In the United States, when prisoners are released they re-enter a challenging environment that works against them as becoming productive members of society. Simmons School of Social Work points out, “Within three years of release, 67.8 percent of ex-offenders are rearrested, and within five years, 76.6 percent are rearrested” ( Simmons Staff, 2016). The stigma of being an inmate can hang over them for a lifetime. Many of the former inmates lack any marketable skills and struggle to find employment. This can be a major cause for former inmates to backslide and be sent back to prison.
Many state statutes exclude persons with a criminal record from obtaining any type of trade of professional license. In the state of Georgia, any person that has “been convicted of any felony or of any crime involving moral turpitude in the courts of this state or any other state, territory, or country” can be denied their application for a professional license due to his or her conviction (Schulte, 2014). Restrictions such as these severely limits employment opportunities for ex-inmates that would offer prisoners re-entering back into their communities a way to become successful. There are nearly 80 professions that former inmates are forbid from gaining entry such as becoming a barber,
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It is more than reasonable to ban a teacher that was convicted on having an inappropriate relationship with a student from ever entering back into the field of education. However, John Kleinig, who is the director of the Institute for Criminal Justice Ethics, raises the question “Why does it makes sense to prevent a person who has been convicted of food stamp fraud from being employed as the skilled barber he learned to be while in prison?” (Kleinig (2008), p. 255). It does not make much sense unless as a society we are trying to further the punishment of re-entering inmates and attempting to set them up for