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One in Five: How Mass Incarceration Deepens Inequality and Harms Public Safety

By Nazgol Ghandnoosh, Ph.D., Luke Trinka and Celeste Barry

The final installment of the "One in Five" series explores a key driver of disparity in imprisonment: laws and policies that exacerbate inequality and disproportionately overburden communities of color.

Related to: Racial Justice, Incarceration, Sentencing Reform, Voting Rights, Youth Justice, Collateral Consequences

Executive Summary

As noted in the first installment of this One in Five series,1 scholars have declared a “generational shift” in the lifetime likelihood of imprisonment for Black men, from a staggering one in three for those born in 1981 to a still troubling one in five for Black men born in 2001.2

The Sentencing Project’s One in Five series has documented the important inroads that reforms have made in reducing both the overall level of incarceration and its racial disparities. Specifically, the United States experienced a 24% decline in its prison population between 2009, its peak year, and 2022.3 While all major racial and ethnic groups experienced decarceration, the Black prison population has downsized the most.4 But with the prison population in 2022 nearly six times as large as 50 years ago and Black Americans still imprisoned at nearly five times the rate of whites, the crisis of mass incarceration and its racial injustice remain undeniable.5 What’s more, the progress made so far is at risk of stalling or being reversed.

The previous installment of the One in Five series examined three drivers of racial disparity from within the criminal legal system: disparate racial impact of laws and policies, racial bias in the discretion of criminal legal professionals, and resource allocation decisions that disadvantage low-income people.6 This final installment of the series presents a fourth driver of disparity in imprisonment which relates to the damaging consequences of criminal legal contact—contact that is disproportionately experienced by communities of color.

Specifically, this report explores laws and policies that exacerbate socioeconomic inequalities by 1) imposing financial burdens and collateral consequences on people with criminal convictions and 2) diverting public resources from effective interventions to promote public safety. For example:

  • Fines, fees, and predatory pricing exacerbate the economic precarity of justice-involved Americans and their families. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has noted that predatory monetary practices exist at every phase of the criminal legal process.7
  • Employment during incarceration comes with low, and sometimes zero, wages. The ACLU and the Global Human Rights Clinic of the University of Chicago Law School have found that the average minimum wage for the most common forms of prison labor is $0.13/ hour, and the average maximum is $0.52/ hour.8
  • A criminal conviction creates lifelong barriers to securing steady employment and housing, and many states disqualify people with felony drug convictions from cash assistance and food stamps. Nearly all states also restrict voting rights for people with criminal convictions. Yet research has shown that post-incarceration employment, access to food stamps, and voting are associated with lower recidivism rates.9
  • Finally, the high cost of mass incarceration comes at the expense of investing in effective crime prevention and drug treatment programs—for both incarcerated individuals and the broader public.

These laws and policies exacerbate the marginalization of justice-involved people—who are disproportionately people of color—by eroding the economic and social buffers against crime and increasing the likelihood of police contact. Fortunately, jurisdictions around the country have initiated promising reforms to reduce the direct and indirect harms of criminal convictions and redirect resources to more effective interventions:

  • To reduce the financial burdens of incarceration and promote beneficial contact with support networks, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Minnesota have made all phone calls from their prisons free. Massachusetts, New York City and several California counties have done the same for their jails.
  • To end the injustices associated with prison labor, Colorado amended its constitution and removed language allowing “slavery and involuntary servitude” in the case of punishment for a crime. Advocates are still working to ensure that this change bans forced and unpaid labor among incarcerated workers.
  • To reduce labor market discrimination resulting from a criminal record, a majority of states and many cities ‘Ban the Box’—removing the question about conviction history from initial job applications and delaying a background check until later in the hiring process. In addition, a majority of states no longer impose bans on food stamps or cash assistance for people with a felony drug conviction. Finally, Washington, DC, has joined Maine, Vermont, and Puerto Rico in fully untangling voting rights from criminal legal involvement by permitting its prison population to vote.
  • The federal government and states are also increasing investments in crime prevention. Congress has restored Pell eligibility to people in prison. California voters approved Proposition 47 in 2014, reducing prison admissions and redirecting a significant portion of state prison savings to investments including mental health and substance abuse treatment. Oregonians approved Measure 110 in 2020, decriminalizing possession of small quantities of all drugs and dedicating more resources to treatment and recovery services.

In addition, the reduction of many forms of criminal legal contact—including youth arrests and misdemeanor convictions—will itself improve public safety, by limiting the harms associated with this contact.

But there remains great resistance to these common-sense reforms and their needed expansion. For example, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin rolled back an automatic voting rights restoration process that had been used by his predecessors for over a decade. In addition, years after Colorado legislators sought to end “slavery and involuntary servitude” as punishment for a crime, incarcerated individuals continue to be forced to work under threats of punishment.10 Eliminating racial disparities in incarceration will require addressing these sources of inequality by limiting the socioeconomic disadvantage and marginalization resulting from a criminal conviction and dramatically increasing investments in effective public safety programs.

Introduction: How Socioeconomic Disparities Fuel Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Imprisonment

Experience with socioeconomic disadvantage is common among many people in prisons, where over two-thirds (69%) of the population are people of color.11 In 2016, nearly two-thirds of imprisoned individuals had not completed high school, 17% had spent time in the foster care system, and 14% reported being homeless in the year before their arrest.12 Prior installments of the One in Five series examined three key ways that socioeconomic inequality, in addition to racial bias and racially disparate laws and policies, contribute to racial disparities in imprisonment:

  • Spatially-concentrated urban poverty resulting from longstanding and ongoing segregation, discrimination, and disinvestment contribute to higher rates of homicide offending and victimization among certain communities of color.11 Specifically, Black Americans were 9.3 times as likely as whites to be homicide victims in 2020, American Indians were 4.3 times as likely, and Latinxs were 1.9 times as likely, based on age-adjusted figures.14
  • The large footprint of policing—particularly on Black Americans— is in part a failed response to racial disparities in serious crimes.15  For example, police officers’ reliance on millions of minor traffic stops annually as a pretext to investigate drivers for criminal activity disproportionately impacts Black and Latinx drivers. Among those they pull over, police are more likely to search Black and Latinx drivers than whites.16 But police are often less likely to find drugs or weapons among the Black and Latinx drivers who they search, compared to whites.17
  • A financially burdensome and under-resourced criminal legal system puts people with low incomes, who are disproportionately people of color, at a disadvantage.6 For example, pretrial release often requires cash bail which disadvantages low-income people of color and increases the pressure to take a less favorable plea deal. In addition, state indigent defense programs are critically underfunded.

This installment of the One in Five series explores how criminal legal contact exacerbates the marginalization of justice-involved people—who are disproportionately people of color—by further eroding the economic and social buffers against crime, and increasing the likelihood of police contact. One illustration of this impact is the finding among researchers that mass incarceration increased the U.S. poverty rate by at least 20% between 1980 and 2004.19 This report examines the mechanisms producing outcomes such as this and highlights reforms seeking to end these injustices and improve public safety.

Revising Policies That Exacerbate Socioeconomic Inequalities and Redirecting Public Spending Toward Crime Prevention and Drug Treatment

While the criminal legal system is not well-positioned to address the socioeconomic inequality that contributes to differential crime rates, it should not aggravate these problems. Advocates have had success in downsizing criminal penalties and redirecting savings towards community safety, as well as limiting the collateral consequences of criminal convictions and associated fines and fees.

Limiting Fines and Fees

The Department of Justice recommends alleviating the burden of fines and fees by creating penalty-free payment plans or amnesty periods where individuals can have such outstanding debt waived, as some jurisdictions have done.51 For example, Minnesota and Iowa are advancing debt relief by setting up a payment plan for overdue court debt to help drivers avoid license suspension.52 Atlanta and Milwaukee are experimenting with warrant clearances that allow those with outstanding minor offenses and traffic violations to resolve their cases without risk of arrest or failure-to-appear fees.52 San Francisco Superior Court no longer suspends defendants’ driver’s licenses for their failure to pay fines and fees.52

Other measures address high costs during incarceration. Signed into law in 2023, the Martha Wright-Reed Just and Reasonable Communications Act expands the Federal Communications Commission’s power to reduce the exorbitant phone and video call costs for incarcerated people and their families.55 California, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Minnesota have made all calls from their prisons free; Massachusetts, New York City and several California counties have done the same for their jails, and the organization Worth Rises is pursuing similar reforms around the country.56 By helping people to stay connected with their families and support networks, these reforms will support rehabilitation and reentry.57

Pushing for Fair Wages

Incarcerated workers produce goods and services amounting to over $11 billion every year, yet they remain unfairly compensated for their labor, with average nominal wages even lower today than they were in 2001.58 There is some hope for reform as momentum builds to right this wrong. The Fair Wages for Incarcerated Workers Act, introduced by Senator Cory Booker in 2023, would extend the protections of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, including a federal minimum wage, to incarcerated workers.59

In 2018, Colorado became the first state to amend its state constitution and remove language allowing “slavery and involuntary servitude” as punishment for a crime.60 Similar constitutional amendments have passed in Utah, Nebraska, Vermont, Oregon, Alabama, and Tennessee, and residents of Nevada and California are expected to vote on like-minded revisions in 2024.61 If duly implemented, these amendments would ban forced and unpaid labor among incarcerated workers; however a class action lawsuit filed in Colorado in 2022 highlights that incarcerated individuals there continue to be forced to work under threats of punishment including losing family contact privileges and being moved into solitary confinement.62

Limiting the Collateral Consequences of Criminal Convictions

Employment

To reduce employment barriers for those with criminal records, many states have revised their occupational licensing requirements.63 In addition, 37 states, 150 cities and counties, and the federal government have passed laws or issued administrative orders to “Ban the Box”—removing the question about conviction history from initial job applications and delaying a background check until later in the hiring process.64 These fair-chance reforms often apply only to public sector employers, but the National Employment Law Project reports that many states—including Hawaii, Illinois, and Washington—and cities and counties—including Los Angeles and Waterloo, IA—extend these laws to private sector employers as well.65 California law also now allows people with most felony convictions to automatically seal their records if they complete all terms of their sentence and remain conviction-free for at least four years, so that it does not appear on criminal background checks.66 Nearly all states have some policy in place that allows for sealing or expunging one’s record.67 However, the onerous filing fees and long processing times associated with the process often limit these policies’ impacts.68

While some studies suggest that employers discriminate more against all Black job applicants without information about who has a criminal record, some experts emphasize the benefits for the vast numbers of Black job seekers who have criminal records and call for other reforms to tackle broader forms of hiring bias.69

Social Welfare

Advocates have also been successful in removing another barrier to reentry, which primarily affect low-income women of color: denial of federal cash assistance and food stamp benefits for people convicted in state or federal courts of felony drug offenses.70 The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act that created the ban also permitted states to opt out or modify its terms. As of December 2023, 29 states and Washington, DC, do not impose bans on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits for people with a felony drug conviction and 25 states and the District allow people with felony drug convictions to access Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) benefits.71 Advocates continue to seek to fully eliminate these restrictions at the federal level, through the RESTORE Act and reforms to the Agriculture Improvement Act (known as the Farm Bill).72

Housing

Advocates are also addressing housing insecurity for people with criminal histories in private and public housing markets. In 2011, the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) began urging public housing authorities to broaden admission criteria to help people released from prison reunite with their families, and later prevented the use of arrest records for screening residents.73 In 2016, HUD advised providers in public and private markets that issuing blanket bans on people with criminal histories violates the Fair Housing Act and provided guidance to those who continue criminal records screening.74 In 2022, HUD advised private housing providers to not use criminal histories to screen tenants for housing due to their racially disparate impact and because criminal histories are not reliable predictors of whether someone will be a good tenant.75 Lawsuits in New York City, Chicago, and enforcement actions by federal and state agencies in Louisiana, Connecticut, and Virginia have also tackled discriminatory screening policies. New Jersey now bans landlords from asking about criminal histories until after they have conditionally approved a housing application, narrows how far back a record can be used as a basis for a denial, and requires that they explain any subsequent rejection in writing and give potential tenants an opportunity to respond.76

Voting Rights

States are also reinstating voting rights and improving democratic representation. Since 1997, 26 states have expanded voting rights to people with felony convictions. As a result, over two million Americans have regained the right to vote.77 Washington, DC, has joined Maine, Vermont, and Puerto Rico in permitting people in prison to vote.78

But 4.6 million Americans—most of whom are not incarcerated—remain barred from voting due to a felony conviction.79 And the hard-won reinstatement of voting rights is precarious in some states. For example, over a million people were expected to regain their voting rights after Floridians overwhelmingly passed Amendment 4 in 2018, allowing most people who had completed their sentences to vote. But the state legislature and governor undermined this referendum by conditioning re-enfranchisement on the payment of court-ordered monetary sanctions, blocking access to the majority of those whose voting rights had been restored.80 In Virginia, Governor Glenn Youngkin rolled back an automatic voting rights restoration process that had been used by his predecessors for over a decade.81

In August 2023, advocacy organizers, academics, researchers, communications specialists, and more gathered together at The Sentencing Project’s Civic Power 2023 Convening to build momentum on recent efforts to expand the vote and challenge fifty years of mass incarceration.

In addition, in the absence of corrective action by the U.S. Census Bureau, several states have taken action against prison gerrymandering by counting imprisoned people as residents of their home address – often located in urban areas – rather than their prisons—which are often located in rural areas. The switch in how incarcerated people are counted influences financial and Congressional apportionments and thus helps prevent the dilution of the political power of communities most impacted by incarceration.82

Contracting Criminal Penalties and Expanding Community Resources

In two states, voter referendums led to contraction of criminal penalties and reinvestment of funds that would have been used for incarceration. First, California voters in November 2014 approved Proposition 47, which reclassified a number of low-level offenses from felonies to misdemeanors. This reform reduced the state’s overall level of arrests, jail bookings, and incarceration.83 It also allocated a significant portion of state prison savings each year to preventing crime from happening in the first place.84 This includes investments in mental health and substance abuse treatment, programs to reduce school truancy and prevent dropouts, and support for victim services. More recently, Oregon voters approved Measure 110 in 2020, decriminalizing possession of small quantities of all drugs and applying the state’s marijuana tax revenues to expand treatment and recovery services.85 However, Oregon’s delayed rollout of treatment services as part of Measure 110 has led to calls for the law to be repealed and has elicited concerns from some states considering similar reforms.86

In 2021 and 2022, Congress and federal agencies also increased investments in harm reduction and community-based violence interruption programs.87 But the balance of public investments remains heavily in favor of punishment over prevention and some public health approaches have not been sustained.

Investing in Justice-Impacted People’s Health and Education

The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy is encouraging states to use Medicaid funds to provide mental health and drug treatment in jails and prisons.88 A 2018 federal law allowed states to reconnect incarcerated people with Medicaid benefits, and California is the first to adopt the change, by providing certain Medicaid benefits to incarcerated individuals 90 days prior to their release.89 The First Step Act of 2018 requires the federal Bureau of Prisons to expand access to medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD). However, the agency has struggled with implementation.90 Rhode Island has led the nation in providing MOUD to its incarcerated population.91

The main educational investments have come in the form of college access. The Second Chance Pell pilot program created in 2015 allows colleges and universities to offer incarcerated students Pell-Grant-funded postsecondary education. In 2020, Congress restored Pell eligibility to people in prison, with broad eligibility having begun in summer 2023.92 Likewise, the criminal history question was removed from the Common Application for undergraduate admission in 2018, although individual universities often still make this inquiry.93

Scaling Back Criminal Legal Contact to Promote Public Safety

Policymakers can improve public safety, as discussed above, by reducing the financial burdens and collateral consequences associated with a criminal conviction, and by making better crime prevention investments. It is important to note that scaling back criminal legal contact itself would also improve public safety:

  • The arrest rate for youth under age 18 peaked in 1996 and has declined by more than 80% since94—a decline which both reflects and will reinforce the decline in youth crime. Numerous studies have found that police contact during adolescence – not only arrests, but also police stops and warnings—increases the likelihood of future delinquency and violence, particularly when the young people view the police contact as unjust.95 For instance, a 2020 study examining youth in Chicago found that the odds of committing any delinquent or violent acts were 44% to 81% higher for youth who had prior police contact than for comparable youth who did not have police contact.96
  • Declining to charge individuals for non-violent misdemeanors reduces their likelihood for future offending.97 Research on prosecutorial reforms seeking to decriminalize poverty in Suffolk County, MA through dismissing, declining to prosecute, or diverting people charged with nonviolent misdemeanors like disorderly conduct and shoplifting, has found that subsequent rearrests declined for those impacted by the reform and crime rates for nonviolent misdemeanor offenses did not increase.98 Refraining to pursue misdemeanor charges prevents the stigmatizing and often lifelong effects of a criminal record.99
  • The number of people imprisoned for a drug or property crime has fallen by nearly half since its peak in 2007,100 while the jail population has declined by 19% from its historic high in 2008.101 Both of these trends will narrow the criminogenic impacts of incarceration. A number of studies have found that short terms of imprisonment in carceral settings with limited rehabilitative programs result in higher recidivism rates than community supervision, and the life disruptions caused by pretrial detention contributed to higher rates of recidivism compared to pretrial release.102

Scaling back criminal legal contact, therefore, in addition to limiting the harms resulting from that contact, would improve public safety while helping to reduce racial inequity in incarceration.

Conclusion

While recent reforms have reduced overall levels of criminal-legal-system contact and its racial and ethnic disparities, we remain fully within the era of mass incarceration. Excessive levels of control and punishment, particularly for people of color, are not advancing community safety goals and are damaging families and communities.103 The four installments of the One in Five series offer a blueprint for ending racial inequity in incarceration and shifting towards more effective investments in public safety.

The first installment documented the progress made so far and the ongoing work ahead.104 The second installment underscored the need for durable investments in communities of color that are disproportionately impacted by serious violent crime, as well as a reduction in the footprint of policing.11 The third installment demonstrated how jurisdictions around the country have begun tackling three key drivers of racial disparity: disparate racial impact of laws and policies, racial bias in the discretion of criminal legal professionals, and resource allocation decisions that disadvantage low-income people.6 This fourth and final installment has highlighted reforms that tackle a fourth driver of disparity: laws and policies that exacerbate socioeconomic inequalities and divert public spending from effective investments in public safety. For the criminal legal system to uphold the principle of justice, policymakers and practitioners will need to protect and expand these reforms.

1.

Ghandnoosh, N. (2023). One in five: Ending racial inequity in incarceration. The Sentencing Project. The second and third installments in this series are: Ghandnoosh, N., & Barry, C. (2023). One in five: Disparities in crime and policing. The Sentencing Project; Ghandnoosh, N., Barry, C., & Trinka, L. (2023). One in five: Racial disparity in imprisonment—causes and remedies. The Sentencing Project.
2.

Robey, J., Massoglia, M., & Light, M. (2023). A generational shift: Race and the declining lifetime risk of imprisonment. Demography, p. 1. https://doi.org/10.1215/00703370-10863378; see also Roehrkasse, A., & Wildeman, C. (2022). Lifetime risk of imprisonment in the United States remains high and starkly unequal. Scientific Advances, 8(48). https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abo3395.
3.

The prison population increased for the first time in almost a decade between 2021 and 2022. Carson, A. E., & Kluckow, R. (2023). Prisoners in 2022 – Statistical Tables. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Carson, E. A. (2012). Prisoners in 2011. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
4.

This report uses the terms Black and African American interchangeably. The number of imprisoned Black Americans decreased 38% between peak year 2002 and 2022. Carson & Kluckow (2023), see note 3; Sabol, W., West, H., & Cooper, M. (2009). Prisoners in 2008. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
5.

Ghandnoosh, N. (2023). Ending 50 years of mass incarceration: Urgent reform needed to protect future generations. The Sentencing Project; Carson & Kluckow (2023), see note 3; Bureau of Justice Statistics (1982). Prisoners 1925–81.
6.

Ghandnoosh, Barry, & Trinka (2023), see note 1.
7.

Consumer Financial Protections Bureau. (2022). Justice-involved individuals and the consumer financial marketplace.
8.

ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022). Captive labor: Exploitation of incarcerated workers. ACLU.
9.

Love, M. & Sibilla, N. (2023). Access to SNAP and TANF benefits after a drug conviction: A survey of state laws. Collateral Consequences Resource Center; Fair Housing Center for Rights and Research. (2022). Fair housing for people with a criminal record: A digital toolkit; Budd, K. M., & Monazzam, N. (2023). Increasing public safety by restoring voting rights. The Sentencing Project.
10.

Lilgerose v. Polis, et al. (CO Dist. Ct. 2022). https://towardsjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Amendment-A-litigation-Complaint-Stamped.pdf. See also: Clark, M. (2023, September 19). Forced labor continues in Colorado, years after vote to end prison slavery. Bolts; Anderson, M. (2023, November 13). Colorado banned forced prison labor 5 years ago. Prisoners say it’s still happening. NPR.
11.

Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023), see note 1.
12.

Beatty, L. G., & Snell, T. L. (2021). Profile of prison inmates, 2016. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
13.

Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023), see note 1.
14.

Asian/Pacific Islander people experience lower rates of victimization than whites, but note that there is significant variation by national origin among Asian Americans in exposure to imprisonment. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (n.d.) Fatal injury and violence data; Wu, J. (2021). Within-race variations in sentencing outcomes: Nationality and punishment among Asians in United States federal courts. Punishment & Society, 25(2), 449–470. https://doi.org/10.1177/14624745211063120.
15.

Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023) see note 1.
16.

These numbers are based on data from 2018, rather than 2020, to bypass the anomalies created by COVID-19. Tapp, S. N., & Davis, E. J. (2022). Contacts between police and the public, 2020. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
17.

Melamed, S. (2019, October 14). As Philadelphia aims to curb racial disparities, why are police stops of black drivers skyrocketing? The Philadelphia Inquirer; Missouri Attorney General. (2019). Vehicle stops executive summary; Muhammad, K. G., Western, B., Negussie, Y., & Backes, E. (Eds.) (2022). Reducing racial inequality in crime and justice: science, practice, and policy. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; Lofstrom, M., Hayes, J., Martin, B., and Premkumar, D., and Gumbs, A. (2021). Racial disparities in law enforcement stops. Public Policy Institute of California.
18.

Ghandnoosh, Barry, & Trinka (2023), see note 1.
19.

DeFina, R., & Hannon, L. (2013). The impact of mass incarceration on poverty. Crime and Delinquency, 59(4), 562-586.
20.

Consumer Financial Protections Bureau. (2022). Justice-involved individuals and the consumer financial marketplace, pp. 4-5.
21.

Wessler, M. (2023, February 8). Incarcerated people must be at the forefront of Biden Administration and Federal Trade Commission efforts to end “junk fees.” Prison Policy Initiative; Bing, L., Pettit, B., & Slavinsky, I. (2022). Incomparable punishments: How economic inequality contributes to the disparate impacts of legal fines and fees. RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 8(2), 118-136. https://doi.org/10.7758/RSF.2022.8.2.06.
22.

On average, the fee for a $20 online transfer is 19% ($3.80). In some states, rates were as high as 37%. Raher, S. & Herring, T. (2021, November 9). Show me the money: Tracking the companies that have a lock on sending funds to incarcerated people. Prison Policy Initiative; Wessler (2023), see note 21.
23.

Wessler (2023), see note 21; Zarrow, R. & Blackwell, C. (2023, October 03). California prisons price gouge necessities, leaving people struggling to pay for soap | Opinion. The Sacramento Bee.
24.

Collins, M. J. (2022, July 28). Incarcerated people pay more as inflation hits Kentucky prison stores. Louisville Public Media; See also: Eisen, L. (2023, April 19). American’s dystopian incarceration system of pay to stay behind bars. Brennan Center for Justice.
25.

Huebner, B. M., Giuffre, A., Pleggenkuhle, B., & Kras, K. R. (2021). The price of a sex offense conviction: A comparative analysis of the costs of community supervision. Criminology 60(1), 159–186. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12294.
26.

Harris, A., Pattillo, M., & Sykes, B.L. (2022). Studying the system of monetary sanctions. RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 8(2), 1–33. https://doi.org/10.7758/RSF.2022.8.2.01.
27.

Wessler (2023), see note 21.
28.

Over 80% of incarcerated workers in state and federal prisons work in jobs maintaining the prisons, including janitorial and kitchen duties, work in infirmaries, libraries, and stockrooms, and grounds maintenance. Approximately 7% of incarcerated workers have jobs in state-owned correctional industries where the pay is higher: the average minimum hourly wage is $0.30 and the average maximum hourly wage is $1.30. ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
29.

These calculations are based on a 40-hour work week: Non-industry jobs in Louisiana prisons pay, on average, $0.03/ hour. In-state phone calls cost approximately $0.22/ minute. Peter Wagner, P. & Bertram, W. (2022, December). State of phone justice 2022: The problem, the progress, and what’s next—Appendix Table 5. Average jail calling rates in each state, 2021. Prison Policy Initiative; ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
30.

ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
31.

Beatty, L. G. & Snell, T. L. (2023). Work assignments reported by prisoners, 2016. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
32.

Hauptman, M. (2023). The health and safety of incarcerated workers: OSHA’s applicability in the prison context. ABA Journal of Labor & Employment Law, 37(1), 71-92.
33.

ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
34.

Shannon, S. K. S., Uggen, C., Schnittker, J., Thompson, M., Wakefield, S., & Massoglia, M. (2017). The growth, scope, and spatial distribution of people with felony records in the United States, 1948–2010. Demography, 54(5), 1795-1818. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13524-017-0611-1.
35.

Pager, D. (2007). Marked: Race, Crime, and Finding Work in an Era of Mass Incarceration. University of Chicago Press; Center for Community Alternatives. (2015). Boxed out. Criminal history screening and college application attrition.
36.

Bushway, S. D., Cabreros, I., Welburn Paige, J., Schwam, D., & Wenger, J. B. (2022). Barred from employment—more than half of unemployed men in their 30s had a criminal history of arrest. Science Advances, 8(7). https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abj6992.
37.

Quinton, S. (2017). To help ex-offenders get jobs, some states reconsider licenses. Stateline.
38.

Kimpel, A. F. (2022). Paying for a clean record. Criminal Law and Criminology, 112(3), 439-547.
39.

Kolbeck, S. G., Bellair, P. E., & Lopez, S. (2022). Race, work history, and the employment recidivism relationship. Criminology, 60(4), 637-666. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12317.
40.

Burnside, A. (2022). No more double punishments: Lifting the ban on SNAP and TANF for people with prior felony drug convictions. Center for Law and Social Policy.
41.

Kolbeck, Bellair, & Lopez (2022), see note 39.
42.

Fair Housing Center for Rights and Research (2022), see note 9.
43.

Uggen, C., Larson, R., Shannon, S., & Stewart, R. (2022). Locked out 2022: Estimates of people denied voting rights due to a felony conviction. The Sentencing Project.
44.

Budd & Monazzam (2023), see note 9.
45.

Ghandnoosh, N., Stammen, E., & Muhitch, K. (2021). Parents in Prison. The Sentencing Project.
46.

Martin, E. (2017). Hidden consequences: The impact of incarceration on dependent children. National Institute of Justice.
47.

Sebastian, T., Love, H., Washington, S., Barr, A., Rahman, I., Paradis, B., Perry, A. M., & Cook, S. (2023). A new community safety blueprint: How the federal government can address violence and harm through a public health approach. Brookings.
48.

Roughly one in three were under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time of their crime. Approximately half of people in state and federal prisons and two-thirds of those in jails either met the threshold for serious psychological distress or had been diagnosed as having a mental disorder. Bronson, J. & Berzofsky, M. (2017). Indicators of mental health problems reported by prisoners and jail inmates, 2011-12. Bureau of Justice Statistics; See also: Maruschak, L. M., Bronson, J., & Alper, M. (2021). Survey of prison inmates, 2016: Alcohol and drug use and treatment reported by prisoners. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Bronson, J., Stroop, J., Zimmer, S., & Berzofsky, M. (2017). Drug use, dependence, and abuse among state prisoners and jail inmates, 2007-2009. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Bebinger, M. (2019, May 8). Opioid addiction drug going mostly to whites, even as black death rate rises. NPR.
49.

Cost is a likely barrier; 25% said they had no health care coverage and could not afford the cost and another 12% said they had had health care coverage but it did not cover treatment or did not cover the full cost. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2022). Key substance use and mental health indicators in the United States: Results from the 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (HHS Publication No. PEP22-07-01-005, NSDUH Series H-57). Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
50.

In 2016, among those who met the criteria for substance use disorder in the year prior to their admission, 20% of people in state prisons and 28% in federal prisons had received professional treatment at some point since their admissions. Maruschak, Bronson, & Alper (2021), see note 48.
51.

U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Associate Attorney General. (2023, April 20). Letter to courts regarding fines and fees for youth and adults; Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
52.

Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
53.

Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
54.

Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
55.

Bertram, W. (2023). Since you asked: What’s next for prison and jail phone justice now that the Martha Wright-Reed Just and Reasonable Communications Act is law? Prison Policy Initiative.
56.

Editorial Board. (2022, October 17). California made prison phone calls free. Others should follow. Washington Post; Johnson, L. (2019, May 1). New York is the first major city to allow free calls from jail. CNN; Worth Rises. (2023, May 19). Minnesota becomes fourth state in the U.S. to make prison phone calls free; Asiedu, K. G., & Li, H. (2023, July 27). California’s free prison calls are repairing estranged relationships and aiding rehabilitation. Los Angeles Times; Burness, A. (2023, August 4). Massachusetts is making communications free for incarcerated people. Bolts.
57.

See Ghandnoosh, N. (2020). Cell phones and “excessive contact”: The contradictory imperatives facing California’s parole-eligible lifers. Criminal Justice Policy Review, 31(2), 159-181. https://doi.org/10.1177/0887403418778205
58.

ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8; Sawyer, W. (2017, April 10). How much do incarcerated people earn in each state? Prison Policy Initiative.
59.

S.516 — 118th Congress (2023-2024): Fair Wages for Incarcerated Workers Act of 2023. (2023, February 16); See also: Cory Booker. (2023, February 17). Booker introduces package of bills to end unfair and abusive labor practices in U.S. corrections facilities.
60.

Colorado amendment A, removal of exception to slavery prohibition for criminals amendment (2018). Ballotpedia.
61.

Associated Press. (2023, February 23). Nevadans to vote in 2024 on removing slavery, involuntary servitude as punishment from state constitution. CBS News.
62.

Lilgerose v. Polis, et al. (2022), see note 10; See also: Clark (2023), see note 10; Anderson (2023), see note 10.
63.

Quinton (2017), see note 37.
64.

Avery, B. & Lu, H. (2021, October 01). Ban the box. U.S. cities, counties, and states adopt fair hiring policies. National Employment Law Project; Wagner, E. (2022, April 26). The ‘Ban the Box’ prohibition at federal agencies will soon be expanded. The Government Executive.
65.

Avery & Lu (2021), see note 64.
66.

Gardiner, D. (2022, September 29). California will let millions of past offenders seal criminal records. San Francisco Chronicle.
67.

Restoration of Rights Project. (2023). 50-State Comparison: Expungement, Sealing & Other Record Relief. Collateral Consequences Resource Center.
68.

Hernandez, A. (2023, November 28). High fees, long waits cast shadow over new criminal expungement laws. Stateline.
69.

Raphael, S. (2021). The intended and unintended consequences of Ban the Box. Annual Review of Criminology, 4, 191-207. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-criminol-061020-022137; Vuolo, M., Lageson, S., & Uggen, C. (2017). Criminal record questions in the era of ‘Ban the Box.’ Criminology & Public Policy, 16 (1), 139-165. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12250; Sugie, N. F. (2017). Criminal record questions, statistical discrimination, and equity in a “Ban the Box” era. Criminology & Public Policy, 16 (1), 167-175. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12265.
70.

Administration for Children and Families. (2020). Characteristics and financial circumstances of TANF recipients fiscal year 2020; Cronquist, K. (2021). Characteristics of supplemental nutrition assistance program households: Fiscal year 2019. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service, Office of Policy Support.
71.

Love & Sibilla (2023), see note 9.; See also: Burnside (2022), see note 40.
72.

Cory Booker. (2023, May 18). Booker, Warnock, Cohen introduce bicameral bill to end policy preventing formerly incarcerated individuals from accessing SNAP; Smith, G. (2023, February). Letter to Congress re: Repeal the ban on individuals with a past felony drug conviction from receiving SNAP or TANF as part of the next Farm Bill.
73.

Donovan, S. & Henriquez, S. (2011). [Letter to PHA Executive Director. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development]; National Low Income Housing Coalition. (2023). Advocates’ Guide ‘23: An educational primer on federal programs and resources related to affordable housing and community.
74.

Kanovsky, H. R. (2016, April 4). Office of General Counsel guidance on application of Fair Housing Act standards to the use of criminal records by providers of housing and real estate-related transactions. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
75.

McCain, D. L. (2022, June 2). [Letter to the Office of Fair Housing & Equal Opportunity re: Implementation of the Office of General Counsel guidance on application of Fair Housing Act standards to the use of criminal records by providers of housing and real estate-related transactions].
76.

Yi, K. (2022, January 5). New Jersey landlords can’t automatically deny renters based on criminal pasts, new law mandates. Gothamist.
77.

Porter, N. D. & McLeod, M. (2023). Expanding the vote: State felony disenfranchisement reform, 1997-2023. The Sentencing Project.
78.

Muhitch, K., & Ghandnoosh, N. (2021). Expanding voting rights to all citizens. The Sentencing Project.
79.

Uggen, Larson, Shannon, & Stewart (2022), see note 43.
80.

Porter & McLeod (2023), see note 77.
81.

Vasilogambros, M. (2023, August 7). In reversal, some states make it harder for people with felony convictions to vote. Virginia Mercury.
82.

Fenster, A. (2021). How many states have ended prison gerrymandering? About a dozen! Prison Policy Initiative.
83.

Scholars have reached conflicting conclusions on whether this reform also reduced racial and ethnic disparities. See Lofstrom, M., Martin, B., & Raphael, S. (2020). Proposition 47’s impact on racial disparity in criminal justice outcomes. Public Policy Institute of California; Gottlieb, A., Charles, P., McLeod, B. A., Kjellstrand, J., & Bonsu, J. E. (2021). Were California’s Decarceration Efforts Smart? A Quasi-Experimental Examination of Racial, Ethnic, and Gender Disparities. Criminal Justice and Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093854820923384.
84.

Californians for Safety and Justice. (2020). Proposition 47 issue brief.
85.

The Skanner News. (2020). Oregon Criminal Justice Commission: Initiate Petition 44 will nearly eliminate racial disparities for drug arrests, convictions. The Skanner News; Drugdecrimoregon.org. Decriminalizing drug use in Oregon: Lessons learned from early implementation.
86.

Oregon Health Authority (2023). Too early to tell: The challenging implementation of Measure 110 has increased risks, but the effectiveness of the program has yet to be determined. Oregon Secretary of State; Bolstad, E. (2023, September 12). Drug decriminalization stumbled in Oregon. Other states are taking note. StateLine.
87.

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2021, December 8). SAMHSA announces unprecedented $30 million harm reduction grant funding opportunity to help address the nation’s substance use and overdose epidemic. U.S. Department of Health & Human Services; Brownlee, C. (2022, August 18). Congress approved millions for gun violence prevention. Will it reach grassroots groups? The Trace; Brownlee, C. (2023, February 22). DOJ funding sparks newfound optimism for community violence intervention groups. The Trace.
88.

Mulvihill, G. (2023, February 21). US plans to allow Medicaid for drug treatment in prisons. AP NEWS.
89.

Seidman, L. (2023, February 13). Leaving prison for many means homelessness and overdose. California hopes to change that. Los Angeles Times; Haldar, S. & Guth, M. (2023, February 7). Section 1115 waiver watch: How California will expand Medicaid pre-release services for incarcerated populations. Kaiser Family Foundation.
90.

Schwartzapfel, B. & Blakinger, K. (2022, December 12). Federal prisons were told to provide addiction medications. Instead, they punish people who use them. The Marshall Project.
91.

Vestal, C. (2020, February 26). The state has figured out how to treat drug-addicted inmates. Stateline. The Pew Charitable Trusts; Weizman, S. R., El-Sabawi, T., Brown, S., Pulice, T., & LaBelle, R. (2022, June 22). To save lives, prioritize treatment for opioid use disorder in correctional facilities. HealthAffairs.
92.

Morrison, A. (2022, August 30). Student loan relief limited for many by US drug war’s legacy. AP NEWS; Turner, N. (2022, August 23). More than half a million people in prison may soon be able to afford college. Vera Institute of Justice.
93.

Gravely, A. (2021, September 6). ‘A natural progression.’ Inside Higher Ed.
94.

Rovner, J. (2023). Youth justice by the numbers. The Sentencing Project.
95.

Chenane, J. L., Wright, E. M., & Wang, Y. (2020). The Effects of Police Contact and Neighborhood Context on Delinquency and Violence. Victims & Offenders, 16(4) 1–24. https://doi:10.1080/15564886.2020.1815112; Wiley, S. A., & Esbensen, F.-A. (2013). The Effect of Police Contact. Crime & Delinquency, 62(3), 283–307. https://doi.org/10.1177/0011128713492496.
96.

Chenane, Wright, & Wang (2020), see note 95.
97.

Merrefield, C. (2023, February 14). Choosing not to prosecute low-level crimes may reduce future crime, research finds. The Journalist’s Resource; Huzinga, D. & Henry, K. (2008). The effect of arrest and justice system sanctions on subsequent behavior: Findings from longitudinal and other studies. In: Liberman, A.M. (Eds.) The long view of crime: A synthesis of longitudinal research. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-71165-2_7.
98.

Agan, A. Y., Doleac, J. L., & Harvey, A. (2021). Misdemeanor prosecution. National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w28600; Vera Institute of Justice. (2021, April 2). What happened when Boston stopped prosecuting nonviolent crimes.
99.

Vera Institute of Justice (2021), see note 98.
100.

Ghandnoosh (2023), see note 5.
101.

The 2021 jail population increased from 549,000 in 2020, a pandemic-era low. Minton, T. D. (2011). Jail inmates at midyear 2010 – Statistical tables. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Zeng, Z. (2022). Jail inmates in 2021 – Statistical tables. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
102.

Petrich, D. M., Pratt, T. C., Jonson, C. L., & Cullen, F. T. (2021). Custodial sanctions and reoffending: A meta-analytic review. Crime and Justice, 50(1), 353–424. https://doi.org/10.1086/715100; Loeffler, C. E., & Nagin, D. S. (2022). The impact of incarceration on recidivism. Annual Review of Criminology, 5(1), 133–152. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-criminol-030920-112506.
103.

See for example: Rios, V. M. (2011). Punished: Policing the lives of Black and Latino boys. New York University Press; Wakefield, S. & Wildeman, C. (2011). Mass imprisonment and racial disparities in childhood behavioral problems. Criminology & Public Policy, 10, 791–817. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-9133.2011.00741.x; Braman, D. 2004. Doing time on the outside: Incarceration and family life in urban America. University of Michigan Press; Western, B. (2002). The impact of incarceration on wage mobility and inequality. American Sociological Review, 67, 526–546.
104.

Ghandnoosh (2023), see note 1.
105.

Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023), see note 1.
106.

Ghandnoosh, Barry, & Trinka (2023), see note 1.
Ghandnoosh, N. (2023). One in five: Ending racial inequity in incarceration. The Sentencing Project. The second and third installments in this series are: Ghandnoosh, N., & Barry, C. (2023). One in five: Disparities in crime and policing. The Sentencing Project; Ghandnoosh, N., Barry, C., & Trinka, L. (2023). One in five: Racial disparity in imprisonment—causes and remedies. The Sentencing Project.
Robey, J., Massoglia, M., & Light, M. (2023). A generational shift: Race and the declining lifetime risk of imprisonment. Demography, p. 1. https://doi.org/10.1215/00703370-10863378; see also Roehrkasse, A., & Wildeman, C. (2022). Lifetime risk of imprisonment in the United States remains high and starkly unequal. Scientific Advances, 8(48). https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abo3395.
The prison population increased for the first time in almost a decade between 2021 and 2022. Carson, A. E., & Kluckow, R. (2023). Prisoners in 2022 – Statistical Tables. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Carson, E. A. (2012). Prisoners in 2011. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
This report uses the terms Black and African American interchangeably. The number of imprisoned Black Americans decreased 38% between peak year 2002 and 2022. Carson & Kluckow (2023), see note 3; Sabol, W., West, H., & Cooper, M. (2009). Prisoners in 2008. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Ghandnoosh, N. (2023). Ending 50 years of mass incarceration: Urgent reform needed to protect future generations. The Sentencing Project; Carson & Kluckow (2023), see note 3; Bureau of Justice Statistics (1982). Prisoners 1925–81.
Ghandnoosh, Barry, & Trinka (2023), see note 1.
Consumer Financial Protections Bureau. (2022). Justice-involved individuals and the consumer financial marketplace.
ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022). Captive labor: Exploitation of incarcerated workers. ACLU.
Love, M. & Sibilla, N. (2023). Access to SNAP and TANF benefits after a drug conviction: A survey of state laws. Collateral Consequences Resource Center; Fair Housing Center for Rights and Research. (2022). Fair housing for people with a criminal record: A digital toolkit; Budd, K. M., & Monazzam, N. (2023). Increasing public safety by restoring voting rights. The Sentencing Project.
Lilgerose v. Polis, et al. (CO Dist. Ct. 2022). https://towardsjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Amendment-A-litigation-Complaint-Stamped.pdf. See also: Clark, M. (2023, September 19). Forced labor continues in Colorado, years after vote to end prison slavery. Bolts; Anderson, M. (2023, November 13). Colorado banned forced prison labor 5 years ago. Prisoners say it’s still happening. NPR.
Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023), see note 1.
Beatty, L. G., & Snell, T. L. (2021). Profile of prison inmates, 2016. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023), see note 1.
Asian/Pacific Islander people experience lower rates of victimization than whites, but note that there is significant variation by national origin among Asian Americans in exposure to imprisonment. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (n.d.) Fatal injury and violence data; Wu, J. (2021). Within-race variations in sentencing outcomes: Nationality and punishment among Asians in United States federal courts. Punishment & Society, 25(2), 449–470. https://doi.org/10.1177/14624745211063120.
Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023) see note 1.
These numbers are based on data from 2018, rather than 2020, to bypass the anomalies created by COVID-19. Tapp, S. N., & Davis, E. J. (2022). Contacts between police and the public, 2020. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Melamed, S. (2019, October 14). As Philadelphia aims to curb racial disparities, why are police stops of black drivers skyrocketing? The Philadelphia Inquirer; Missouri Attorney General. (2019). Vehicle stops executive summary; Muhammad, K. G., Western, B., Negussie, Y., & Backes, E. (Eds.) (2022). Reducing racial inequality in crime and justice: science, practice, and policy. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; Lofstrom, M., Hayes, J., Martin, B., and Premkumar, D., and Gumbs, A. (2021). Racial disparities in law enforcement stops. Public Policy Institute of California.
Ghandnoosh, Barry, & Trinka (2023), see note 1.
DeFina, R., & Hannon, L. (2013). The impact of mass incarceration on poverty. Crime and Delinquency, 59(4), 562-586.
Consumer Financial Protections Bureau. (2022). Justice-involved individuals and the consumer financial marketplace, pp. 4-5.
Wessler, M. (2023, February 8). Incarcerated people must be at the forefront of Biden Administration and Federal Trade Commission efforts to end “junk fees.” Prison Policy Initiative; Bing, L., Pettit, B., & Slavinsky, I. (2022). Incomparable punishments: How economic inequality contributes to the disparate impacts of legal fines and fees. RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 8(2), 118-136. https://doi.org/10.7758/RSF.2022.8.2.06.
On average, the fee for a $20 online transfer is 19% ($3.80). In some states, rates were as high as 37%. Raher, S. & Herring, T. (2021, November 9). Show me the money: Tracking the companies that have a lock on sending funds to incarcerated people. Prison Policy Initiative; Wessler (2023), see note 21.
Wessler (2023), see note 21; Zarrow, R. & Blackwell, C. (2023, October 03). California prisons price gouge necessities, leaving people struggling to pay for soap | Opinion. The Sacramento Bee.
Collins, M. J. (2022, July 28). Incarcerated people pay more as inflation hits Kentucky prison stores. Louisville Public Media; See also: Eisen, L. (2023, April 19). American’s dystopian incarceration system of pay to stay behind bars. Brennan Center for Justice.
Huebner, B. M., Giuffre, A., Pleggenkuhle, B., & Kras, K. R. (2021). The price of a sex offense conviction: A comparative analysis of the costs of community supervision. Criminology 60(1), 159–186. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12294.
Harris, A., Pattillo, M., & Sykes, B.L. (2022). Studying the system of monetary sanctions. RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 8(2), 1–33. https://doi.org/10.7758/RSF.2022.8.2.01.
Wessler (2023), see note 21.
Over 80% of incarcerated workers in state and federal prisons work in jobs maintaining the prisons, including janitorial and kitchen duties, work in infirmaries, libraries, and stockrooms, and grounds maintenance. Approximately 7% of incarcerated workers have jobs in state-owned correctional industries where the pay is higher: the average minimum hourly wage is $0.30 and the average maximum hourly wage is $1.30. ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
These calculations are based on a 40-hour work week: Non-industry jobs in Louisiana prisons pay, on average, $0.03/ hour. In-state phone calls cost approximately $0.22/ minute. Peter Wagner, P. & Bertram, W. (2022, December). State of phone justice 2022: The problem, the progress, and what’s next—Appendix Table 5. Average jail calling rates in each state, 2021. Prison Policy Initiative; ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
Beatty, L. G. & Snell, T. L. (2023). Work assignments reported by prisoners, 2016. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Hauptman, M. (2023). The health and safety of incarcerated workers: OSHA’s applicability in the prison context. ABA Journal of Labor & Employment Law, 37(1), 71-92.
ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8.
Shannon, S. K. S., Uggen, C., Schnittker, J., Thompson, M., Wakefield, S., & Massoglia, M. (2017). The growth, scope, and spatial distribution of people with felony records in the United States, 1948–2010. Demography, 54(5), 1795-1818. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13524-017-0611-1.
Pager, D. (2007). Marked: Race, Crime, and Finding Work in an Era of Mass Incarceration. University of Chicago Press; Center for Community Alternatives. (2015). Boxed out. Criminal history screening and college application attrition.
Bushway, S. D., Cabreros, I., Welburn Paige, J., Schwam, D., & Wenger, J. B. (2022). Barred from employment—more than half of unemployed men in their 30s had a criminal history of arrest. Science Advances, 8(7). https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abj6992.
Quinton, S. (2017). To help ex-offenders get jobs, some states reconsider licenses. Stateline.
Kimpel, A. F. (2022). Paying for a clean record. Criminal Law and Criminology, 112(3), 439-547.
Kolbeck, S. G., Bellair, P. E., & Lopez, S. (2022). Race, work history, and the employment recidivism relationship. Criminology, 60(4), 637-666. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12317.
Burnside, A. (2022). No more double punishments: Lifting the ban on SNAP and TANF for people with prior felony drug convictions. Center for Law and Social Policy.
Kolbeck, Bellair, & Lopez (2022), see note 39.
Fair Housing Center for Rights and Research (2022), see note 9.
Uggen, C., Larson, R., Shannon, S., & Stewart, R. (2022). Locked out 2022: Estimates of people denied voting rights due to a felony conviction. The Sentencing Project.
Budd & Monazzam (2023), see note 9.
Ghandnoosh, N., Stammen, E., & Muhitch, K. (2021). Parents in Prison. The Sentencing Project.
Martin, E. (2017). Hidden consequences: The impact of incarceration on dependent children. National Institute of Justice.
Sebastian, T., Love, H., Washington, S., Barr, A., Rahman, I., Paradis, B., Perry, A. M., & Cook, S. (2023). A new community safety blueprint: How the federal government can address violence and harm through a public health approach. Brookings.
Roughly one in three were under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time of their crime. Approximately half of people in state and federal prisons and two-thirds of those in jails either met the threshold for serious psychological distress or had been diagnosed as having a mental disorder. Bronson, J. & Berzofsky, M. (2017). Indicators of mental health problems reported by prisoners and jail inmates, 2011-12. Bureau of Justice Statistics; See also: Maruschak, L. M., Bronson, J., & Alper, M. (2021). Survey of prison inmates, 2016: Alcohol and drug use and treatment reported by prisoners. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Bronson, J., Stroop, J., Zimmer, S., & Berzofsky, M. (2017). Drug use, dependence, and abuse among state prisoners and jail inmates, 2007-2009. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Bebinger, M. (2019, May 8). Opioid addiction drug going mostly to whites, even as black death rate rises. NPR.
Cost is a likely barrier; 25% said they had no health care coverage and could not afford the cost and another 12% said they had had health care coverage but it did not cover treatment or did not cover the full cost. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2022). Key substance use and mental health indicators in the United States: Results from the 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (HHS Publication No. PEP22-07-01-005, NSDUH Series H-57). Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
In 2016, among those who met the criteria for substance use disorder in the year prior to their admission, 20% of people in state prisons and 28% in federal prisons had received professional treatment at some point since their admissions. Maruschak, Bronson, & Alper (2021), see note 48.
U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Associate Attorney General. (2023, April 20). Letter to courts regarding fines and fees for youth and adults; Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
Muhammad et al. (2022), see note 17.
Bertram, W. (2023). Since you asked: What’s next for prison and jail phone justice now that the Martha Wright-Reed Just and Reasonable Communications Act is law? Prison Policy Initiative.
Editorial Board. (2022, October 17). California made prison phone calls free. Others should follow. Washington Post; Johnson, L. (2019, May 1). New York is the first major city to allow free calls from jail. CNN; Worth Rises. (2023, May 19). Minnesota becomes fourth state in the U.S. to make prison phone calls free; Asiedu, K. G., & Li, H. (2023, July 27). California’s free prison calls are repairing estranged relationships and aiding rehabilitation. Los Angeles Times; Burness, A. (2023, August 4). Massachusetts is making communications free for incarcerated people. Bolts.
See Ghandnoosh, N. (2020). Cell phones and “excessive contact”: The contradictory imperatives facing California’s parole-eligible lifers. Criminal Justice Policy Review, 31(2), 159-181. https://doi.org/10.1177/0887403418778205
ACLU & The University of Chicago’s Global Human Rights Clinic (2022), see note 8; Sawyer, W. (2017, April 10). How much do incarcerated people earn in each state? Prison Policy Initiative.
S.516 — 118th Congress (2023-2024): Fair Wages for Incarcerated Workers Act of 2023. (2023, February 16); See also: Cory Booker. (2023, February 17). Booker introduces package of bills to end unfair and abusive labor practices in U.S. corrections facilities.
Colorado amendment A, removal of exception to slavery prohibition for criminals amendment (2018). Ballotpedia.
Associated Press. (2023, February 23). Nevadans to vote in 2024 on removing slavery, involuntary servitude as punishment from state constitution. CBS News.
Lilgerose v. Polis, et al. (2022), see note 10; See also: Clark (2023), see note 10; Anderson (2023), see note 10.
Quinton (2017), see note 37.
Avery, B. & Lu, H. (2021, October 01). Ban the box. U.S. cities, counties, and states adopt fair hiring policies. National Employment Law Project; Wagner, E. (2022, April 26). The ‘Ban the Box’ prohibition at federal agencies will soon be expanded. The Government Executive.
Avery & Lu (2021), see note 64.
Gardiner, D. (2022, September 29). California will let millions of past offenders seal criminal records. San Francisco Chronicle.
Restoration of Rights Project. (2023). 50-State Comparison: Expungement, Sealing & Other Record Relief. Collateral Consequences Resource Center.
Hernandez, A. (2023, November 28). High fees, long waits cast shadow over new criminal expungement laws. Stateline.
Raphael, S. (2021). The intended and unintended consequences of Ban the Box. Annual Review of Criminology, 4, 191-207. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-criminol-061020-022137; Vuolo, M., Lageson, S., & Uggen, C. (2017). Criminal record questions in the era of ‘Ban the Box.’ Criminology & Public Policy, 16 (1), 139-165. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12250; Sugie, N. F. (2017). Criminal record questions, statistical discrimination, and equity in a “Ban the Box” era. Criminology & Public Policy, 16 (1), 167-175. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12265.
Administration for Children and Families. (2020). Characteristics and financial circumstances of TANF recipients fiscal year 2020; Cronquist, K. (2021). Characteristics of supplemental nutrition assistance program households: Fiscal year 2019. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service, Office of Policy Support.
Love & Sibilla (2023), see note 9.; See also: Burnside (2022), see note 40.
Cory Booker. (2023, May 18). Booker, Warnock, Cohen introduce bicameral bill to end policy preventing formerly incarcerated individuals from accessing SNAP; Smith, G. (2023, February). Letter to Congress re: Repeal the ban on individuals with a past felony drug conviction from receiving SNAP or TANF as part of the next Farm Bill.
Donovan, S. & Henriquez, S. (2011). [Letter to PHA Executive Director. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development]; National Low Income Housing Coalition. (2023). Advocates’ Guide ‘23: An educational primer on federal programs and resources related to affordable housing and community.
Kanovsky, H. R. (2016, April 4). Office of General Counsel guidance on application of Fair Housing Act standards to the use of criminal records by providers of housing and real estate-related transactions. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
McCain, D. L. (2022, June 2). [Letter to the Office of Fair Housing & Equal Opportunity re: Implementation of the Office of General Counsel guidance on application of Fair Housing Act standards to the use of criminal records by providers of housing and real estate-related transactions].
Yi, K. (2022, January 5). New Jersey landlords can’t automatically deny renters based on criminal pasts, new law mandates. Gothamist.
Porter, N. D. & McLeod, M. (2023). Expanding the vote: State felony disenfranchisement reform, 1997-2023. The Sentencing Project.
Muhitch, K., & Ghandnoosh, N. (2021). Expanding voting rights to all citizens. The Sentencing Project.
Uggen, Larson, Shannon, & Stewart (2022), see note 43.
Porter & McLeod (2023), see note 77.
Vasilogambros, M. (2023, August 7). In reversal, some states make it harder for people with felony convictions to vote. Virginia Mercury.
Fenster, A. (2021). How many states have ended prison gerrymandering? About a dozen! Prison Policy Initiative.
Scholars have reached conflicting conclusions on whether this reform also reduced racial and ethnic disparities. See Lofstrom, M., Martin, B., & Raphael, S. (2020). Proposition 47’s impact on racial disparity in criminal justice outcomes. Public Policy Institute of California; Gottlieb, A., Charles, P., McLeod, B. A., Kjellstrand, J., & Bonsu, J. E. (2021). Were California’s Decarceration Efforts Smart? A Quasi-Experimental Examination of Racial, Ethnic, and Gender Disparities. Criminal Justice and Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093854820923384.
Californians for Safety and Justice. (2020). Proposition 47 issue brief.
The Skanner News. (2020). Oregon Criminal Justice Commission: Initiate Petition 44 will nearly eliminate racial disparities for drug arrests, convictions. The Skanner News; Drugdecrimoregon.org. Decriminalizing drug use in Oregon: Lessons learned from early implementation.
Oregon Health Authority (2023). Too early to tell: The challenging implementation of Measure 110 has increased risks, but the effectiveness of the program has yet to be determined. Oregon Secretary of State; Bolstad, E. (2023, September 12). Drug decriminalization stumbled in Oregon. Other states are taking note. StateLine.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2021, December 8). SAMHSA announces unprecedented $30 million harm reduction grant funding opportunity to help address the nation’s substance use and overdose epidemic. U.S. Department of Health & Human Services; Brownlee, C. (2022, August 18). Congress approved millions for gun violence prevention. Will it reach grassroots groups? The Trace; Brownlee, C. (2023, February 22). DOJ funding sparks newfound optimism for community violence intervention groups. The Trace.
Mulvihill, G. (2023, February 21). US plans to allow Medicaid for drug treatment in prisons. AP NEWS.
Seidman, L. (2023, February 13). Leaving prison for many means homelessness and overdose. California hopes to change that. Los Angeles Times; Haldar, S. & Guth, M. (2023, February 7). Section 1115 waiver watch: How California will expand Medicaid pre-release services for incarcerated populations. Kaiser Family Foundation.
Schwartzapfel, B. & Blakinger, K. (2022, December 12). Federal prisons were told to provide addiction medications. Instead, they punish people who use them. The Marshall Project.
Vestal, C. (2020, February 26). The state has figured out how to treat drug-addicted inmates. Stateline. The Pew Charitable Trusts; Weizman, S. R., El-Sabawi, T., Brown, S., Pulice, T., & LaBelle, R. (2022, June 22). To save lives, prioritize treatment for opioid use disorder in correctional facilities. HealthAffairs.
Morrison, A. (2022, August 30). Student loan relief limited for many by US drug war’s legacy. AP NEWS; Turner, N. (2022, August 23). More than half a million people in prison may soon be able to afford college. Vera Institute of Justice.
Gravely, A. (2021, September 6). ‘A natural progression.’ Inside Higher Ed.
Rovner, J. (2023). Youth justice by the numbers. The Sentencing Project.
Chenane, J. L., Wright, E. M., & Wang, Y. (2020). The Effects of Police Contact and Neighborhood Context on Delinquency and Violence. Victims & Offenders, 16(4) 1–24. https://doi:10.1080/15564886.2020.1815112; Wiley, S. A., & Esbensen, F.-A. (2013). The Effect of Police Contact. Crime & Delinquency, 62(3), 283–307. https://doi.org/10.1177/0011128713492496.
Chenane, Wright, & Wang (2020), see note 95.
Merrefield, C. (2023, February 14). Choosing not to prosecute low-level crimes may reduce future crime, research finds. The Journalist’s Resource; Huzinga, D. & Henry, K. (2008). The effect of arrest and justice system sanctions on subsequent behavior: Findings from longitudinal and other studies. In: Liberman, A.M. (Eds.) The long view of crime: A synthesis of longitudinal research. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-71165-2_7.
Agan, A. Y., Doleac, J. L., & Harvey, A. (2021). Misdemeanor prosecution. National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w28600; Vera Institute of Justice. (2021, April 2). What happened when Boston stopped prosecuting nonviolent crimes.
Vera Institute of Justice (2021), see note 98.
Ghandnoosh (2023), see note 5.
The 2021 jail population increased from 549,000 in 2020, a pandemic-era low. Minton, T. D. (2011). Jail inmates at midyear 2010 – Statistical tables. Bureau of Justice Statistics; Zeng, Z. (2022). Jail inmates in 2021 – Statistical tables. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Petrich, D. M., Pratt, T. C., Jonson, C. L., & Cullen, F. T. (2021). Custodial sanctions and reoffending: A meta-analytic review. Crime and Justice, 50(1), 353–424. https://doi.org/10.1086/715100; Loeffler, C. E., & Nagin, D. S. (2022). The impact of incarceration on recidivism. Annual Review of Criminology, 5(1), 133–152. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-criminol-030920-112506.
See for example: Rios, V. M. (2011). Punished: Policing the lives of Black and Latino boys. New York University Press; Wakefield, S. & Wildeman, C. (2011). Mass imprisonment and racial disparities in childhood behavioral problems. Criminology & Public Policy, 10, 791–817. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-9133.2011.00741.x; Braman, D. 2004. Doing time on the outside: Incarceration and family life in urban America. University of Michigan Press; Western, B. (2002). The impact of incarceration on wage mobility and inequality. American Sociological Review, 67, 526–546.
Ghandnoosh (2023), see note 1.
Ghandnoosh & Barry (2023), see note 1.
Ghandnoosh, Barry, & Trinka (2023), see note 1.

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