5 ms·

Sometimes I wonder if laws like this actually increase discrimination. I had a professor who hired a female minority who had good qualifications and interviewed

Sometimes I wonder if laws like this actually increase discrimination. I had a professor who hired a female minority who had good qualifications and interviewed well, but turned out to be incompetent. He was fanatical about documenting everything, noted down when she made mistakes and actually tried a lot to help her fix them, but no luck, so he let her go, and then she sued. The suit was eventually dismissed, but he said it was very stressful and costly for him. So I wonder if situations like these make people say, "Screw it, I'm hiring someone that can't sue me if they don't work out." Not a good thing, but I think a very possible secondary effect of this sort of thing.

timr 16y ago
You're relying on a fallacy -- the law doesn't need to exist for the lawsuits to exist. Even if your professor's employee wasn't a minority, she could have sued for wrongful termination. Likewise, this guy could be suing for something other than age discrimination. In your example, the end result would be identical. Here, it sounds like the lower courts have determined that there's a basis for a trial, but Google is trying desperately to prevent a trial from taking place. Frankly, I'd like to see why.
- lionhearted 16y ago
  > You're relying on a fallacy -- the law doesn't need to exist for the lawsuits to exist. Do you mean this particular law doesn't need to exist for lawsuits to exist? Because all lawsuits need grounds to bring suit. > Google is trying desperately to prevent a trial from taking place. Frankly, I'd like to see why. Because they have literally nothing to gain from being dragged into court, paying legal fees, with a chance of being forced to pay millions of dollars and getting their reputation bashed, but gain nothing if they win? I think anyone sane wouldn't want that scenario to happen, it's lose/lose for them.
  - timr 16y ago
    "Do you mean this particular law doesn't need to exist for lawsuits to exist? Because all lawsuits need grounds to bring suit." Yes, that's what I mean. Eliminating the protected class won't eliminate lawsuits from people who believe that they have been the victim of unfair discrimination, because people who believe they are unfairly fired can still file suits for wrongful termination. They just can't explicitly claim age/gender/religion/whatever as a basis. If I can provide evidence that Foogle, Inc. fired me without cause, I might possibly have grounds for a case of wrongful termination against them, regardless of my age, gender, etc. But if the law also says that I can't be fired for my age, then it suddenly becomes much more important that I can demonstrate that Foogle, Inc. has a pattern of firing people who reach their Nth birthday. Basically, eliminating the protected class just makes it harder for people who are legitimately being discriminated against to make their case. It doesn't really deter people who are simply irrationally angry or looking for a cheap payout. If we imagine a universe where age isn't a protected class, your professor's secretary would cause just as much trouble -- she'd still lose, and she'd still have her day in court while doing losing. Unfortunately, it suddenly becomes possible for Foogle to start firing people en masse at age N, simply by fictioning up a few bad performance reviews. But now nobody can prove it, because age isn't a protected class, and will be ignored by the court.
    - lionhearted 16y ago
      I understand your point - people can bring bad lawsuits for bad reasons anyways - but I'm not sure you got my point. If there's a special protected class that the process for laying off/firing is different from other people, then that might make you think twice about hiring someone from that. This won't make a difference for superstar people, and it won't make a difference for people in high demand. It only makes a difference for people at the margin - if there's two equally good candidates for a hard to measure role, and you're not sure if either of them will work out - wouldn't it be sensible to take the one that there's less chance of backlash for letting go if they don't work out? Now, you could mention that's against the law too, and you'd be right. But I'll give you a real life example of how this happens. There's specific laws in California about doing what's called a "condo conversion", that is, turning a rental property into a condominium and selling it. There were quite a few condo conversions from 1998 to 2008 in California. The law says the previous renter needs to get a payout - for people under age 55 or 60, the payout is something like $4000. For people over that age, the payout if $15,000 or so. (don't remember the exact numbers - just that the payout for people over a certain age was more than double) Now, if you were renting an apartment and considering doing condo conversions in a year or two once you had more money, would you ever rent that apartment to an elderly person? No, you wouldn't. Not because you're a jerk. Not because you hate the elderly. But because, well, why would you want to pay $15,000 to someone to leave an apartment after renting it for 10 months? Hell, they might pay less rent than $15,000 in the 10 months! You'd be better off leaving it unrented! And mind you, this is a legally protected right, the landlord can't even explain, "I'm thinking of doing a condo conversion, I'm happy to rent to you, but if you want this can you waive the mandatory payment? If not I might wind up giving you more money than you pay me in rent." That's not possible, this payment is a non-waiveable right in California. That law is to protect elderly people, thinking it's harder for them to move. But a result is that it's harder for them to rent in high transition areas. Okay, make a law prohibiting that too, but if someone gets five candidates for an apartment they're considering a condo conversion on, they don't want to rent to someone that they're going to have to pay more money to than they receive in rent. Hence, less housing de facto available for the elderly as a result of the de jure anti-discrimation law. So you might be doing more harm than good. > If we imagine a universe where age isn't a protected class, your professor's secretary would cause just as much trouble She wasn't a secretary, she was either an electrical engineer or a coder in assembly language. They were making systems to transfer energy to different power grids efficiently at a crowded train station back when he worked in industry. I do think it's funny you just assumed she was a secretary though when I just said my professor of technology hired a female minority who interviewed well with good credentials, but turned out to be bad at her job. Even in academia she could've been a researcher or lab technician or administrator.
_delirium 16y ago
If a large company has a statistically noticeable pattern of not hiring minorities, though, they'll likely get sued for that, instead--- especially if anyone's actually said anything in a discoverable memo like, "I'm hiring someone that can't sue me if they don't work out". (Smaller companies, of course, can get away with pretty much whatever they want as far as hiring decisions go, as long as they don't say something stupid in public, because their number of hires isn't enough for anyone to conclude a strong pattern.)
jacquesm 16y ago
I'm surprised that she would sue. After all, she must realize that she was treated fairly and that she's going to make it incredibly hard for the next female minority to get hired, who might be qualified and a nice person to boot. Stuff like that tends to linger, even if it is subconscious and against the law.
- patio11 16y ago
  I'm surprised that she would sue She may have never heard criticism of her abilities in her entire life, was working for a boss who had nothing but positive feedback for her for an extended period of time, and then was suddenly canned with no warning for being incompetent. Every professor and teacher she's ever known is in unanimous agreement: she's awesome. Clearly, the boss must be racist.
- lionhearted 16y ago
  Someone mentioned the same thing in class. Professor said that during a settlement negotiation, he asked, "Why are you doing this?" and she actually said: "I need the money, and don't know what else I could do." Her and her lawyer offered to settle for something like $6,000 but he refused it on principle and went on to win. Actually, it was kind of sad. He was really a sweet, kind, nice person, literally no temper at all but gently assertive, very balanced and helpful. The class I was in was a low-ish level technology class and we had quite a diversity of people in there. He helped everyone as much as they needed, assigned intelligent and fun assignments... really just a great guy.
- roel_v 16y ago
  It's not in her interest in any shape or form to care about the next minority. It's perfectly rational for her to maximize her own profit.

timr 16y ago

You're relying on a fallacy -- the law doesn't need to exist for the lawsuits to exist. Even if your professor's employee wasn't a minority, she could have sued for wrongful termination. Likewise, this guy could be suing for something other than age discrimination. In your example, the end result would be identical. Here, it sounds like the lower courts have determined that there's a basis for a trial, but Google is trying desperately to prevent a trial from taking place. Frankly, I'd like to see why.

lionhearted 16y ago
> You're relying on a fallacy -- the law doesn't need to exist for the lawsuits to exist. Do you mean this particular law doesn't need to exist for lawsuits to exist? Because all lawsuits need grounds to bring suit. > Google is trying desperately to prevent a trial from taking place. Frankly, I'd like to see why. Because they have literally nothing to gain from being dragged into court, paying legal fees, with a chance of being forced to pay millions of dollars and getting their reputation bashed, but gain nothing if they win? I think anyone sane wouldn't want that scenario to happen, it's lose/lose for them.
- timr 16y ago
  "Do you mean this particular law doesn't need to exist for lawsuits to exist? Because all lawsuits need grounds to bring suit." Yes, that's what I mean. Eliminating the protected class won't eliminate lawsuits from people who believe that they have been the victim of unfair discrimination, because people who believe they are unfairly fired can still file suits for wrongful termination. They just can't explicitly claim age/gender/religion/whatever as a basis. If I can provide evidence that Foogle, Inc. fired me without cause, I might possibly have grounds for a case of wrongful termination against them, regardless of my age, gender, etc. But if the law also says that I can't be fired for my age, then it suddenly becomes much more important that I can demonstrate that Foogle, Inc. has a pattern of firing people who reach their Nth birthday. Basically, eliminating the protected class just makes it harder for people who are legitimately being discriminated against to make their case. It doesn't really deter people who are simply irrationally angry or looking for a cheap payout. If we imagine a universe where age isn't a protected class, your professor's secretary would cause just as much trouble -- she'd still lose, and she'd still have her day in court while doing losing. Unfortunately, it suddenly becomes possible for Foogle to start firing people en masse at age N, simply by fictioning up a few bad performance reviews. But now nobody can prove it, because age isn't a protected class, and will be ignored by the court.
  - lionhearted 16y ago
    I understand your point - people can bring bad lawsuits for bad reasons anyways - but I'm not sure you got my point. If there's a special protected class that the process for laying off/firing is different from other people, then that might make you think twice about hiring someone from that. This won't make a difference for superstar people, and it won't make a difference for people in high demand. It only makes a difference for people at the margin - if there's two equally good candidates for a hard to measure role, and you're not sure if either of them will work out - wouldn't it be sensible to take the one that there's less chance of backlash for letting go if they don't work out? Now, you could mention that's against the law too, and you'd be right. But I'll give you a real life example of how this happens. There's specific laws in California about doing what's called a "condo conversion", that is, turning a rental property into a condominium and selling it. There were quite a few condo conversions from 1998 to 2008 in California. The law says the previous renter needs to get a payout - for people under age 55 or 60, the payout is something like $4000. For people over that age, the payout if $15,000 or so. (don't remember the exact numbers - just that the payout for people over a certain age was more than double) Now, if you were renting an apartment and considering doing condo conversions in a year or two once you had more money, would you ever rent that apartment to an elderly person? No, you wouldn't. Not because you're a jerk. Not because you hate the elderly. But because, well, why would you want to pay $15,000 to someone to leave an apartment after renting it for 10 months? Hell, they might pay less rent than $15,000 in the 10 months! You'd be better off leaving it unrented! And mind you, this is a legally protected right, the landlord can't even explain, "I'm thinking of doing a condo conversion, I'm happy to rent to you, but if you want this can you waive the mandatory payment? If not I might wind up giving you more money than you pay me in rent." That's not possible, this payment is a non-waiveable right in California. That law is to protect elderly people, thinking it's harder for them to move. But a result is that it's harder for them to rent in high transition areas. Okay, make a law prohibiting that too, but if someone gets five candidates for an apartment they're considering a condo conversion on, they don't want to rent to someone that they're going to have to pay more money to than they receive in rent. Hence, less housing de facto available for the elderly as a result of the de jure anti-discrimation law. So you might be doing more harm than good. > If we imagine a universe where age isn't a protected class, your professor's secretary would cause just as much trouble She wasn't a secretary, she was either an electrical engineer or a coder in assembly language. They were making systems to transfer energy to different power grids efficiently at a crowded train station back when he worked in industry. I do think it's funny you just assumed she was a secretary though when I just said my professor of technology hired a female minority who interviewed well with good credentials, but turned out to be bad at her job. Even in academia she could've been a researcher or lab technician or administrator.

_delirium 16y ago

If a large company has a statistically noticeable pattern of not hiring minorities, though, they'll likely get sued for that, instead--- especially if anyone's actually said anything in a discoverable memo like, "I'm hiring someone that can't sue me if they don't work out". (Smaller companies, of course, can get away with pretty much whatever they want as far as hiring decisions go, as long as they don't say something stupid in public, because their number of hires isn't enough for anyone to conclude a strong pattern.)

jacquesm 16y ago

I'm surprised that she would sue. After all, she must realize that she was treated fairly and that she's going to make it incredibly hard for the next female minority to get hired, who might be qualified and a nice person to boot. Stuff like that tends to linger, even if it is subconscious and against the law.

patio11 16y ago
I'm surprised that she would sue She may have never heard criticism of her abilities in her entire life, was working for a boss who had nothing but positive feedback for her for an extended period of time, and then was suddenly canned with no warning for being incompetent. Every professor and teacher she's ever known is in unanimous agreement: she's awesome. Clearly, the boss must be racist.
lionhearted 16y ago
Someone mentioned the same thing in class. Professor said that during a settlement negotiation, he asked, "Why are you doing this?" and she actually said: "I need the money, and don't know what else I could do." Her and her lawyer offered to settle for something like $6,000 but he refused it on principle and went on to win. Actually, it was kind of sad. He was really a sweet, kind, nice person, literally no temper at all but gently assertive, very balanced and helpful. The class I was in was a low-ish level technology class and we had quite a diversity of people in there. He helped everyone as much as they needed, assigned intelligent and fun assignments... really just a great guy.
roel_v 16y ago
It's not in her interest in any shape or form to care about the next minority. It's perfectly rational for her to maximize her own profit.