This chapter examines the economic status of offenders, with a particular focus on their engagement with employment, where applicable. This includes those who were presented in the Introduction as having an economic status of 'substantial employment only' and 'education & training substantial employment'. A significant proportion of offenders' employment records do not meet the CSO's classification criteria for 'substantial employment' (see economic status definitions in Methodology), so these are initially excluded from the discussion. However, an examination of 'neither education nor employment' records is presented at the end of the chapter. The available data for employment spans from 2005 to 2019.  

For 5.3% of the 2,850 offenders, employment was their last economic status up to April 2016. Employment was the first economic status recorded after April 2016 for 4.3%, while 11.8% were in employment in May 2019.

Just over two-fifths of matched offenders (41.6%) have any record of employment. The highest employment rate between 2005 and 2019 was 15.8% in 2007 and it dropped steadily after 2007 to just 3.3% in the first four months of 2016. After April 2016, the employment rate rose to 11.7% by the first five months of 2019.

There were 150 offenders whose last economic status up to April 2016 included substantial employment and their median duration of employment was 1.7 years. There were 340 offenders whose last economic status in May 2019 included substantial employment and they had a shorter median duration of employment of just 1 year.

Table 2.4 presents the years which offenders were last in employment up to April 2016. In 2005, 70 offenders were in employment for the last time up to April 2016. The longest median duration of employment for offenders' last employment up to April 2016 was 2.0 years. This was the median between 2007 and 2012, and again in 2015.

Table 2.5 presents the years which offenders were last in employment after April 2016. In 2019, 330 offenders were in employment and the median duration of employment was 1.3 years.

Median weekly earnings for offenders were €346 in 2011. By the period May to December 2016, median weekly earnings fell to €235. By 2018, the median for offenders had risen to €350. 

(NOTE: for official statistics on national income in Ireland see EU-SILC, while for official sources of earnings data please see the Earnings, Hours and Employment Costs Survey (EHECS) and Earnings Analysis using Administrative Data Sources 2018 (EAADS).) 

Social protection payments were 26.6% of all income, (defined as income from employment plus social protection payments), for offenders who were employed in 2013. By 2019, social protection payments were 15.5% of all offenders' income.

Four out of five (78.7%) of the 1,720 offenders in April 2016 who were neither in education nor employment were receiving social protection payments. Immediately after April 2016, 73.3% of the 1,560 offenders who were not in education or employment received social protection payments and by May 2019 this proportion had risen to 81.0%.

The most likely social protection payment received by offenders immediately before and after April 2016 was ‘supplementary payments’. Four in ten offenders (39.5%) before April 2016 and nine in ten (89.1%) after April 2016 received ‘supplementary payments’. However, by May 2019, the most likely type of payment was ‘working age income supports’, received by 41.0% of offenders.

Substantial employment at key points of this analysis was demonstrated to be low among offenders. Records of employment that failed to meet the CSO classification of 'substantial' are included as unsubstantially employed in the classification 'neither education nor employment'. Of the 1,720 offenders last recorded in 'neither education nor employment' up to April 2016, 12.4% were unsubstantially employed, falling to 8.0% regarding first economic activity after April 2016, and 4.9% in May 2019.