Jobs, News and Re-offending after Incarceration

We study how local labor market conditions and information about job availability affect recidivism after incarceration. We exploit daily variations in the quality of the labor market at the time of release from prison. We combine individual-level administrative data on former inmates in France to county-level daily data on new job vacancies, and on newspaper coverage of job creations and destructions. Our analysis provides two new findings. First, media coverage of job creations reduces recidivism, suggesting that policies promoting access to information about employment opportunities can contribute to reducing recidivism. Second, we show that there is heterogeneity in what kinds of jobs affect recidivism: in France, former inmates do not respond to overall job creations, but better opportunities in low-skilled high-paying jobs at release reduce recidivism rates.