An estimated 70 million Americans have been touched by the justice system, through an arrest, conviction, or incarceration. That’s one in three adults. And that number is forecast to grow to 100 million by 2030.
The justice-impacted population faces many challenges, including finding good-paying jobs and careers that will lead them to economic stability and prosperity. Outdated systems from static background checks to parole limitations continue to block access to opportunity, but solutions exist.
At a time when employers are having trouble finding enough workers in industries such as health care, construction, and manufacturing, breaking down barriers to workforce opportunities for this often-overlooked population is crucial to not only their economic future but the nation’s.
WorkingNation presents Breaking Barriers: Justice and Work, a look at the hurdles that millions of justice-impacted Americans face as they try to navigate the workforce, and the hiring practices and initiatives that are helping them reenter and thrive, creating economic stability and mobility.
Breaking Barriers features an informative, thoughtful, and hopeful discussion led by journalist Hari Sreenivasan with:
What are some of the barriers for the justice-impacted as they try to navigate the job market? What can be done to unlock this often-overlooked talent pool in search of good jobs?
Here is some of what our panelists shared:
After incarceration: “You probably can’t even get signed up for (job placement) services because you don’t have documentation. People will come in without an ID, without a license, without access to their Social Security card, and because all of these programs are federally- or state-funded, there are lots of regulations that are attached that have eligibility requirements that all have to be proven.
“Most folks might come out without stable housing. So, ‘I don’t have housing, I don’t have an address, how can I even begin to think about getting an ID?’ If there are things like back fines, child support arrearages that are attached to someone’s ability to even get a driver’s license, you can’t use that to then get a job because oftentimes jobs are requiring driver’s licenses these days.
“These different pieces are just piling one on top of the other as someone walks into a center and tries to even make that first step.”
Perceptions: “I have found is that often people think they’re a Black man or a Latino man, and there’s a narrative that they have in their head about that particular person. Sometimes that narrative determines what you feel they’re deserving of. When you think of more than 70 million Americans who have an arrest or conviction record, they’re people. They’re citizens. They’re moms. They’re dads. They’re aunts. They’re uncles.
“They are buying groceries alongside you and they’re that’s really trying to work and earn and be productive. Nobody’s ever left prison saying, ‘I can’t wait to get back here.’
“It’s an invisible life sentence that folks are serving.’
Youth offenders: “I got locked up when I was 19. When I got out, I was 26. My peers were just getting out of college and here I am trying to figure out how to get a job, right? We’re not talking about folks who are still in the cycle of incarceration. They’re out of that cycle, but they stepped into another cycle called ‘post-conviction poverty.’
Probation and supervised parole: “[That is] 3.8 million people and they are the most scrutinized. They’re out there living amongst us. This is the population we need to be focused on. We should be creating pathways to success, not cycles back.”
Locked out: “It’s not just about the individual employers right now, it’s also about the status of your economy locally. If you’re a board supervisor, or a county commissioner, or a city council member, or a state rep, or a governor, and you’re looking at declining labor force participation rates, why is that?
“Why is it that half the population is not even involved in looking for jobs and they’re in these low-wage situations like warehouses? It’s because you’re locking people out of your growth economy.”
Benefits to employers: “A lot of people take that first step forward because they want to do something good. But pretty quickly, they realize they’re not only doing something good for the community, something very good is happening in their business.
“Many organizations who have a policy of hiring people who’ve been justice-involved have found a couple of things. Number one, their culture is better. Number two, they regularly report an ability to fill open jobs in an incredibly competitive environment.
“It has tremendous dividends for businesses and all the statistics say employers who have committed policies will openly say that the people they hire are as good or better employees than the rest of their employee base.”
Breaking Barriers was produced in partnership with WPVI in Philadelphia and premiered on the station on Saturday, April 5, during Second Chance Month, dedicated to “advancing efforts that promote fairness and access to opportunity for people who have been directly impacted by the criminal legal system.”
Breaking Barriers: Justice and Work, and previous episodes of the Breaking Barriers series, was made possible through funding provided by the Ares Charitable Foundation.
“Through this episode of Breaking Barriers, we aim to showcase the resilience and potential of people who are justice-impacted while advocating for workforce solutions that can help drive economic growth and opportunity,” says Michelle Armstrong, managing director at Ares Management Corporation and president of the Ares Charitable Foundation.
“Expanding hiring opportunities for this significant population isn’t just socially responsible, it’s economically essential. We aim to shift perceptions, promote inclusive hiring, and empower individuals with purpose,” says Art Bilger, founder and CEO of WorkingNation.
Watch Breaking Barriers: Justice and Work here.
Explore more of our WorkingNation reporting on efforts to create more access to the workforce for justice-impacted individuals here.
Watch our Emmy-award winning Breaking Barriers: Embracing People With Disabilities in the Workforce here.
Watch our Breaking Barriers: Embracing Age in the Workforce here.
© Copyright 2025 by Structural Unemployment, LLC dba WorkingNation
Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.
Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.
Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.
Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.
Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.
Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.
