Employment, Crime, and the Life Course

Savolainen, Jukka; Aaltonen, Mikko; Skarðhamar, Torbjørn

doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190201371.013.24

Cited by 2 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 49 publications

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“…Uggen found that the impact of employment on recidivism was near zero for individuals younger than 27 years of age but negative and statistically significant for those 27 or older. These findings have been widely cited (e.g., Apel et al, 2007;Berg & Huebner, 2011;LeBel et al, 2008;Newton et al, 2018;Savolainen et al, 2019;Visher et al, 2005;Zweig et al, 2011), both in speaking to the validity of life-course perspectives and in calls for employment programs in prison and postrelease for formerly incarcerated individuals. This latter point is particularly important as the implications of Uggen's (2000) findings are that "programming providing marginal jobs are unattractive for youth" but "may provide the turning point toward a viable pathway out of crime for older offenders" (p. 544).…”

Section: Life-course Perspective Employment and Crimementioning

confidence: 91%

Revisiting the relationship between age, employment, and recidivism

2023

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Employment theoretically serves as a source of informal social control that can promote desistance from crime (Sampson & Laub, 1993). Findings from studies assessing the effects of employment, however, have been mixed. In a seminal study, Uggen (2000) reanalyzed data from the National Supported Work (NSW) Demonstration Project and found that employment significantly reduced the rate of recidivism among individuals aged 27 and older but had no impact on younger individuals. We reproduce and replicate Uggen's (2000) findings with data from four distinct employment programs: The National Supported Work Program (1975–1979), the Transitional Aid Research Project (1976–1977), the Employment Services for Ex‐Offenders (1981–1984), and the Enhanced Services for the Hard‐to‐Employ Center for Employment Opportunities (2004–2008). We closely reproduced Uggen's original findings in the NSW but found evidence that the statistically significant interaction between age and employment in the NSW was only present at the year 3 follow‐up and the observed effect is highly sensitive to minor threats to internal validity. Furthermore, a significant age–employment interaction was not observed in the three other data sources. These findings should encourage scholars to continue to investigate the age‐graded nature of employment and crime, especially through a sociohistorical lens.

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Section: Life-course Perspective Employment and Crimementioning

confidence: 91%

Revisiting the relationship between age, employment, and recidivism

2023

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“…Studies in the tradition of life course criminology have demonstrated that major events and transitions in individuals' life, such as getting a job and starting a family, are important to understand desistance from criminal careers (e.g., Uggen & Wakefield, 2008;Craig et al, 2014;Skardhamar et al, 2015;Savolainen et al, 2018). Though central to the life course approach, most studies conducted in this field however do not incorporate the notion that people live their lives in the larger context of society where macro-level circumstances change over time (Elder & Giele, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Crime, Families and the Economy: Micro-conditions as Moderator of Macro-effects

Werve

Blokland

Weerman

2022

J Dev Life Course Criminology

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Since the early 1990s, increasing attention is being paid to the impact of life course transitions on criminal behavior. However, individuals’ life courses do not evolve in a vacuum but rather in the broad context of societal characteristics and developments. In this paper, we analyze whether there is an effect of macroeconomic circumstances on individuals’ criminal careers and whether this effect is conditional on marital status and parenthood. We employ micro-level data from a Dutch large-scale longitudinal study and enrich these with macro-level data. Using logistic panel data models for criminal behavior, we distinguish three types of effects: the macro-effect of experiencing declining economic times, the micro-effect of family composition and the interaction effect, indicating whether the effect of economic decline is differentiated by marital status and parenthood. We quantify economic decline either as an increase in the unemployment rate (objective and backward-looking measure) or as a decrease in consumer confidence (subjective and forward-looking). First, we find that an increase in the unemployment rate has no effect on criminal careers, but a decrease in the consumer confidence is associated with an increase in individual-level crime. Next, we confirm earlier results that marriage has a negative effect on crime, while parenthood has no effect. Finally, our results indicate that the detrimental effect of decreasing consumer confidence on criminal behavior is nullified for married individuals.

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Employment, Crime, and the Life Course

Cited by 2 publications

References 49 publications

Revisiting the relationship between age, employment, and recidivism

Revisiting the relationship between age, employment, and recidivism

Crime, Families and the Economy: Micro-conditions as Moderator of Macro-effects

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