Arrest records are generally public, in my experience. Perhaps it wasn't important to ask me since it would come up in a background check. But then so are conviction records. It's just not what I remember when applying to jobs, is all.
In my previous state it wasn't banned and I saw it on every application I ever filled out, but that was quite some years ago and my current state doesn't allow it. I've heard stories of people being fired for other reasons, but officially because the company did a background check later and the person had lied on their application.
