Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Consequences of Incarceration for Racial Stratification

University Of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison WI

Investigators

Abstract

While stratification researchers typically focus on education and the family as primary institutions affecting inequality, a new institution has become of central importance for racial stratification: the criminal justice system. With lifetime probabilities of incarceration nearing 30 percent for young black men, experience with the institution of criminal justice has increasingly important consequences for racial inequality. Yet, research has only begun to examine the social and economic consequences of large scale incarceration, and to assess the implications for racial disparities. This project investigates the effects of incarceration on the socioeconomic attainment in employment, occupational status, and earnings of white and black men. It uses data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to obtain quantitative estimates of these effects on racial stratification. It then uses in-depth interviews with a sample of Milwaukee parolees to purse a deeper understanding of the mechanisms that generate the quantitative effects. Together, the quantitative and qualitative data provide for a comprehensive analysis of how race differences in incarceration affect race differences economic success later in life.