They’ve done their time behind bars and been on good behavior since their release, but advocates say some of Georgia’s 4.2 million former felons are still shackled by their past deeds.
While the state’s unemployment rate was around 3.4% before the pandemic, the unemployment rate for residents with criminal records was close to 15% during that time, according to Douglas Ammar, the executive director of the nonprofit group the Georgia Justice Project.
[…] The Georgia Budget Policy Institute found that formerly incarcerated residents lost on average $36,000 in wages last year, which amounted to about $2.6 billion in wasted spending power. Forty states have a criminal record expungement program, including North Carolina and Arkansas, according to the Georgia Justice Project.
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