Through mass incarceration, we have decided that millions of our fellow citizens should be locked out of opportunity. That thousands of our most vulnerable communities should remain destabilized. That tens of billions of our taxpayer dollars every year should fund a cycle that does much to punish and little to renew.

The perversity of it all is exemplified by the barriers people returning from incarceration to their communities face in trying to get jobs. Each year, more than 500,000 people are released from incarceration, and research shows that access to employment is one of the greatest predictors of whether they will re-offend and fall back into the vicious cycle. A National Institute of Justice report showed that "a criminal record reduced the likelihood of a callback or job offer by nearly 50 percent (28 percent for applicants without a criminal record versus 15 percent of applicants with)" and noted that "more than 80 percent of U.S. employers perform criminal background checks on prospective employees." Even with the positive progress of the Ban the Box movement and other reform pushes, the numbers are still daunting. Two-thirds of people released from incarceration are arrested for a new offense within three years.

Each entrepreneur in the inaugural Unlocked Futures cohort told stories about the punishment that continued after serving their time, the frustration and of being rejected for job opening after job opening. They escaped the broken cycle by taking matters into their own hands.

Read the full article about how entrepreneurship can help end mass incarceration by Tulaine Montgomery at medium.com.