More Job Seekers Scramble To Erase Their Criminal Past

[steven johnson]

With unemployment hovering around 10%, employers are becoming more critical of minor arrests and convictions in a prospective employee's past. There are now services that will help expunge court records of minor brushes with the law to assist people in getting hired.

In 1967, 50% of American men had been arrested and the current statistic stands at 60%. An arrest and conviction search now costs $10 from database providers which can quickly search 3,100 court jurisdictions.

U.S. job seekers are crashing into the worst employment market in years and background checks that reach deeper than ever into their pasts.

The result: a surge of people seeking to legally clear their criminal records.

In Michigan, state police estimate they'll set aside 46% more convictions this year than last. Oregon is on track to set aside 33% more. Florida sealed and expunged nearly 15,000 criminal records in the fiscal year ended June 30, up 43% from the previous year. The courts of Cook County, which includes Chicago and nearby suburbs, received about 7,600 expungement requests in the year's first three quarters, nearly double the pace from the year before.

These convictions are increasingly coming to employers' attention. Background checks have become more commonplace in the years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and cheaper. More than 80% of companies performed such checks in 2006, compared with fewer than 50% in 1998, according to the Society for Human Resource Management, an association of HR professionals.

More Job Seekers Scramble To Erase Their Criminal Past