Dive Brief:
- Nearly half of employers (48%) believe ban the box laws—which outlaw the checkbox on job applications that asks candidates if they've ever been convicted of a crime—are unfair to them, according to a survey of more than 500 individuals conducted by background screening provider EmployeeScreenIQ.
- Additionally, more than half of employers (53%) continue to ask candidates to self-disclose criminal histories on applications, despite the growing number of ban the box laws and EEOC guidance that advises against the practice.
- Passed by more than 100 cities and counties and at least 13 states, ban the box laws appear to be having an impact on some employers' practices; in 2014, 66% of respondents said they asked candidates to self-disclose their criminal histories on job applications, 13 percentage points more than this year.
Dive Insight:
It's no shock that some employers are not happy about ban-the-box laws, but those laws have gained serious momentum in the past few years. And that's not likely to change.
According to the survey, one of employers' primary complaints about ban the box laws is that there is little or no consistency among them, making compliance difficult, especially for multistate employers. For example, some of these laws do little more than ban the box, but others add onerous and unique reporting requirements. In fact, 26% of respondents to the 2015 survey reported finding ban the box laws confusing.
"Most employers want to know about their candidates' criminal pasts, and the majority of those want that information up front," said Nick Fishman, of EmployeeScreenIQ. "To date, this desire has trumped compliance concerns associated with ban the box laws and the EEOC, but with more ban the box laws being enacted seemingly every day, it will be interesting to see if the trend of employers removing the criminal history checkbox continues or even intensifies."
