5 ms·

Hmm. They start talking about making things illegal at just about the same point that I'm thinking this can be a great competitive advantage for anyone who will

by m_myers 15y ago

Hmm. They start talking about making things illegal at just about the same point that I'm thinking this can be a great competitive advantage for anyone who will hire unemployed workers. Different points of view, I guess.

balloot 15y ago
You're definitely right about the competitive advantage thing. You want to create a silly blanket rule? Fine - I'll be happy to interview the guy who's a rockstar engineer but decided to travel Asia for 6 months.
- dreamdu5t 15y ago
  We're talking about unemployed, not somebody who has the money to burn on traveling to Asia for 6 months.
  - hugh3 15y ago
    Still unemployed! But we are talking edge cases here.
    - nradov 15y ago
      No. http://www.bls.gov/cps/faq.htm#Ques5 http://www.bls.gov/cps/faq.htm#Ques5 "Persons are classified as unemployed if they do not have a job, have actively looked for work in the prior 4 weeks, and are currently available for work."
      - dspeyer 15y ago
        This is the definition used for assembling official statistics. It is unlikely that this is used by companies setting hiring rules.
      - arantius 15y ago
        Well now, that's anyone who currently has no employment, and is applying for a particular job ("actively looked for work"), isn't it?
  - PakG1 15y ago
    To be honest, traveling some parts of Asia isn't exactly expensive. Only when you get into Korea, Japan, HK. Most of the other places in Asia are pretty cheap, especially if you're backpacking.
zasz 15y ago
I don't think there are necessarily enough firms who are intelligent enough to gain a competitive advantage by hiring the unemployed. Some sort of blanket government protection might be useful.
jriddycuz 15y ago
And this advantage goes to smaller, leaner companies who are not hobbled by policies handed down from on high about who can and cannot be hired. Laws making it illegal to discriminate on the basis of employment status would only help the organizations who are not already doing it.
- rmc 15y ago
  Laws making it illegal to discriminate like this would also help the people who are currently unemployed.
  - ericd 15y ago
    Laws that make it illegal to discriminate would not help businesses (they lose the ability to use every signal available to them, and it might become taboo to ask about why one is unemployed, etc), and it will probably result in more discrimination lawsuits from disgruntled interviewees. No one needs more of those. That said, the stance of some of the companies in the article is silly.
pchristensen 15y ago
Take a look at this: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t04.htm http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t04.htm Who's going to get a competitive advantage by hiring the 5 million people with a HS diploma or less? Edge case whizzes are not effected by this. Anecdotally, yes, but in practice it's those without economically valuable skills. Two hands and a strong back ain't what they used to be.
notJim 15y ago
It's unlikely that the number of people who think like you is large enough to make a significant difference in the lives of the unemployed.

by m_myers 15y ago

balloot 15y ago

You're definitely right about the competitive advantage thing. You want to create a silly blanket rule? Fine - I'll be happy to interview the guy who's a rockstar engineer but decided to travel Asia for 6 months.

dreamdu5t 15y ago
We're talking about unemployed, not somebody who has the money to burn on traveling to Asia for 6 months.
- hugh3 15y ago
  Still unemployed! But we are talking edge cases here.
  - nradov 15y ago
    No. http://www.bls.gov/cps/faq.htm#Ques5 http://www.bls.gov/cps/faq.htm#Ques5 "Persons are classified as unemployed if they do not have a job, have actively looked for work in the prior 4 weeks, and are currently available for work."
    - dspeyer 15y ago
      This is the definition used for assembling official statistics. It is unlikely that this is used by companies setting hiring rules.
    - arantius 15y ago
      Well now, that's anyone who currently has no employment, and is applying for a particular job ("actively looked for work"), isn't it?
- PakG1 15y ago
  To be honest, traveling some parts of Asia isn't exactly expensive. Only when you get into Korea, Japan, HK. Most of the other places in Asia are pretty cheap, especially if you're backpacking.

zasz 15y ago

I don't think there are necessarily enough firms who are intelligent enough to gain a competitive advantage by hiring the unemployed. Some sort of blanket government protection might be useful.

jriddycuz 15y ago

And this advantage goes to smaller, leaner companies who are not hobbled by policies handed down from on high about who can and cannot be hired. Laws making it illegal to discriminate on the basis of employment status would only help the organizations who are not already doing it.

rmc 15y ago
Laws making it illegal to discriminate like this would also help the people who are currently unemployed.
- ericd 15y ago
  Laws that make it illegal to discriminate would not help businesses (they lose the ability to use every signal available to them, and it might become taboo to ask about why one is unemployed, etc), and it will probably result in more discrimination lawsuits from disgruntled interviewees. No one needs more of those. That said, the stance of some of the companies in the article is silly.

pchristensen 15y ago

Take a look at this: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t04.htm http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t04.htm Who's going to get a competitive advantage by hiring the 5 million people with a HS diploma or less? Edge case whizzes are not effected by this. Anecdotally, yes, but in practice it's those without economically valuable skills. Two hands and a strong back ain't what they used to be.

notJim 15y ago

It's unlikely that the number of people who think like you is large enough to make a significant difference in the lives of the unemployed.