ABSTRACT
Life course criminologists theorize that life course transitions into adult roles can act as turning points and foster desistance. Transitions into employment, marriage or parenthood lead to increased embeddedness in conventional society. For young men and women, employment seems especially important. A job not only provides steady income, but is associated with numerous factors that promote desistance, such as social control at the workplace or an increased sense of responsibility. As mentioned in the introductory chapter, empirical research shows that employment is associated with reduced offending in young adults (e.g. MacKenzie and De Li, 2002, Sampson and Laub, 1990, Uggen, 2000), who are prone to committing more crimes during spells of unemployment and fewer crimes when they are employed (e.g. Farrington et al., 1986, Fergusson et al., 2001).
