Consequences of a Criminal Record for Employment Opportunity in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 2002 (ICPSR 3599)

Data Collection Notes View help for Data Collection Notes

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Study Purpose View help for Study Purpose

This study investigated how and why employers make the hiring decisions they do. Questions asked included: (1) How do employers' reactions to applicants with criminal records compare to their reactions to other groups of marginalized workers? (2) How does the type of crime or the context of the sanction affect employers' evaluations of applicants with criminal records? (3) What kinds of formal screens do employers use to evaluate applicants for entry-level jobs? and (4) How do the characteristics of the job, the applicant pool, the customer base, and the company (location, size, industry, etc.) affect employers' willingness to consider applicants with criminal records?

Study Design View help for Study Design

Data consist of 177 completed telephone interviews with employers. The survey was administered by the Michigan State Survey Center. Calls were made to each establishment, asking to speak with the person in charge of hiring. The baseline survey instrument was developed by Harry Holzer et al. (1996, 2002). It includes questions about the company, such as size, industry, employee turnover, and racial composition, questions about hiring procedures, questions about the last worker hired for a position not requiring a college degree, and questions about the employer's attitude toward various kinds of marginalized workers. In addition, several vignette items were added to assess employers' reactions to applicants convicted of different types of crimes or who had received different types of sanctions. Roughly half of employers were read a vignette in which the subject was presented as White, with the other half receiving a vignette in which the subject was presented as Black.

Sample View help for Sample

Job openings for entry-level positions (defined as job requiring no previous experience and no education past high school) were identified from the classified section of the MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL's Sunday edition between June and December 2001. During this same time period, a supplemental sample was drawn from JOBNET, a state-sponsored Web site for employment listings. All job openings within a 25-mile radius of downtown Milwaukee were included.

Universe View help for Universe

Employers in the Milwaukee area who advertised for entry-level jobs between June and December 2001.

Unit(s) of Observation View help for Unit(s) of Observation

Data Source View help for Data Source

Data Type(s) View help for Data Type(s)

Description of Variables View help for Description of Variables

Variables include the business's location, its main product, whether it was minority-owned, its distance from public transportation, how long it would take to get from the downtown business area to the business using public transportation, total employees, number of temporary employees, number of unskilled employees, number of positions that did not require a college degree, race of employees in non-college degree positions, percentage of employees covered by a collective bargaining agreement, number of workers hired in past year, number of workers who left the business in the last year, and number of current job vacancies. Other variables focus on details of the application and hiring process for the last employee hired into a position that did not require a college degree, sex, age, race, and education of that employee, kinds of tasks regularly performed by that employee, kind of education and work experience needed for that position, the compensation for that position, number of hours per week usually worked in that position, whether health insurance was provided for that position, and possibility of promotion for someone in that position. Additional items include whether the business would hire an applicant on welfare, an applicant with a GED, an applicant with a criminal record, an applicant with only part-time work experience, or an applicant who had been unemployed for over a year, whether the company required applicants to take a drug test, what percentage of drug tests had been positive in the last year, whether the company asked applicants about their criminal background, percentage of applicants that reported a prior conviction in the last year, whether the company performed background checks, percentage of background checks in the last year that found a criminal record, how background checks were performed, number of employees company hired with a criminal record in the last year, number of those still employed, how positive the company's experience with those employees was, the percentage of applicants who were Black, White, and Hispanic, the percentage of customers who were Black, White, and Hispanic, and the respondent's title, race, age, education, and gender. Also included are answers to questions that described hypothetical applicants.

Response Rates View help for Response Rates

The final survey sample of 177 respondents represented a 51-percent response rate. Four firms were dropped from the survey sample and were excluded from the denominator for the calculation of the response rate.

Presence of Common Scales View help for Presence of Common Scales

Several Likert-type scales were used.

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Original Release Date View help for Original Release Date

2003-06-19

Version History View help for Version History

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