Post-prison Employment Quality and Future Criminal Justice Contact

Figure 2.

Effect of High-Quality Versus Low-Quality Employment on Future Criminal Justice Contact

Source: Author's compilation from data from the Michigan Unemployment Insurance Agency and the Michigan Workforce Development Agency.

Note: These figures represent estimates of the effect of finding employment after release from prison in an industry that offers high-quality employment (relative to finding employment in an industry that offers low-quality employment) on the cumulative likelihood of experiencing an arrest (left panel) or returning to prison (right panel) in each of the eight quarters after finding employment. High-quality industries include manufacturing, transportation and warehousing, construction, educational services, and mining; low-quality industries include services to buildings and dwellings, employment services, arts-entertainment-recreation, accommodation and food services, and other services. Estimates are expressed in percentage points, with negative values indicating reduced future criminal justice contact for those who find high-quality employment. The estimates with solid-line confidence intervals represent the naïve difference in future criminal justice contact between those who find high- and low-quality employment. The estimates with dashed-line confidence intervals represent the estimated difference in future criminal justice contact between those who find high- and low-quality employment that accounts for differential selection into employment quality using inverse propensity score weighting.