Finding employment after being released from prison can be one of the most difficult tasks a felon faces. No one wants to hire you but parole terms require you to have a job or go back to jail. Even if you do not have parole requirements, you have to support yourself and face the question on every job application:

"Have you ever been convicted of a felony?"

Over 80% of all employers use some form of background check today which greatly limits the job paths available to convicted felons and even those convicted of misdemeanors.

Here are some jobs that are available:

#3 Start your own business

This is one of the best options for ex-cons because you never have to go through a background check and never have to worry about being fired. The best businesses are low cost start-ups. Look for something you can do at home, on your computer, or something where people want to pay you to come to them. This avoids renting a storefront or office. Some examples

Windshield repair - People pay you to come to their house and repair dings in their windshield. You can purchase a kit, practice on windshields in a junkyard until you are good enough, then offer your services through your local free newspaper. Locksmith – There are many places where you can train to be a locksmith, even home study courses.

The big advantage of starting your own business is that there are no background checks. I recommend you buy some books on starting your business and a book on creating a business plan. Some books on marketing your business and the difference between a sole-proprietorship and a corporation would also be a good idea. This is a huge topic and much too complicated to go into here but you must do some research and understand at least something about running a business before jumping in. The important thing to do is research and study business books first. Most businesses fail because the person who starts it knows nothing about business. They hope to hang out their sign and the money will come in. It never happens that way. You will need a plan and you should start small.

#2 Medical Tests

It may not sound glamorous, maybe even scary, but it pays real money and they do not ask any questions other than health related ones. There are many medical studies going on around the country. These are not all for cancer or heard disease either. Somewhere a company has a new product that heals scars. They want people with scars who will try their product and let them photograph the results.

Some company has a new tattoo removal system and they need people to test it on. Some of these jobs are outpatient type jobs where they pay you a few hundred dollars a month. Others are in-patient where you are kept in a hospital and monitored. These pay the most and may involve testing new drugs, anti depressants, or they may simply want to see how a healthy person reacts to an anti-inflammatory drug. You may even be one of the people who receive the placebo drug that does nothing and not the real drug. Check the Internet or if you have a local teaching hospital or research center they may be able to help too.

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