Juvenile Arrest and Later Economic Attainment: Strength and Mechanisms of the Relationship

The accumulation of disadvantage: Criminal justice contact, credit, and debt in the transition to adulthood*

“…Several foundational studies identify significant consequences of criminal justice contact for credit and consumer market debt levels. This research demonstrates that groups with criminal justice contact own fewer assets, hold less debt, and accumulate less wealth over time than groups without criminal justice contact (Maroto, 2015; Maroto & Sykes, 2020; Siennick & Widdowson, 2020; Turney & Schneider, 2016; Zaw et al., 2016). Debt from legal financial obligations may also both limit credit access to lower cost debt and lead to a greater likelihood of carrying high‐cost consumer debts (Aaltonen et al., 2016; Warner et al., 2020).…”

“…Prior work has demonstrated that financial markets are a significant arena of social exclusion and disadvantageous inclusion for those with criminal justice contact. Prior work, however, has also identified mixed results, with some analyses finding primarily negative associations with debt (Maroto & Sykes, 2020; Siennick & Widdowson, 2020) and others finding null (Maroto & Sykes, 2020) or positive associations (Warner et al., 2020). The mixed results likely arise in part because of differences between studies in the measurement of debt: Each includes different sets of debts.…”

“…Siennick and Widdowson (2020) demonstrated that even juvenile arrest has long‐term consequences for financial outcomes across young adulthood in the NLSY97 cohort. They examined the long‐term cumulative impacts of juvenile arrest on “economic attainment,” which they conceptualized as total net worth, total assets, and total debt (including housing debt), using propensity score methods.…”

“…They examined the long‐term cumulative impacts of juvenile arrest on “economic attainment,” which they conceptualized as total net worth, total assets, and total debt (including housing debt), using propensity score methods. Siennick and Widdowson (2020) found that juvenile arrest results in lower total logged debt levels by age 30. In supplemental analyses, they found the negative effect of criminal justice contact on debt depended on the type of debt: Juvenile arrest reduced levels of house, car, and college debt by age 30 relative to youth without a juvenile arrest, but juvenile arrest resulted in no differences in levels of credit card, personal, or other debts to businesses.…”

“…Prior work has leveraged the longitudinal design of the NLSY97 to model criminal justice contact similar to an experimental treatment as a strategy to limit the influence of selection effects. To approximate an experiment, studies necessarily focus on specific stages of the life course: juvenile arrest (Siennick & Widdowson, 2020) or new criminal justice contact from age 25 to 30 (Maroto & Sykes, 2020; Warner et al., 2020). This experimental approach has produced important results highlighting the direct consequences of criminal justice contact.…”