CJPR, Vol 8. Nos. 2-3/97, pp.

119-143
119
©IUP

Work Conditions and Juvenile Delinquency:

Is Youth Employment Criminogenic?
Francis T. Cullen
University of Cincinnati
Nicolas Williams
University of Cincinnati
John Paul Wright
East Tennessee State University

Abstract

In both public and scholarly circles, it often is assumed that employ-

ment is beneficial to the development of adolescents. To assess this
claim, we explored the relationship of working to delinquency among a
sample of youths, drawn from the National Youth Survey, who were in
school and between the ages of 12 and 19. The analysis revealed that
work conditions, especially the number of hours employed, were posi-
tively associated with delinquent involvement. We argue that these
results are consistent with a critical criminological perspective, which
would see juvenile employment within its structural context and be sen-
sitive to how the needs of youths are not served in the prevailing labor
market. Accordingly, we caution against a policy agenda that views
employment as a panacea for delinquency.

Although there are pockets of dissent (Gottfredson and Hirschi, 1990;

Hirschi and Gottfredson 1995; Wilson and Herrnstein 1985), criminolo-
gists generally argue that employment improves people’s lives and makes
involvement in crime less likely (see, for example, Allan and
Steffensmeier 1989; Currie 1985; Sampson and Laub 1993). In embrac-
ing work as beneficial, criminologists converge with the public’s view
that employment contributes to the healthy development of youths
(Phillips and Sandstrom 1990) and is capable of reducing crime (Cullen
and Travis 1984).
Demonstrating the benefits of employment, however, is a more chal-
lenging task. Ecological research, especially studies that aggregate data
120

at units smaller than the national level, tends to show a positive relation-
ship between unemployment and crime (Chiricos 1987; Freeman 1995).
Although a plausible interpretation, this relationship does not necessarily
mean that unemployed individuals are more criminogenic-for three rea-
sons. First, the proportion of unemployment in an ecological unit may
not only operationalize the pool of individuals motivated to offend but
also aspects of routine activities, such as guardianship and opportunities
for crime (Land, Cantor, and Russell 1995). Second, crime may not be
caused by the individual experience of unemployment but by the concen-
tration of disadvantage, which in turn shreds the fabric of the community
and weakens social control (Sampson and Wilson 1995). Third, even if
imputing relationships from the ecological-level to the individual-level
does not prove fallacious, an unemployment-crime association subse-
quently may be shown to be spurious when a range of social and psycho-
logical characteristics of individuals are taken into account (Hirschi and
Gottfredson 1995; Wilson and Herrnstein 1985).
Although aggregate-level research is fairly plentiful, research on indi-
vidual employment status and crime is less extensive and complicated.
Studies of offenders under correctional supervision, for example, fall short
of showing that work-related interventions consistently reduce recidivism
(Brewer, Hawkins, Catalano, and Neckerman 1995; Gendreau and Ross
1987; Rossi, Berk, and Lenihan 1980; Turner and Petersilia 1996). Perhaps
the major finding is from Sampson and Laub’s (1993) reanalysis of the
Gluecks’ longitudinal data. They conclude that although working per se is
unrelated to criminal involvement, the quality of employment-specifical-
ly, job stability-does mitigate against illegal conduct (cf. Homey,
Osgood, and Marshall 1995). Thomberry and Christianson (1984) make
an additional qualification: it appears that the effect of unemployment on
crime becomes stronger as individuals move into adulthood.
The relationship of unemployment to crime becomes even more com-
plex when juveniles are concerned. Empirically, as Hagan (1996, p. 8)
notes, there are &dquo;surprisingly few studies that focus on unemployment
among individual adolescents.&dquo; The research that does exist, moreover,
reaches equivocal conclusions: some studies find that employment exerts
no effect on youth crime (Crowley 1984; Gottfredson 1985), while others

suggest that employment may reduce criminal involvement (Farrington,

Gallagher, Morley, St. Ledger, and West 1986; Good, Priog-Good, and
Sickles 1986). Interpreting these results is difficult, however, because the
studies use very different samples (high-risk youths versus general sam-
ples ; youths in school versus those who have left school).
 121

Conceptual considerations also contribute to the complexity of under-

standing the relationship of unemployment to illegality among juveniles.
For adults, full-time employment is seen as normative and unemployment
as a sign of individual failure and/or social disadvantage. Accordingly,

unemployment may well be expected to have salient ramifications in an

adult’s life and thus to foster illegal conduct. For adolescents, however,
work is typically voluntary, limited to part-time employment, and an add-
on to the mandatory task of attending school. In this context, it is not clear
that unemployment is a criminogenic risk factor; it could mean that a
youth is insulated from demands of having to work by family affluence or
sacrifice, or that the youth is taking a temporary respite from the job mar-
ket as other interests are pursued (for example, extra-curricular activities).
Conversely, employment-especially if it involves working long hours in
poor quality jobs-may expose youths to situations and influences that
undermine conformity (Agnew 1986; Greenberger and Steinberg 1986;
Steinberg 1996). In short, as developmental criminologists suggest, the
impact of factors-in this case working-may have differential effects at
varying points in the life-course (Sampson and Laub 1995).
As Agnew (1986) points out, traditional criminological perspectives,
particularly strain theory and social control theory, would hold that
employment diminishes adolescent waywardness. For strain theory,
working would attenuate criminogenic strain by providing economic
opportunity and, in the short run, by satisfying materialistic desires (see
Greenberg 1993 [1977]). Social control theory would hypothesize that
employment reduces crime by strengthening social bonds, especially the
bond of &dquo;commitment&dquo; or a &dquo;stake in conformity&dquo; (see Sampson and
Laub 1993). In a similar vein, economic approaches see work as increas-
ing the rationality of conformity and as making the choice to break the
law less attractive (Freeman 1995, 1996).
A critical criminological perspective, however, would take a more
cautious, if not jaundiced view, of the benefits attributed to the entry of
youths into the labor market. From this perspective, juvenile employ-
ment would be understood in its structural context and in terms of the
interests it Work might well be beneficial to youths if it were
serves.

designed support their personal development and to facilitate their

to
transition into meaningful occupational positions in the primary labor
market (Currie 1985). Alternatively, a juvenile labor market that was not
organized to address the needs of adolescents and that used youths as a
source of inexpensive labor would be seen as exploitive and as potential-

ly criminogenic.
122

In this regard, youths typically receive low pay for their work, often
minimum wage, and are concentrated in clerical, service, and laborer jobs
(Card and Krueger 1995; Hill and Nixon 1984); that is, they are a pool of
inexpensive labor for the secondary labor market. They also work rela-
tively long hours, even while enrolled in school; for example, high school
juniors average 18.6 hours per week employed while the figure for
seniors is 23.5 hours (Ruhm 1995). Although some scholars view such
low-level employment as socializing youths into the work ethic and as
facilitating future occupational success, other scholars contend &dquo;that the
type of jobs in which most teenagers are employed have serious limita-
tions with respect to their developmental potential&dquo; (Schneider and
Schmidt 1996, p. 19; see, especially, Greenberger and Steinberg 1986).
In particular, the jobs often involve low cognitive complexity and offer
few opportunities for authority and responsibility-that is, they fail to
provide the kind of experiences needed to nurture development
(Schneider and Schmidt 1996). Furthermore, this work can potentially
expose youths to noxious occupational environments and to added life
stress, with jobs competing, for example, with family and school obliga-
tions (Agnew 1986; DiAmico 1984; Greenberger and Steinberg 1986;
Steinberg 1996).
It also is noteworthy that &dquo;the money teenagers earn is often used to
buy luxuries that enhance their status among their peers rather than to ful-
fill a genuine need&dquo; (Schneider and Schmidt 1996, p. 19; see also
Bachman, Johnston, and O’Malley 1984; Freedman and Thornton 1990;
Sullivan 1989). From a critical perspective, these materialistic desires are
not &dquo;natural&dquo; or foreordained. In contemporary capitalist United States,
youths now constitute an important &dquo;market&dquo; whose consumption desires,
rather than other human potentialities, are consciously targeted by busi-
ness interests. It is estimated that teenagers spend $109 billion annually

and, when their influence on their parents’ spending is taken into account,
this figure climbs to $170 billion. By 19 years of age, 37 percent of
youths carry a credit card (St. John 1995).
Messner and Rosenfeld’s (1994) institutional-anomie theory appears
relevant here (see also Rosenfeld and Messner 1995). They observe that
a distinctive feature of the United States is the extent to which the eco-
nomic institution-its structural interests and its cultural values as
expressed in the &dquo;American Dream&dquo;-dominates other institutional
spheres. Although they do not focus specifically on the adolescent stage
in the life-course, several considerations support the conclusion that the
social institution of youth has been &dquo;penetrated&dquo; (to use their term) by
economic interests and values.
 123

First, as just noted,

money, materialism, and conspicuous consump-
tion features of youth culture. Second, going to work is now a
are core

commonplace experience among school-aged adolescents-both males

and females. It is estimated that as many as nine in ten students will be
employed at some point during their high school years, causing Schneider
and Schmidt (1996, p. 17) to observe that &dquo;work is perhaps the most com-
mon out-of-school activity among America’s
teenagers.&dquo; Third,
teenagers’ employment patterns coincide, at least broadly, with two eco-
nomic interests: 1) the growing need for cheap labor in the service sector
of post-industrial United States; and 2) the growing economic potential of
the youth market following the Baby Boom. Thus, after 1948, youth
employment for 16 to 19 year-olds reached a post-World War II minimum
of 37.4 percent in 1964, only to rise steadily to 48.6 percent by 1979.
Since that time, this employment rate has fluctuated year-to-year, but
overall has remained relatively constant (Bureau of Labor Statistics 1996;
see also Steinberg 1996). Fourth, high school youths in the United States
work considerably more than adolescents in other advanced industrial
nations, where the domains of school and part-time work are not mixed
so readily (Reubens, Harrison, and Rupp 1981; Steinberg 1996). Fifth,
there is widespread agreement among parents that employment is benefi-
cial for their children, and that some form of work should begin by age
13 (Phillips and Sandstrom 1990). This finding is consistent with
Messner and Rosenfeld’s (1994) core contention that families are pene-
trated by economic values.
In short, we can outline two broad competing theoretical views on the
impact of work on delinquency. On one side, traditional liberal crimino-
logical theories would tend to see employment as reducing crime by cre-
ating opportunities and social bonds. Popular wisdom would also
embrace a sanguinary view of work, emphasizing how it builds character
and teaches important lessons about life in the &dquo;real world&dquo; (Phillips and
Sandstrom 1990). On the other side, critical criminology would see the
extensive participation of youths in the labor market as reflecting capital-
ist needs for cheap labor and a market to be exploited. The dominance of
economic interests would mean that the needs and interests of youths in
the workforce would receive scant consideration and their healthy devel-
opment would be undermined. Reinforcing this view, developmental
criminologists and psychologists would caution that the effects of work
may well vary by a person’s stage in the life-course, furnishing adults
with a meaningful stake in society but interfering with the successful
completion of developmental tasks earlier in life.
124

Although employment is an integral feature of adolescents’ lives in

the United States, individual-level criminological research on the effects
of working on delinquency is sparse. The studies that do exist, however,
are consistent in finding that &dquo;work intensity&dquo;-that is, the number of
hours worked per week-is positively associated with delinquency
(Agnew 1986; Heimer 1995; Wright, Cullen, and Williams forthcoming).
Research from psychology and economics tends to show that employ-
ment has few (and sometimes beneficial) effects when the number of
hours worked is modest, but that working more than 20 hours a week is
associated with lower future earnings, lower grades in school, reduced
educational aspirations, less favorable self-perceptions, and higher drug
use (Bachman, Bare, and Frankie 1986; Light 1994; Mortimer and Finch
1986; Ruhm 1995; Steinberg and Dornbusch 1991; Steinberg,
Greenberger, Garduque, Ruggiero, and Vaux 1982). On balance, then,
there is beginning evidence that youths’ employment tends to be crim-
inogenic (Ruggiero, Greenberger, and Steinberg 1982).
The current study is intended to bring further evidence to bear on the
theoretical debate regarding the effects of youths’ working. Using two
waves of the National Youth Survey, we explore how various aspects of

employment are related to delinquency. The analysis include not only

work intensity (hours worked), but also wages, time spent in current job,
and how often jobs were changed. To avoid the possibility of a misspec-
ified model, we control for school, family, and peer variables commonly
included in delinquency research. Finally, to surmount the problem of
causal ordering, we control for previous delinquency. The inclusion of
previous delinquency also is important, because it serves as a proxy for
enduring individual differences that theorists contend account for rela-
tionships between work and crime (see Gottfredson and Hirschi 1990;
Wilson and Herrnstein 1985).

Methods

Sample
Data for this study come from the fourth (1979) and fifth (1980)
waves of the well known National Youth Survey (Elliott, Huizinga, and
Ageton 1985). The NYS is a longitudinal national probability sample of
1,725 youths aged 11to 17 in 1976. Previous analysis of these data have
detected no serious bias associated with panel attrition or panel condi-
tioning for certain key variables (Elliott et al. 1985). The fourth and fifth
 125

waves of data are used because they represent for most adolescents the
time in which they are in high school and beginning their experience with
paid work. Moreover, these waves contain measures central to our theo-
retical argument.

Work Measures

Job Stability. This interval level variable measures the number of

weeks the adolescent has been employed in his/her current job.
Employment patterns of young adults indicate that adolescents switch
jobs frequently, holding as many as three per year (Steinberg et al. 1982).
Higher scores on this variable may indicate that the respondents are more
dedicated to their current job and that their current position is a stable
source of resources.

Hourly Wages. The conceptualization of this variable is problemat-

ic. The desire for money is responsible for much adolescent employment
(Steinberg 1996). Working provides the adolescent with the funds neces-
sary to participate in adolescent culture-a process potentially crimino-
genic (Wright et al. forthcoming). On the other hand, higher levels of pay
may provide a compensatory role by more heavily investing the adoles-
cent in the role of work (Agnew 1984). To measure hourly wages, we
include in the analysis an ordinal variable that assessed how much the
adolescent was paid per hour in his or her current job. Higher scores on
this variable indicate higher wages.
Job Changes. A characteristic of adolescent employment patterns is
the rapid succession of job turnover. Adolescents switch jobs frequently,
typically in pursuit of better pay, more desirable hours, or easier work
conditions (Agnew 1984). As such, we measure job changes with a sin-
gle item that asked respondents how many jobs they have held in the past.
Work Intensity. Central to our analysis is the number of paid hours
per week the adolescent works. As noted, prior research shows that adoles-
cents who work an extended number of hours per week-that is, some-
where between 15 to 20 hours per week-are less successful in school, have
weaker family ties, and are more delinquent (Steinberg et al. 1982, Wright
et al. forthcoming). Similar to past research, we square the work intensity
variable because work intensity does not appear to have effects until the
adolescent breaches the 15 to 20 hour mark (Berry and Feldman 1985).
We should mention that we were unable to control whether students
were interviewed during the school year as opposed to during summer
vacation. At the very least, the sample was limited to youths still enrolled
126

in school, regardless of when the interview was conducted. Future

research should explore whether the effects of working differ during the
school year versus summer vacation. Note, however, that although
youths work more in the summer months, &dquo;the differences are relatively
small, suggesting that a large number of students continue their academ-
ic year employment throughout the summer or vice versa&dquo; (Ruhm 1995,
p. 296). Based on the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth data, Ruhm
( 1995) has estimated that for juniors and seniors, students work about 4.5
hours per week more in the summer than during the school year.
We should also note that because the NYS data are now nearly two
decades old, some question about the generalizability of the results to
contemporary American youth may be raised. Of course, this criticism
can be leveled against the growing body of research based on the NYS.
On a broad level, we would suggest that there is evidence that the causal
factors related to crime are not so time specific that data from other eras
cannot be used to illuminate causal processes (see, for example, Sampson
and Laub 1993). On a more specific level, we have a measure of confi-
dence in our results because the central theoretical variable-juvenile
employment-has remained relatively stable since the NYS data were
collected. As noted previously, rates of youth employment rose steadily
following World War II, but since 1979 has remained fairly constant.
Family Measures
Life Stress. This scale is composed by summing the responses to 8
items that tap into various stressful life occurrences. Respondents were
asked whether any of the named events happened to their parents during
the course of the past year. These items include such stressful occur-
rences as divorce, illness, death, and separation (alpha=.88).

Family Cohesion. This is a six-item composite measure of the cohe-

siveness of the family. The scale taps into the extent to which the family
functions as a unit, spends time together in various activities, and the
degree to which the parents have been influential in the adolescent’s life
(alpha=.75)
Parental Disapproval. We also include a nine-item scale that assess-
es the extent to which the adolescents view how disapproving of delin-
quency their parents are. The individual items cover a range of behaviors
evaluated by parents-including nonserious offenses such as stealing
something less than five dollars, to serious offenses such as hitting some-
one or selling hard drugs (alpha=.84).
 127

School Variables

Academic Success. This variable is measured by a single item that

asks the adolescent about their overall grade-point-average. Scores ranged
along a five-point Likert scale from 1=&dquo;mostly F’s,&dquo; to 5=&dquo;mostly A’s.&dquo;
School Commitment. This is a four-item measure that assesses the
amount of time the adolescent spends studying and the importance of
schoolwork in the adolescent’s life. Three items tap into the amount of
time the respondent spends studying during the afternoon, evening, and
over the weekend. The last item asks subjects how important schoolwork
has been (alpha=.75).

Delinquent Friends
The NYS contains excellent measures of delinquent friends. We
employ a regularly used nine-item scale that asked respondents how
many of their &dquo;close friends&dquo; had participated in certain delinquent events
over the last year. Responses ranged from 1=&dquo;none of them,&dquo; to 5=&dquo;all
of them.&dquo; Respondents who score high on this scale report having more
delinquent friends (alpha=.82).
Delinquency Measure
Finally, a twenty-item delinquency scale was employed at both Time
1 (Wave 4, 1979) and Time 2 (Wave 5, 1980). Each scale is constructed
by summing the reported frequency of participation in a range of delin-
quent events. The Time 1 delinquency scale assess the frequency of
delinquent involvement over the past year (alpha=.80). Similarly, the
Time 2 delinquency scale measures the frequency of involvement in
delinquent activities from Time 1 to Time 2 (alpha=.82)’.
Results

Table 1 presents the results for five separate analysis. The first two
models analyze the data cross-sectionally for 1979 and 1980, with no
control introduced for previous delinquency. Models 3 and 4 regress
1980 delinquency on the independent variables for 1979, with and with-
out delinquency for that year respectively. Finally, the fifth model ana-
lyzes the 1980 data but includes a control for 1979 delinquency.
128

The results for the four work variables are largely consistent across
the analysis. Wages-that is, pay per hour-is unrelated to delinquency,
but the other three work variables are significantly and positively related
to delinquent involvement. Work intensity or hours worked has the
strongest effects, followed by job changes and then by job stability. In
line with previous research, prior delinquency and associating with delin-
quent friends are the most potent predictors of delinquency, far outdis-
tancing the modest effects of the work variables. On the other hand, the
effects of work variables not only remain statistically significant when
prior delinquency and delinquent friends are in the equation but also are
more strongly related to delinquency than family and school variables.
Previous research suggests that working a limited number of hours
per week is not criminogenic (Wright et al. forthcoming). Accordingly,
we explored whether a threshold exists after which the number of hours

employed begins to foster delinquency. We thus calculated the number of

hours where working began to have an effect on delinquency. The pro-
cedure involved entering both the linear and squared terms for hours
worked into the regression equation and solving a+2b*H2=0, where a is
the coefficient on hours and b is the coefficient on hours-squared. Similar
to past research, the analysis revealed that working begins to generate
affects on delinquency at 18 hours of employment per week.

Discussion

Going to work has become a commonplace experience among ado-

lescents in the United States. Despite this fact, criminologists have only
infrequently examined whether employment protects against or causes
delinquency. Instead, they often have treated the family and the school as
the only conventional institutions in the lives of juveniles. The research
reported here suggests that this neglect of the institution of work is a
potentially important omission: the effects of employment appear to rival
if not surpass the effects of family and school factors.
When scholars have considered the potential criminogenic influence
of labor market participation, they have tended to assume that access to
jobs is desirable and that crime will be reduced by programs that empha-
size job skills and employment. In so doing, they have reinforced, inad-
vertently but uncritically, the hegemony of the ideology that labor in and
of itself advances the healthy development of the young. Our analysis
questions this view, discovering that occupational involvement increases
delinquency. Again, this finding is not idiosyncratic; it is consistent with
 129

previous criminological research on work and delinquency (Agnew 1986;

Heimer 1995; Wright et al. forthcoming) and with psychological research
on how work negatively effects youths’ lives (Greenberger and Steinberg
1986; Steinberg 1996).
The specific findings of our research warrant further comment. First,
wages, which might be viewed as an indicator of job quality, had a neg-
ligible relationship with delinquency. This finding suggests that high pay
does not insulate against other effects of entering the labor market.
Second, both switching jobs frequently and job stability-that is, staying
at one’s job for a lengthen tenure-were positively associated with illegal
conduct. This result is paradoxical, but it seems to indicate that both
types of job experiences have unique criminogenic effects. Changing
jobs frequently may reflect exposure to unpleasant or stressful work situ-
ations ; job stability may be a sign that youths are deepening their involve-
ment in an occupational position, perhaps at the expense of addressing
other developmental needs.
Third and most important, work intensity appears to increase delin-
quency (see also Agnew 1986; Heimer 1995; Wright et al. forthcoming).
Our analysis revealed, however, that the effects of this variable took hold
only when youths worked more than 18 hours. This finding suggests that
youthful employment is likely not problematic if it is properly monitored
and limited to a few hours a week. Economic research even indicates
that working can have positive effects on later economic outcomes, such
as earnings, if the hours worked are not extensive and the youths are
older teens, such as seniors in high school (Light 1994, 1995; Ruhm
1995). A broader conclusion is that employment should be developmen-
tally appropriate, with occupational demands matched to the maturity and
needs of individual youths.
The criminogenic impact of youthful employment is, we believe,
consistent with a critical criminological perspective that views labor
within its structural context. From this perspective, the extensive
employment of adolescents serves economic interests in two ways: as a
of
pool low-wage labor for jobs located in the secondary labor market,
and as a pool of potential consumers to be enticed to desire goods and ser-
vices. These two interests intersect, of course: work fosters consumption,
while materialistic desires heighten incentives to work. In this context,
youths become a commodity to be used rather than a person to be invest-
ed in and nurtured toward healthy development.
Recall that American adolescents still in school are more likely to
work than their counterparts in other advanced industrial nations, in large
130

part because the enormous expansion in post-World War II United States

of the service economy has created a sustained demand for part-time,
inexpensive labor (Reubens et al. 1981 ). According to Steinberg (1996,
p. 167), these structural conditions create powerful forces aimed at justi-
fying the work-is-good ideology:
One reason for the uphill nature of the battle against excessive student
employment is the tremendous power wielded by the industries that are major
employers of teenagers - restaurants, supermarkets, and retail stores. These
employers thrive on the inexpensive part-time labor provided by Amencan stu-
dents. Not surpnsingly, they continue lobbying legislators to keep child labor
laws loose, waging a concerted public relations campaign designed to convince
American parents and students that adolescents somehow reap characterologi-
cal, if not moral, benefits from spending their afternoons and evemngs flipping
hamburgers, stuffing bumtos, and operating cash registers.

In short, the hegemony of the ideology that work builds character

diverts attention away from the kind of labor in which youths are
involved and leads even parents to support their children’s going to work.
In a study of parents with employed offspring, Phillips and Sandstrom
(1990, p. 177) report that &dquo;approximately two-thirds indicated no desired
changes&dquo; in their children’s jobs, and of those who did want changes,
&dquo;more parents indicated a desire for their children to work additional
hours than fewer hours.&dquo; These findings are salient, observe Phillips and
Sandstrom (1990, p. 18), because &dquo;excessive hours of adolescent work is
an issue that has been of foremost concern to researchers.&dquo;
A critical perspective thus is valuable in questioning the pervasive
sanguinary view of work, which is found inside and outside scholarly cir-
cles. We recognize the risk, however, of moving too far beyond our data.
At this point, the results reported here are suggestive, not definitive, and
the precise mechanisms by which work fosters delinquency remain large-
ly unexplored empirically and a matter of theoretical speculation. To
date, scholars have generally hypothesized that work and the acquisition
of financial resources increase delinquency by affecting factors identified
by traditional criminological theories: that is, by reducing social bonds to
parents and to school, increasing strain, and exposing youths to deviant
peer influences and values (see, for example, Agnew 1986, 1990; Cullen,
Larson, and Mathers 1985; Hirschi 1983; Wright et al. forthcoming).
There also is evidence that materialism and a desire for money-values
potentially made more salient by employment-are positively related to
delinquent involvement (Agnew 1994; Ruggiero et al. 1982).
 131

Although these lines of inquiry are not without utility, a critical per-
spective-with a sensitivity to how employees are exploited-would lead
us in a different direction: to a systematic focus on the kind of work con-
ditions that juveniles experience in on the job. Shanahan, Finch,
Mortimer, and Ruy (1991) note that there is an extensive social science
literature linking psychological functioning among adults to work expe-
riences, such as time pressures, unpleasant physical tasks, excessive
workloads, role ambiguity and conflict, job insecurity, and the support (or
lack thereof) of supervisors. Notably, their empirical research shows that
the quality of work conditions also has an impact on depression among
adolescents, and that the effects of specific factors vary by the develop-
mental stage of the respondents.
In a similar vein, criminologists might fruitfully explore how a wide
range of measures of the quality of work conditions influences delin-
quency. Again, a critical perspective would anticipate that misconduct
would be heightened by work that was exploitive and insensitive to the
needs of youths, such as by exposing them to excessive hours, noxious
work settings, coercive and unsupportive discipline, and tasks that pro-
vide remuneration but little intrinsic reward and personal development.
Although studies are in short supply, existing evidence lends credence to
this proposition. In a study of occupational deviance among adolescents,
Ruggiero et al. (1982) report that theft and other forms of misconduct
were related to poor quality interpersonal relationships in the work-

place-what they termed as a &dquo;negative social environment.&dquo; Agnew’s

(1986, p. 19) analysis of Youth in Transition national data also suggests
that the quality of the work environment matters, finding that delinquent
involvement was lower for &dquo;juveniles in white-collar jobs of long dura-
tion, short hours, and low pay.&dquo;
We also recognize that the deleterious effects of work reported here
and in other studies pertain only to school-aged adolescents. It may well
be possible that as youths make the transition from high school into the
full-time labor market that working will reduce their risk of criminal
involvement. Still, there is individual-level (Crowley 1984; Sampson and
Laub 1993) and ecological-level research (Allan and Steffensmeier 1989)
that questions whether the mere fact of employment insulates young
adults against crime-that is, that work in and of itself is beneficial.
Instead, this research reveals that employment in low-quality jobs-what
Currie (1985) calls underemployment-is criminogenic (see also
Sullivan 1989). In any case, it appears that criminological theory and
research might benefit from paying systematic attention to how work
132

experiences affect criminal behavior across the life-course.

We also would like to make explicit a point that has perhaps remained
more implicit in this paper: in line with Lynch ( 1996), we recommend
that scholars explore the integration of critical and life-course (or devel-
opmental) criminologies. Given the role that individualistic theories his-
torically have played in acquitting the social order of any complicity in
crime causation (Gould 1981 ), it is understandable why critical criminol-
ogists have not readily embraced a life-course approach that focuses on
early development and the inculcation of traits that predispose individu-
als to wayward behavior. Still, the empirical evidence showing that
developmental factors matter in criminal behavior is mounting and can-
not be ignored (see, for example, Farrington 1994; Loeber and Le Blanc
1990). More importantly, if critical criminology is correct, the quality of
development and thus the risk for crime should itself be intimately shaped
by prevailing structural conditions (see Currie 1985; Sampson and Laub
1994). In this regard, our research hopefully lends a measure of support
to this perspective. We have suggested that economic interests that ben-
efit from youths’ labor underlie the extensive employment of adolescents
in the United States; that inevitably some youths work too many hours in
exploitive conditions; that exposure to these kinds of workplaces inhibits
healthy development; and thus that in the end &dquo;going to work&dquo; tends to
foster delinquent behavior.
In challenging a sanguinary view of the effects of employment, we
are not saying that labor market conditions and policies are unimportant.
On an ecological level, a plausible case can be made that concentrations
of joblessness and unemployment, combined with racial isolation and ris-
ing inequality, contribute to a host of problems-including crime-in the
inner cities (Currie 1985; Hagan 1994; Sampson and Wilson 1995;
Wilson 1996). This reality raises important policy questions about the
need for government intervention in fashioning an economic policy that
is relevant to the nation’s disadvantaged population. In his recent When
Work Disappears, for example, William Julius Wilson ( 1996) has called
for a revitalized &dquo;WPA-style&dquo; jobs program that would offer useful pub-
lic works employment to all able-bodied workers (see also Kaus 1992).
Wilson notes that the United States, in contrast to nations such as
Germany, is largely bereft of systematic programs aimed at assisting the
transition of high school youths into the labor market (see also Panel on
High Risk Youth 1993).
While not denying either the impact of these larger structural sources
of crime or potential ameliorative effects of a more effective and inclu-
 133

sive labor policy, our findings caution against the premature, intense
involvement of adolescents in work. Again, there is a growing body of
evidence, accumulated over the last decade, which suggests that working
a large number of hours each week is detrimental to many youths. The
effects of extensive employment appear to be general, increasing the risk
for delinquency, drug and alcohol use, personal problems, and detach-
ment from school (Greenberger and Steinberg 1986; Steinberg 1996).
These findings would favor policies that curtail how much adolescents
work, especially when school is in session’-.
Steinberg notes, however, that states pay scant attention to the inten-
sity of the labor market participation of youths age 16 and over. &dquo;Current
child labor regulations,&dquo; he observes, &dquo;permit students to work far more
during the school year than is good for their scholastic development or
psychological well-being&dquo; (1996, p. 193). Thus, only Maine and
Washington limit these youths’ employment during the school year to 20
hours or less; 13 states place the upper-limit at 40 hours a week, and 29
states fail to regulate hours worked once a youth reaches 16 (p. 193).
Steinberg cautions that &dquo;not all parents are aware of the dangers of exces-
sive employment&dquo; (p. 193), and he advises that &dquo;we must make it clear in
the minds of young people and parents that the primary activity of child-
hood and adolescence is schooling&dquo; (p. 188).
These considerations also should cause criminologists to exercise
caution before advancing a policy agenda that sees employment in the
current labor market as the solution to delinquency. Let us hasten to say
that we do not dismiss the possibility of designing effective work pro-
grams that provide at-risk youth jobs within the context of support ser-
vices (see, for example, Krisberg, Currie, Onek, and Wiebush 1995).
Still, the stubborn reality is that few such programs exist, and that the
political will to establish quality work programs for disadvantaged youths
appears in short-supply. For most youths, then, working means employ-
ment in low-paying, low-skill jobs that do little to equip them with the
cognitive skills and human capital needed to secure quality positions. In
the absence of educational credentials, these youths are likely to be con-
signed to the secondary labor market.
The challenge is to foster the healthy psycho-social development of
youths and to prepare them for a place in post-industrial America. As
essential element of a policy agenda will be blunting the effects of
inequalities that reproduce themselves within at-risk families (Currie
1985; Sampson and Laub 1995). We have no illusions that this task will
be easily accomplished or that a larger social movement for social justice
134

is on the horizon. But some space for practical progressive reforms may
be possible (Dionne 1996). For example, there is a growing knowledge
base showing that early intervention programs with at-risk children and
their families can be effective (Yoshikawa 1994). Furthermore, there is
evidence that a combination of economic incentives and enrichment can
retain disadvantaged youths in school, build human capital, and reduce
delinquent involvement (Greenwood, Model, Rydell, and Chiesa 1996).
Calling for early intervention and for programs to keep kids in school is
a modest but, we believe, potentially achievable agenda. In any case,
such proposals strike us as preferable to an approach that would see the
solution to delinquency as resting in the employment of youths in a labor
market that too often does little to advance their human development and
life prospects.

Notes

’Our analysis did not include parental income as a control variable

because of the number of missing cases associated with the measure.
As one reviewer pointed out, it is possible that the effects of employment
2
might vary by neighborhood context. Qualitative research by Sullivan
(1989), for example, shows how work takes on different meanings and
effects across lower-class communities that differ in race-ethnicity and in
social capital. We would caution, however, in assuming that employment
is "good" for youths in economically deprived areas. Thus, research by
Wright et al. (forthcoming) reports that work intensity is positively relat-
ed to delinquency among high-risk youths. In any case, how employment
varies by neighborhood deserves further investigation.
 135

Table 1: The Impact of Work Conditions on Delinquency

Model 1 is the within 1980 wave (cross-sectional)

Model 2 is the within 1979 wave (cross-sectional)
Model 3 is the prospective model in which the 1979 independent variables are
used to predict 1980 delinquency.
Model 4 is similar to model number 3 except a control is included for prior
(1979) delinquency.
Model 5 is the within 1980 wave controlling for prior (1979) delinquency.
*
significant at or below p<.05,, one-tailed test.
136

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