Employment discrimination against felons in the United States

Employment discrimination against persons with criminal records in the United States has been illegal since passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Employers may lawfully consider an applicant's or employee's criminal conviction(s) for employment purposes e.g., hiring, retention, promotion, benefits, and delegated duties. That said, blanket policies or practices e.g., exclusion of all job applicants with convictions from hiring may violate the Act due to the disparate impact on some minorities protected by the act who might have as a subpopulation higher rates of criminal convictions and arrests. Likewise, policies or practices that are not sufficiently narrowly tailored for legitimate business necessity may be violations of the Act - if the discriminatory treatment or impact falls predominately upon those persons protected by the Act. Title VII applies to businesses with more than 15 employees and defines two types of discrimination, disparate treatment and disparate impact. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has been enforcing Title VII since it came into effect in 1965. It has periodically issued an enforcement guidance explaining how employers could use criminal records without violating the Civil Rights Act; in April 2012 it published an enforcement guidance requiring companies to establish procedures to show that they are not using criminal records to discriminate by race or national origin. The size of the problem is unknown.

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 makes some forms of discrimination against certain categories of persons in the United States illegal. It defines two types of discrimination: disparate treatment and disparate impact. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), who has been enforcing Title VII since it came into effect in 1965, has periodically issued an 'enforcement guidance' explaining how employers could use criminal records without violating the Civil Rights Act; As of 1998, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission had interpreted the Civil Rights Act to require that, where an employment policy which discriminates against criminals will have a disparate racial impact, employers must show a business necessity before automatically disqualifying criminals.

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