11.

Job Discrimination
 Introduction

 Job discrimination has many variations.

 Affirmative action has been one proposed remedy
for past discrimination.
What moral arguments exist for and against
discrimination?
What are the obligations of employers toward
their employees regarding discrimination
issues?

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 Meaning of Job Discrimination

 Definition: Job discrimination occurs when:

(1)An employment decision in some way harms or
disadvantages an employee or a job applicant.
(2)The decision is based on membership in a certain
group, rather than on individual merit.
(3)The decision rests on prejudice, false stereotypes,
or the assumption that the group in question is in
some way inferior and thus does not deserve equal
treatment.

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 Meaning of Job Discrimination

 Forms of discrimination: Discrimination can be

individual or institutional, intentional or unwitting.
 Arguments against discrimination: It involves
false assumptions about a group and harms its
members, so utilitarians would reject it due to its
ill effects on overall human welfare.
 Kantians would repudiate it as failing to respect
people as ends in themselves.
 Discrimination is also unjust.

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 Evidence of Discrimination

 Statistical evidence: Studies reveal the persistence

of discrimination in American life.
Research shows wide economic disparities
between whites and racial minorities.
It shows significant occupational and income
differences seen in white males as compared to
women and minorities.
Few women and minorities can be found at the
very top of the business world.

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 Evidence of Discrimination

 Attitudinal evidence: Statistics alone do not

conclusively establish discrimination – other
elements may account for the disparities in income
and position between men and women and
between whites and other races.
 Widespread racist and sexist attitudes and biased
institutional practices and policies come into play.
 Women and minorities often find themselves
measured by a “white male” value system.

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 Affirmative Action: The Legal Context

 The Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of

Education (1954) declared racially segregated
schooling as unconstitutional and helped launch
the civil rights movement in the U.S.
 The Civil Rights Act of 1964 (later amended by the
Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972)
prohibited all forms of discrimination based on
race, color, sex, religion, or national origin.

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 Affirmative Action: The Legal Context

 The Age Discrimination in Employment Act (1967

and 1978), and the Americans with Disabilities Act
(1990) further defined illegal discrimination.
 By the 1970s, companies contracting with the federal
government were required to develop affirmative
action programs.
 They reflected the courts’ recognition that job
discrimination can exist even in the absence of
conscious intent to discriminate.
Business Ethics
Chapter 11
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 Affirmative Action: The Legal Context

 Many companies believe that they benefit from

affirmative action by becoming more diverse.
 Critics say that it has often meant illegal quotas,
preferential treatment of women and minorities, or
reverse discrimination against white males.
 Many Americans now oppose affirmative action, and
political opposition to it has grown greater than ever,
particularly regarding federal programs.

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 Affirmative Action: The Legal Context

 The Supreme Court has adopted a case-by-case

approach to affirmative action.
Overall a majority of the Court has upheld
programs that are moderate and flexible.
Race can be taken into account employment
decisions, but only as one factor among many.
Programs that demand rigid and unreasonable
quotas or that impose excessive hardships on
present employees are illegal.

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 Affirmative Action: The Moral
Issues
 Arguments for affirmative action:
(1)Compensatory justice demands affirmative action
programs.
Point: We have a moral obligation to redress past
injuries.
Counterpoint: People today can’t be expected to atone
for the sins of the past – and why should today’s
candidates receive any special consideration?

Business Ethics
Chapter 11
11
 Affirmative Action: The Moral
Issues
(2) It is necessary to permit fairer competition.
Point:
Taking race and sex into account makes job
competition fairer by keeping white men from having
an undeserved competitive edge.
Counterpoint:
Employers have the right to seek the best-qualified
candidates without trying to make life fair for
everybody – and disadvantaged whites are also out
there.
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 Affirmative Action: The Moral
Issues
(3) It is needed to break the cycle of minorities and
women locked in low-paying, low-prestige jobs.
Point:
Even if racism and sexism ended, mere nondiscrimination
would need a century or more for blacks and women to
equalize their positions.
Counterpoint:
Affirmative action has its costs – making everyone
racially conscious and causing resentment and frustration.
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 Affirmative Action: The Moral
Issues
 Arguments against affirmative action:
(1)It injures white men and violates their rights.
Point:
Such programs violate the right of white men to be
treated as individuals and to have racial or sexual
considerations not affect employment decisions.
Counterpoint:
The interests of white men have to be balanced against
society’s interest in promoting these programs.

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 Affirmative Action: The Moral Issues
(2) Affirmative action itself violates the principle of
equality.
Point:
If equality is the goal, it must be the means, too. Such
programs are based on the same principle that
encouraged past discrimination.
Counterpoint:
We can’t wish the reality of discrimination away by
pretending the world is colorblind, when it is not.

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 Affirmative Action: The Moral
(3) Nondiscrimination Issues
alone will achieve our social
goals; stronger affirmative action is unnecessary.
Point:
The 1964 Civil Rights Act already outlaws job
discrimination, many discrimination cases have been
won before the EEOC or in court. So we only need to
insist on rigorous enforcement of the law.
Counterpoint:
The absence of vigorous affirmative action programs
halts progress.
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 Comparable Worth

 The meaning of the comparable worth:

 It says that women and men should be paid on the
same scale – not only for doing the same or
equivalent jobs, but also for doing different jobs
involving equal skill, effort, and responsibility.

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 Comparable Worth
 Advocates
 point to statistics showing that women are in more
low-paying jobs than men – and that the more women
dominate an occupation, the less it pays.
 Some say monetary reparations (retroactive payment
adjustments) are due to for past work.
 They believe that paying women equally for a job of
equal worth is a matter of social justice.
 Opponents say that women have freely chosen
lower-paying occupations.

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 Sexual Harassment
 Definition: “Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for
sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct
of a sexual nature constitute sexual harassment
when:
 (1) submission to such conduct is made either
explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of an
individual’s employment,

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 Sexual Harassment
(2) submission to or rejection of such conduct by an
individual is used as the basis for employment
decisions affecting such individual, or
 (3) such conduct has the purpose or effect of
substantially interfering with an individual’s work
performance or creating an intimidating, hostile, or
offensive working environment.”

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 Sexual Harassment
Two forms of sexual harassment:
(1)Quid pro quo harassment :
(2)occurs when a supervisor makes an employee’s job
opportunities conditional on the employee’s entering
into a sexual relationship with, or granting sexual
favors to, the supervisor.
(3)Hostile working environment :
(4)is behavior of a sexual nature that is distressing to
workers (often, but not exclusively, women) and
interferes with their ability to perform on the job.

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 Sexual Harassment

 The view of the law courts:

 In sexual harassment cases, the courts look to what a
reasonable person would find offensive.
 But what matters morally is to respect each person’s
choices and wishes.

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 Sexual Harassment: Dealing with sexual
harassment:
 An employee encountering sexual harassment
should:
(1) Make it clear that the behavior is unwanted.
(2) If the behavior persists, document it by keeping a
record of what has occurred, who was involved, and
when it happened.
(3) Complain to the appropriate supervisor.
(4) If internal complaints prove ineffective, consider
seeing a lawyer and learning in detail what legal
options are available.
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 DISCUSS
• A bisexual employer
who sexually harasses
both men & women
• An infatuated
employees
supervisor is a
woman and the • Because he
employees are men. discriminates against
neither gender, is
• Sexual harrasment?
there no sexual
harassment?

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 Assignment

• Uses the ethical theories you know to

substantiate your argument on the
following:
1. Job discrimination and comparative
worth
2. Your view on “Affirmative Action”
3. Sexual Harassment

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