30% of Americans with criminal records for cannabis are unemployed. Despite record low unemployment, Americans convicted of cannabis crimes still have a difficult time finding a job. Richard Bronson joins Dan Humiston to talk about his company, 70 Million Jobs mission to help anyone with criminal record find a job. The proceeds from their current Crowdfunding campaign on Republic will help them accomplish their mission. Produced by Podconx https://podconx.com/guests/richard-bronson
30% of Americans with criminal records for cannabis are unemployed.
Despite record low unemployment, Americans convicted of cannabis crimes still have a difficult time finding a job. Richard Bronson joins Dan Humiston to talk about his company, 70 Million Jobs mission to help anyone with criminal record find a job. The proceeds from their current Crowdfunding campaign on Republic will help them accomplish their mission.
https://podconx.com/guests/richard-bronson
Dan Humiston: [00:00:00] Just a quick reminder before we start today's show that the Cannabis Dispensary Spotlight series sponsored by Helix Bio TRAC features cannabis dispensary owners from throughout the United States and Canada. Listen every Thursday and Sunday to hear fascinating insight into all the different strategies that these pioneering retailers are using to crack the national and international expansion code sponsored by Helix Biotech and playing exclusively on the Raising Cannabis Capital podcast.
Dan Humiston: [00:00:34] From MJ Bulls Media, I'm Dan Humiston and this is Cannabis crowd-funding. Today, I'm Cannabis crowd-funding.
Dan Humiston: [00:01:01] We're joined by Richard Branson from 70 million jobs. Richard, welcome to the show.
Richard Bronson: [00:01:06] Thanks so much for having me. Dan, it's great to be here.
Dan Humiston: [00:01:09] Well, I appreciate you taking time out from the really, really the important work that you're doing. Seventy million jobs is not only the name of your company, it's you really your mission to find jobs for men and women with criminal records. And I didn't realize this until I read it on your Web site that over 70 million Americans have criminal records, which is about one in every three adults, and a lot of them are having trouble finding jobs. I want to start off by saying thank you for doing this. I think the service that you're providing is is long overdue. But I got to admit, I didn't realize this. This was really a problem, especially with unemployment so low. And so I guess maybe to start off with, why is it so hard for people with criminal records to find jobs?
Richard Bronson: [00:01:56] That's a great question. And that's one in three adults with a record. That is the stat that always stuns people when they hear it these days with the existence of needed answers to questions on the Internet. Every company pretty much performs a background check on anybody that they are considering hiring. And if you have a criminal record of any con, you're going to get a background check in the background check with if you have a record. We'll have a red flag for most companies. That is the beginning and the end of your relationship, almost regardless of what you've done. It provides this incredibly challenging barrier to employment. And you're right. The bitter irony is that it's all coming during a time when the virus that we're going through, notwithstanding unemployment rates in this country, are at historic lows, about three and a half percent. The unemployment rate, however, among those with records is almost 30 percent. 30 percent is the highest rate of unemployment of any population in our country's history, including during the Great Depression.
Dan Humiston: [00:03:14] Well, certainly, as you said, a lot of our listeners are aware of this. So many of those people have been convicted of Cannabis crimes.
Dan Humiston: [00:03:22] I know you are working hard to turn this around, help people that have been convicted of Cannabis crimes and maybe can tell us some of the things that you're doing to help that subset.
Richard Bronson: [00:03:33] I mean, we've created a two sided marketplace essentially where we're matching up the millions of people who have records and are desperate for a job with corporate America, which happens to right now have millions of jobs unfilled. Now, I myself went to prison. I experienced firsthand how awfully daunting it is to go through this process. Now, I'm a white, college educated male and white corporate America. And I found it impossible. What about the guys I was in prison with who were primarily young men of color with limited education and limited work experience? What are their opportunities?
Richard Bronson: [00:04:14] And the answer is very few, if any,.
Dan Humiston: [00:04:19] Is there are opportunities for companies or advantages for companies to hire people with criminal records.
Richard Bronson: [00:04:25] There are quite a few. We operate a staffing business and a job board that specifically for this population. We have eleven million people in our community. People with records. I spend my days talking to heads of H.R. generally at large companies. I'm trying to show them that in fact, there are many advantages. First of all, they exist, in other words. These companies need people. And the people there and most companies recognize that in this environment they have to look to some nontraditional sources of talent. So this is certainly one. This is a huge population that has largely been ignored. But the companies really want to hire people with criminal records. It turns out that these folks, when they get the job, they actually do incredibly well. We are partnered with the Society for Human Resource Management, or SHERM. They did a study and they discovered that 82 percent of hiring managers believe the quality of hire when you're hiring someone for a record is as good as, if not better than hiring somebody without a record. And not only that, they stick around longer. Retention is better. Not only that, there are certain tax opportunities that are that exist. And it's great PR for a company to be able to send a message to the towns and cities in which they do business with to their. Fires to their employers that they're a big company, but they have a heart.
Dan Humiston: [00:06:03] And I think it's almost like they've already done their time. It's not like they weren't well.
Richard Bronson: [00:06:08] That's the irony. They get done their time. What are we supposed to do when they come out of jail or prison? Right. Let me throw out another statistic. I do. There's nobody in the world, Republicans, Democrats, anybody who doesn't agree that employment is a good thing. If someone comes out of jail, in prison, they need to earn a living. Either they're going to go on welfare or they're going to commit a crime or they're going to get a job and be able to put a roof on their head, pay taxes, take care of their family and claim it's important to anybody. But for these folks, it's even more so. And I'll tell you why. There is almost a 75 percent chance that when someone is comes out of jail or prison, that they will be rearrested within a couple of years, somehow percent. Seventy five percent. That's recidivism. Interestingly, almost every one of those people who are re-arrested are unemployed at a time of re-arrest. If you don't have a job, you will be rearrested. But contrariwise, those people who are employed almost never, ever get in trouble again. Employment really is the silver bullet.
Dan Humiston: [00:07:26] Many of the seeds of today's Cannabis revolution were planted in the music of the 60s and the 70s. And no one band had a bigger impact than Cannabis did the Grateful Dead. Their music created a safe environment for their followers to discover. Cannabis has many benefits today. Deadheads are playing pivotal roles in the Cannabis movement, joined Deadhead Cannabis attorney Larry Michigan and Deadhead Cannabis C.P.A. Jim Marty each week on the Deadhead Cannabis show as they talk to the latest Cannabis Jam Bad News. It's your great dead stories with your guests.
Dan Humiston: [00:08:02] Now you're in the middle of a crowdfunding campaign, on republic. Let's talk a little bit about the campaigns, who our listeners can know what you're doing and what you're doing with the proceeds and how they can get involved.
Richard Bronson: [00:08:14] Great. Thank you. I appreciate that opportunity. First of all, we are a Y Combinator company. And for those people who are angel investors or VCP people who might be listening, we went through Y Combinator. And of course, Y Combinator is the international preeminent early stage investor and accelerator program, a program that our BMB and Dropbox and Reddit and Strife and on and on and on. They went through the program, as did we. So we were successful in raising venture capital funds. But we have so many people who are not these shoes who want to be involved in the work. We do not work for profit, so we're left after double bottom line returns. We want to make a lot of money. I want to sell the company and walk away with lots of money from my investors and my employees and myself. But we're also interested in doing massive social good. Right now, we have more than 500 people who've invested in the crowdfund. And I think many, if not most of them are doing it less for the financial returns and more because they believe in the work we're doing. I'm thrilled to have more people involved. We're using the money to build out our sell side. We have eleven million job seekers. Some God knows we've got plenty of those. People need a job. We just need to generate more available positions and to do that. We need staff those hundreds of thousands of accounts that we could be and should be working with. We just need the staff to reach out.
Dan Humiston: [00:09:56] Man, it's like everything is in place right now. We just need the people to do it.
Richard Bronson: [00:10:01] That's what I'm saying.
Dan Humiston: [00:10:04] I agree that, you know, what I really like about the campaign is that it's only a hundred dollars if you want to get involved. Use only one hundred dollars. And right now you have I'm looking at the page right now and we have over 500 people already.
Richard Bronson: [00:10:17] So, you know, the average was like $250. And let me just, you know, underline and you sort of alluded to this, so many of these people have records relating to drugs, selling drugs, using drugs, whatever, growing pot.
Richard Bronson: [00:10:34] And I would argue because I was a big pot smoker and I knew lots of people who got in trouble. And these people today are walking around with the stigma of an arrest, even though we're based in California where it's decriminalized. And yet these people have to walk around, you know, with a life sentence. I would. Say that folks who are in the business particularly really owe a debt of gratitude to the people who, you know, were on the front lines and really where it kind of paves the way for the decriminalization of marijuana and certainly other things that I hope are to come as well. If you have a business in that space, we work with a bunch of Cannabis related industries. We've got wonderful people. We have people who are interested in accessing for social equity licensing. We've got people like that. But we need your help. There's so many more people we can help. And at the same time, I believe that we're going to end up making a lot of money out of this. So what's better than that? Helping people and making money at the same time? I mean, that's the way business should be conducted these days.
Dan Humiston: [00:11:50] That's inspirational. That's inspirational. We've been speaking with Richard Branson from 70 million jobs about their crowdfunding campaign, which is currently live on Republic. And we'll have all of 70 million jobs, information in the show, notes in it. MJBulls.com, including the link to 70 million jobs funding page OneRepublic. And as I mentioned earlier, I want a piece of 70 million jobs for 200 dollars. And do good help somebody who get their life back on track. If you're interested in you want more information, I'd recommend going to the Republic Web site because there's a ton there, including a great video.
Richard Bronson: [00:12:27] Richard, it's a real. You can tell me what we can do better or give me your ideas.
Dan Humiston: [00:12:31] I'd love to hear from them or tell them if you have a job available. Send it.
Richard Bronson: [00:12:37] Yeah. If you have a hundred jobs available like that, eight people for you, then better.
Dan Humiston: [00:12:41] Richard. Richard, it's real pleasure having you on the show and appreciate again all the work that you're doing right now. Keep it up and let's have you back on again.
Richard Bronson: [00:12:50] I'd be thrilled to be there. Dan, thank you so much for having me. It was a pleasure. You're welcome. Good luck.
Dan Humiston: [00:13:00] Today's show was made possible by the generous support of our sponsors, like all 36, the country's premiere blockchain payment processing platform that's providing dispensaries and its customers with a safe and secure payment option other than cash. To learn more. Go to all 236.com. Today's podcast was produced by MJ Bulls Media. The industry's premier Cannabis podcast network with original music produced in part by Jamie Humiston. I'm Dan Humiston and you've been listening to Cannabis crowd-funding.Fear.Fear.
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