Ask HN: How can felons find programming jobs?
88 by sexoffender | 84 comments on Hacker News.
I've been unemployed for 12 months, went to jail 7 months ago for 2 months, applied for dozens of jobs per week for the past 5 months straight, and almost every single one of them has turned me down because I have a felony. I've tried not disclosing it, disclosing it early, disclosing it in the middle of the interview process, and disclosing it at the end when they make me an offer. They all turn me down. Half of them are judgmental turn-downs - they won't return my call and never get back to me, because they think poorly of me. Half are policy - Goldman Sachs made me an offer last month, but withdrew it this morning due to their policy against hiring felons. I only have enough money to last us through April, and that's literally because our local parish gave us a $1,000 check out of nowhere, which adds to what's left over from our tax return. I'm a hard worker with a wife and 5 kids to support. I just need a job, but nobody will hire me due to my background. Any pointers or advice would be greatly appreciated. Especially any pointers on where to actually find a job. Because I'm still on probation, I can't move out of state and can either work remote or local (greater Chicago area). Most of the jobs out here require 3+ years in C# which I don't have and don't feel comfortable lying about either. For more background, the felony is from flashing someone (while drunk) who was just under 17 years old. This was the second offense (the other was years ago). They are inexcusable and disgusting offenses, but they are permanently on my background. EDIT #1: my crime was in 4 local major newspapers, and all 4 online news articles show up when you google my name, so hiding my background is not really a possibility here. About 4 months ago, a small local software firm, which would have been an amazing job, said "I know you said you're looking for 70k, but we'd like to offer you 75k", and I asked them to give me a few days to think it over, which he was happy to do. Then they never responded to my calls after that, presumably because they found out about this. EDIT #2: I am no longer able to reply to anyone here, since HN now says "slow down, you're posting too fast" when I try, so, um, sorry if I don't reply to you before that resets (probably tomorrow).
I've been unemployed for 12 months, went to jail 7 months ago for 2 months, applied for dozens of jobs per week for the past 5 months straight, and almost every single one of them has turned me down because I have a felony. I've tried not disclosing it, disclosing it early, disclosing it in the middle of the interview process, and disclosing it at the end when they make me an offer. They all turn me down. Half of them are judgmental turn-downs - they won't return my call and never get back to me, because they think poorly of me. Half are policy - Goldman Sachs made me an offer last month, but withdrew it this morning due to their policy against hiring felons. I only have enough money to last us through April, and that's literally because our local parish gave us a $1,000 check out of nowhere, which adds to what's left over from our tax return. I'm a hard worker with a wife and 5 kids to support. I just need a job, but nobody will hire me due to my background. Any pointers or advice would be greatly appreciated. Especially any pointers on where to actually find a job. Because I'm still on probation, I can't move out of state and can either work remote or local (greater Chicago area). Most of the jobs out here require 3+ years in C# which I don't have and don't feel comfortable lying about either. For more background, the felony is from flashing someone (while drunk) who was just under 17 years old. This was the second offense (the other was years ago). They are inexcusable and disgusting offenses, but they are permanently on my background. EDIT #1: my crime was in 4 local major newspapers, and all 4 online news articles show up when you google my name, so hiding my background is not really a possibility here. About 4 months ago, a small local software firm, which would have been an amazing job, said "I know you said you're looking for 70k, but we'd like to offer you 75k", and I asked them to give me a few days to think it over, which he was happy to do. Then they never responded to my calls after that, presumably because they found out about this. EDIT #2: I am no longer able to reply to anyone here, since HN now says "slow down, you're posting too fast" when I try, so, um, sorry if I don't reply to you before that resets (probably tomorrow).
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