Employee Discrimination
...ed job opportunities for women. Evidence is provided on wage gaps amongst women with children and women without as well. The “family gap” is the termed used to describe this evidence. The evidence for this fact is strengthened by points from Waldfogel’s catalog of possible explanations. The gap amongst women should be relatively easy to argue compared to the gap between the genders and races. One idea that was ignored in the paper was the willingness to bargain between genders. The idea would have not been a strong point for Darity and Mason since arguing that this creates discrimination would be difficult. The other papers have no real focus on the topic of gender discrimination. Leading me to believe that gender discrimination is not that severe of a problem. The problem cannot be considered that much of discrimination problem if employers are willing to pay the same wage to different genders, but one gender is better at bargain then another. In the United States, higher paying jobs, such as CEOs, belong mostly to males. This problem appears to be a fleeting one though, since many women go on to higher education and have a larger role. Although an idea of a correlation between wages and education does come into play for the discrimination problem. Education is an interesting point with respect to discrimination. Education levels can lead to discrimination by employers. If this was the case, then Caucasians which may incur poor schooling face discrimination. Education cannot just be a factor in a statistical problem that can be solved out. A cause and effect point of view was developed by Neal and Johnson to prove that education standards could lead to future discrimination. If black people face low rewards for obtaining skills, then they will be less likely to invest time and money into higher education. In this instance, the future will produce people with lower education and cause an education gap between workers. The gap will then create a discriminatory stance by the employer. This is the exact reason why poorly educated Caucasians do not suffer from discrimination related to education gaps. The increased education of females and non-Caucasians is more of a recent trend. Education is not the direct cause of discrimination, but a difference in educational levels can explain the result of discrimination. Firms that choose to discriminate against certain genders, race, and/or education backgrounds will suffer additional cost. Legal costs are not the cost I am speaking of in this case. Non-discriminating firms will hire the best employees to work together. Discriminating firms will higher employees of like kind. Eventually the discriminating firm will loose uniqueness to competitors. The firm may have to overlook potential employees that are more qualified because of discrimination. Whatever the outcome though, the discriminating firm will be forced out by firms that do not discriminate. The main idea is that the discriminating firm will have to forgo its strategy to remain profitable. The idea leads to the fact that discrimination will have to be eliminated in the long-run. Heckman and Arrow use similar arguments to show that discrimination does exist, but will diminish over time because of cost. One big question raised is the network idea on how to measure discrimination. Recall the past and think back for a second about your work experience over your lifetime. Have you ever been hired for a job by someone you know or by someone because of, let’s say your parents? I know I have on many of occasions. The network system works in many ways. Many job positions are filled in the manner of networks. People refer others to employers for specific jobs. Can this be considered employee discrimination? The employer is not discriminating against other candidates, but has prior knowledge of a potential employee. The potential employee will have an advantage since they have a common link to each other. In many cases in today’s society jobs are filled without even posting a help wanted ad. Heckman makes that point in his article about discrimination. The network system does not lead directly to discrimination by employers. Groups that are discriminated against may be at a disadvantage since they do not have the access to these networks. Network systems then prove the point that discrimination does exist if people, who have previously faced discrimination, are unable to access these networks and cannot find employment. This form of discrimination is able to avoid the cost of discrimination though, since people are not being discriminated against, but yet hired through a network. Now another question is why employers discriminate. The idea of discrimination can be defined has holding a person’s color, beliefs, gender, or race against them. Think of the idea of discrimination as people discriminate against others that they cannot relate too nor share common beliefs with. Another way is that employers pick employees that have a common bond or background. The thought pattern would explain why audit studies find discrimination when two identical resumes are sent to hiring firms. Imagine you are reviewing resumes and two identical resumes come up. Both are equally qualified for the job, but you can only choose one to call. I would say that anyone would choose the person that they could best relate too. Now the question why comes in to play. Well think of it this way, you call a person for an interview. You pronounce their name incorrectly and continue not to be able to pronounce the name right. You would feel embarrassed or possibly ignorant toward the person. Arrow refers to this type of discrimination as taste-based discrimination. This is only raising a suggestion toward why people discriminate in these studies. This opinion leads me to side with Heckman on the fact that these studies are not useful in the world today. Heckman points out that creating two identical people is all but impossible since everyone is their own person, not one can be identical. One lesson taught in business is surveys need to be taken with no bias toward what the surveyed person is saying. A trainee starts with a bias view then because they are trained to look...