and incarceration rates. This work finds that while many elements of the lock out system predate the 1970s, the system has expanded and become increasingly racialized, restricting the employment opportunities of African Americans, and harming individuals, families and communities.