Department of Criminal Justice

The Hoosier Initiative for Reentry Employment (HIRE) program provides employment assistance to Indiana residents with felony offenses. We examine whether HIRE participants (n = 328), who obtained jobs after release from prison in 2014, had lower recidivism rates than the comparison group of all offenders released from Indiana prisons in 2014 (n = 17,901). Our results show that HIRE participants, despite having more serious criminal histories, have lower hazards of reincarceration (both new offenses and technical violations) than the comparison group. Contrary to hypotheses, HIRE offenders who had better paying and more prestigious jobs did not have significantly lower hazards of reincarceration. Finally, several factors predict quality of job placement (wage, prestige of field) including: age, veteran status, gender, race/ethnicity, and previous sex offense.