When I was active practicing law I could get virtually everything with a few clicks of the button: past civil suits, criminal, traffic, bankruptcy, divorce, child support, credit report etc. In some instances I would see juvenile records that should have been sealed. Some shit is just laying out there in the open waiting to be read by someone.
if the job you are trying to get - can throw you away cuz of a background check - it's not a job you want. You clearly on an expendable level then.
There are no 'background checks' when it comes to hiring in sports, lawyers, entertainment, music, executives, personal trainers, modelling, photography, surgeons, etc. Anything that requires mad skills, which triumph over a 12 y/o shoplifting or bad credit or unpaid speeding ticket charge.
But for corporate monkey jobs - where you just want to setup another barrier to filter out people - you have to go through that.
I've been thru a couple BG checks. Last one was the army. I don't care. But unless it's triple murder - i know i would've been hired regardless of what was in it. What I brought to the table was paramount over anything else.