[21]

What's good for the society is not necessarily good for the individual.

Him getting a job is good for society, but I don't want to be the one shouldering the risk.

For the individual it's a high risk / low reward situation, so the rational decision is to pass.

Tragedy of the commons.

[mrtksn]

What risk? It's just easy to pass and assume that those who don't have News articles about are lower risk.

Not all crimes are reported on the News as it's for-profit entertainment business that needs to pick the most shocking/entertaining incidents and portray those in a way that more people share it.

[21]

Bayesian statistics, there are different priors.

The probability of a convicted person to do something criminal again is not the same as the risk of an random unconvicted person, just like the risk of a flood reoccurring in a previously flooded area:

> According to an April 2011 report by the Pew Center on the States, the average national recidivism rate for released prisoners is 43%.[2]

> According to the National Institute of Justice, about 68 percent of 405,000 prisoners released in 30 states in 2005 were arrested for a new crime within three years of their release from prison, and 77 percent were arrested within five years.

> According to a national study published in 2003 by The Urban Institute, within three years almost 7 out of 10 released males will be rearrested and half will be back in prison.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recidivism

[mrtksn]

It's not that simple.

Some ridiculous percentage of startups fail, yet not all startups have the same risk of failure.

That's also why it's not a good idea to dismiss a candidate on a single criterion unless you're randomly hiring.