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Inmate labor fuels prisons. The incarcerated work in prison industries that collaborate with private corporations. Fair labor laws do not apply to prisons, where it is common for inmates to earn less than one dollar per hour. But involvement with the criminal justice system continues to shape and hinder the future employment and earnings of the formerly incarcerated long after they have been released. In this issue of RSF, edited by sociologist Sandra Susan Smith and legal scholar Jonathan Simon, an interdisciplinary group of scholars analyze how the criminal justice system acts as a de facto labor market institution by compelling or coercing labor from the justice-involved. 

The social and economic effects of criminal justice involvement are widespread, with almost seven million people under some form of direct supervision. The contributors to this issue examine how the criminal justice system affects the livelihood and families of both the incarcerated and formerly incarcerated. Cody Warner, Joshua Kaiser, and Jason Houle explore how “hidden sentences” --restricted access to voting rights, public housing, and professional licensing--negatively impact labor market outcomes for young adults with criminal records. Michele Cadigan and Garbriela Kirk look at the burden of court fees and fines, or legal financial obligations, that place a strain on the work commitments and resources of low-income people. Joe LaBriola sheds new light on how employment affects recidivism; he shows that parolees who find high-quality jobs, such as in the manufacturing industry, are less likely to return to prison than those employed in low-quality jobs. Noah Zatz and Michael Stoll demonstrate how the threat of imprisonment for nonpayment of child support coerces labor among noncustodial fathers, particularly African-American men. Allison Dwyer Emory and her coauthors show that previously incarcerated fathers are less likely to pay either formal or informal cash child support or offer in-kind assistance to their children’s mothers.

This issue of RSF is a timely contribution to the field of scholarly literature that illuminates the far and often destructive reach that the criminal justice system has on those whose lives it touches. It advances our understanding of how the system functions as a labor market institution and the price it extracts from those involved with it. 

Each year, gun homicides kill over ten thousand people in the United States. While most guns are initially purchased legally, many enter the underground market and end up in the hands of dangerous offenders, such as gang members and convicted felons. This issue of RSF, edited by public policy scholars Philip J. Cook and Harold A. Pollack, brings together eight articles exploring the markets for guns, both legal and illegal. The contributors draw from new datasets and interviews with inmates to examine how offenders obtain guns. By turning a spotlight on these little-understood supply chains, these chapters provide guidance for stemming the flow of guns to the underground market.
 
Cook and Pollack initiate the discussion with a comprehensive introduction that includes an original framework for understanding the legality of transactions that arm dangerous offenders.  Several contributors review trends in gun ownership across the nation and investigate how guns enter the underground market. Deborah Azrael and coauthors conduct a comprehensive survey of gun owners and find 270 million guns in private circulation. They estimate that 70 million firearms changed hands during a recent five-year period.  Most of those transactions were sales by licensed dealers; Garen Wintemute  reports on a survey of dealers that assesses the wide disparities among them as sources of guns to offenders.  Charles Wellford and coauthors use trace data and prison interviews to study how criminals obtain their guns in three jurisdictions that differ widely with respect to gun regulations and culture. 
 
Other contributors explore the effects of gun regulations and legislation on illegal supply chains. Daniel Webster and coauthors study the effects of Maryland’s 2013 Firearm Safety Act, which required all handgun purchasers to obtain a license. They find that 41 percent of surveyed parolees reported that it was more difficult to obtain a handgun after the law passed due to increased cost, lack of trusted sources, or people being less willing to buy handguns on their behalf. Analyzing over three decades of data on handguns recovered in Boston, Anthony Braga shows that fewer guns are illegally obtained from states that adopt legislation restricting buyers to one gun per month.  George Tita and coauthors  report the results of an inmate survey in Los Angeles in which they explored respondents’ knowledge of gun laws.  These findings suggest that laws aimed at legal gun transactions may also decrease the entry of guns into the underground market. 
 
The rate of gun violence in the U.S. surpasses that of any other advanced nation. This issue of RSF offers new empirical research on the underground market that arms dangerous criminals and provides a rich foundation for policies designed to curb gun violence.

The Credible Messenger Mentoring Initiative (CMMI), launched in New York City in 2012, is a transformative program where adults who had been in the justice system serve as mentors, role models, and life coaches for 16- to 24-year-olds. The program socializes and empowers these at-risk and formerly incarcerated youth offenders, diverting them from juvenile justice institutions and rehabilitation centers. It aims to build trust, deepen their ties to their community and family, and help them become peacemakers and role models for other youths.

Real Recognizes Real is the first in-depth study of the CMMI, focusing on the Washington, DC branch of the program, which is becoming a model for a new movement of anti-violent interventions. It shows the advantages of the CMMI being built on the love that members of a community have for one another rather than on outside intervention. The authors also explain how this state-run, non-profit program reduced recidivism rates and helped its participants, youth and mentors alike, develop more meaningful and lasting relationships.

Featuring interviews with youths and their mentors, Real Recognizes Real evaluates the successes, challenges, failures, and lessons of the CMMI, while emphasizing its value in the campaign for juvenile justice reform.

In the series Studies in Transgression