“Ban the Box” Falls Short of Its Goals

In January, some Duke University classmates and I were asked by the North Carolina Governor’s Office to write a memo about how to incentivize employers to hire more formerly incarcerated people. For a month, we researched several common policy options, including tax credits, staffing agencies’ guarantees, Ban the Box (BTB), post-conviction certificate, and support of state contractors that employ ex-felons. BTB is, of course, the recent grassroots effort that aims to stop employers from asking candidates about their criminal history on a job application form until later in the hiring process. In the end, we decided to drop BTB, which was and still is the most popular approach, and instead recommend supplementing federal tax incentives, along with expanding access to rehabilitation certificates and prioritizing contractors who hire ex-offenders.

About a week after we submitted the memo, we had a call with the correspondent from the Governor’s Office who told us that they are actually deep into the process of considering banning the box. She did not mention that they wanted to look at any of the other policies we had proposed to help with ex-felon employment. We walked out of that call feeling a little down and confused.

The hope of BTB is that employers can give ex-offenders an opportunity to tell their stories and prove themselves beyond what their history presumes. The movement has caught on. As of 2018, 33 states have officially banned the box, and over 150 cities have taken the initiative to adopt this policy at the municipal level. Although North Carolina has not adopted statewide BTB laws yet, many cities and counties, including Asheville, Buncombe, Carrboro, Charlotte, Cumberland County, Durham, Durham County, Forsyth, Mecklenburg, Spring Lake, Wake County, Wilmington and Winston-Salem, have banned the box on public-sector job applications.