It seems the EEOC needs to be de-funded. :mad::mad::mad::mad:
The latest is the federal government’s attempt to equalize how black and white job candidates appear to prospective employers even if they differ substantially – just ban employers from checking credit and criminal histories so as not to “unreasonably” disadvantage black job applicants.
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This anti-background check effort recently drew national attention when the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) sued the Kaplan Higher Education Corporation for using credit histories to screen applicants, a widespread and growing practice among both private firms and the government itself.
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Ironically, banning background checks may exacerbate black unemployment. If an employer has inadequate information about a prospective hire, he or she is forced to use crude proxies, and race is a convenient, clear-cut proxy. So rather than risk hiring an ex-felon or chronic deadbeat, stick to whites or Asians. In fact, one study of this relationship found that employers were more likely to hire black males where they could perform background checks on past criminality. In other words, since most blacks have clean records, these “helpful” prohibitions were a liability for those who might otherwise be hired.
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This ill-advised “help” is just one of many similar unhelpful government interventions.
EEOC Warns Employers: If You Don’t Want to Hire Felons, You Need a Good Reason
Washington, DC - The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is warning employers that it is illegal to use a prospective employee’s past conviction records, even for serious felonies, as an “absolute measure” as to whether they should be hired because this “could limit the employment opportunities of some protected groups.”
This is, the EEOC says, because blacks and Hispanics are over-represented among felons.
"Blacks and Hispanics also have an unfortunate higher high school and college dropout rates than whites and Asians – surely this could be determined to be a disparate impact.
I have some bad credit because of medical bills that went to collections a few years ago, and they stay on your record for quite a long while. I also have one on there from ATT when they decided to charge me for months of phone service after I switched to a new location, and got my phone number switched. They kept charging the old number for service even though I had switched to a new number within ATT months previously. Ive argued with them on the phone for many hours over it, and they refuse to budge. I get bills from collectors over it, and just ignore it. If someone wants to deny me a job over medical bills and an ATT phone bill like that then its probably not someone I want to work for in the first place. Im not going to pay hundreds to a collector for a service I never got in the first place.
Besides “credit” is why our country is so fucked up in the first place. Im not going to play the game of having to get credit cards and all this dumb shit that makes bankers rich just to have some stupid credit rating. I decided a while ago if I don’t have the cash Im not going to buy it. Credit is why our economy is tanked.
For instance someone can have a much better credit rating who is 10k in credit card debt than someone who never took a credit card in the first place. Thats all I need to know to say its a scam. Not that one example is ‘it’ but thats just an in your face example of the stupidity of the system.
Im also becoming less thrilled about someone with a felony. There are tons of things you can get charged a felony for now that are really quite stupid. There was a girl trap shooter who had her competition shotgun in her locked car at school. She could have been charged and convicted as a felon. Yet 30 years ago people brought their hunting guns to school to go hunting after class. Myself I was put up for expulsion in HS for having ammo in my truck. I shot trap competitively for many years as a teenager, and won quite a few trophies. Imagine if I had been convicted. Id never be able to own a gun again, join the mil like I did, and never be able to land a job other than construction or McDonalds. The line between a felon and normal dude is so blurry I can almost 100% guarantee you 100% of us will commit a felony in our lives and most of the time its completely innocent or we don’t even know we did. Now if its robbery, rape, murder, or some other heinous crime that is one thing. But if you want to review every law on the books and your entire life we are all felons.
I also see the point in this. If someone had bad credit due to debts or a criminal history the best thing they can be doing is working, and trying to improve themselves. Pretty hard to do if you are stuck at McDonalds. No way to pay your debts and crime pays better than minimum wage.
The problem is some retard trying to tell me (I don’t own a business but just pretend I do for now) who I can and cannot hire. They don’t own MY business, they aren’t paying MY bills, they don’t have to deal with MY employees, and they certainly don’t pay their salaries so, as far as I am concerned, they can fuck off and stay out of who I hire. If I only want to hire white, 6’1" males with dark brown hair and a farmers tan, that is my right.
If you’re going to post a link to a blog that has an axe to grind as opposed to a GENUINE source of news, at least make sure the blog gets it right…
If you read the actual EEOC page (instead of some blog): http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/practices/inquiries_arrest_conviction.cfm
the main gist of this is:
Being arrested doesn’t mean you’ve done anything illegal. And with official and unofficial profiling, minorities are more likely to get arrested and not charged than other ethnicities.
Therefore: you should not use an arrest record to deny someone employment WHEN the record and the job don’t warrant that discrimination.
Specifically it says:
Even if the employer believes that the applicant did engage in the conduct for which he or she was arrested that information should prevent him or her from employment only to the extent that it is evident that the applicant cannot be trusted to perform the duties of the position when
[ul]
[li]considering the nature of the job,[/li]> [li]the nature and seriousness of the offense,[/li]> [li]and the length of time since it occurred.[/li]> [/ul]
This is also true for a conviction.
So if the job is something for which an arrest record or conviction is relevant (like working in a bank, working a cash register, etc.) YOU CAN STILL DENY THEM EMPLOYMENT. When it is not relevant (i.e. mopping the floor at McDonalds) you can’t deny someone employment just because they were arrested.
The guidelines even begin by saying
There is no Federal law that clearly prohibits an employer from asking about arrest and conviction records.
And
using such records as an absolute measure to prevent an individual from being hired could limit the employment opportunities of some protected groups and thus cannot be used in this way.
(Emphasis added).
ETA: So even if it’s mopping a floor at a McDonalds, you can’t deny them employment JUST because they have an arrest record, but you CAN deny them employment for any number of other reasons you can imagine (they don’t work well with your other employees, they don’t conduct themself in a professional manner, etc.).
As for the credit check bit, all it says if that if you want to dive into someone’s credit history, you have to tell them you’re going to and receive their authorization. Sounds reasonable to me. I don’t want anyone rifling through my (non-existent) credit history without me knowing, let alone without my approval.
Get your facts straight and please stop posting non-sensical crap. Doesn’t mean you can’t argue against it. Doesn’t mean you gotta like it. But at least rail against the EEOC for something it’s actually doing.
Not sure who you’re directing this at but my point was that I don’t cower in the corner because someone has a felony just on the face of it.
For instance theres a HUGE difference between a ghetto murderer and someone like my wife’s uncle who got busted with enough pot to count him as a dealer yet he used it for legitimate documented medical issues. He never sold it to anyone, did any dealing, ect. Lots of stupid ass laws out there that catch people up when they’ve done society ZERO wrong.
Of course pedos, murderers, rapists, thieves, ect are different.
On the face of it the whole thing is stupid…the bad credit or OMG felony being automatic denial when any one of us could get tripped up in that because there are so many laws out there and so many ways to get bad credit. Wait til a family member you are financially responsible for has a serious medical issue you can’t pay for racks up bills beyond your ability to pay immediately or a student get tripped up in a OMG he has a competition gun in their car catch.
Of course if you want to run the rat race and toe the line to stupidity thats up to you but you’re only living a lie. Look at the dude in NJ who got his sentence commuted yet he’s a convicted felon now.
For reasons already mentioned (mostly by Belmont) your credit can get fucked basically through no fault of your own. For this reason I’ve always felt credit checks for new employees were entirely unreasonable and would honestly like to see it legislated as such (well, actually, I’d like to see all Americans refuse to apply to job listings requiring a credit check, but that’s not going to happen.)
Criminal record is a much trickier thing.
What I got from what Complication was posting, is that they’re trying to make arrest records not applicable, rather than conviction records - which strikes me as an extremely reasonable measure. My interpretation, however, may be incorrect.
While I agree that there are a number of ways one can land with a felony conviction on what basically amount to massively bullshit grounds, I feel that that’s still substantial enough to warrant disclosure to a potential employer.
The EEOC says “The same is true of convictions” meaning:
Convictions cannot be used as the SOLE and SINGULAR reason for denying someone employment IF the job requirements don’t require someone with a zero-conviction record.
The criteria the EEOC outlines are:
[ul]
[li]the nature of the job
[/li][li]the nature and seriousness of the offense
[/li][li]the length of time since it occurred
[/li][/ul]
So, for instance, if someone was applying for a job sweeping floors at McDonalds and they have a 20-year old conviction on their record for reckless driving (speeding excessively or something) but, otherwise, they were a PERFECT candidate for the job THEN you couldn’t deny them employment. (Although you could: hire someone else instead, tell them they’re overqualified, or ask if they can work horrible shifts so they turn it down).
…to the other extreme…
BUT, if someone was the PERFECT candidate for a job working as a bank teller EXCEPT that they were ARRESTED (but not convicted) for stealing money from their last employer, you could still deny them employment and you wouldn’t run afoul of any laws or guidelines.
It should also be noted that the word felon or felony appears nowhere on that page.
There are now so many nonwhite felons in Georgia that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has ruled that discriminating against felons in the workplace has the same effect as discrimination against blacks and Hispanics — and is therefore illegal.
The shocking ruling, announced in a local newspaper article which quoted Augusta attorney Edward Enoch, means that the EEOC has decided that employers cannot have a blanket policy stating they will not hire convicted felons.
“That approach is based on the belief that blacks and Hispanics are disproportionately charged and convicted of crimes,” Mr. Enoch was quoted as saying.
Basically, you can’t deny someone employment just because they have an arrest/criminal history that is irrelevant to the job.
Which is a lot like saying “you can’t deny someone employment just because they’re black or they have an accent if that is irrelevant to the job.”
If those things ARE relevant to the job, then you can deny them employment just fine. Just like you can opt not to hire a black actor to play JFK in a movie or you can not hire someone with an accent if they need to operate a customer service telephone line and people might not understand them (I wish more companies would take advantage of this ability to deny employment).
As for the credit check thing: basically it’s like saying “we want a piss test or to draw blood to check you for drug use”: You have to ask permission and the person has to consent. And just like drug tests, you can turn someone down from a job if they don’t consent. Big f’ing deal.
The assertion this article makes is that someone would have to provide a reason for NOT hiring a black or hispanic felon, but would not have to provide reason for NOT hiring a white felon. Which is… ding!ding!ding!ding!ding! not true. What IS true is that if you deny ANYONE employment based on their criminal record (black, white, brown, purple, green, blue) and they bring suit against you (and the judge doesn’t immediately throw it out), you need to prove that their criminal record is relevant to the job which is incredibly easy if it actually is.
The article also makes the assertion that “diversity efforts” are discrimination against whites. Well, perhaps, if the majority of those employed are white. But if the majority of those employed are black or hispanic, then those ethnicities can be ‘discriminated against’ in order to hire white people.
Again, you’re going to have a much better time presenting an argument based in reality if you quit posting raging political blogs which gloss over the actual issue in order to stir up unwarranted and mis-directed frustration and anger.
What about someone like me who spent all their life paying their bills on time and using their credit responsibly, only to have their identity stolen?
When my security clearance came up for renewal I had to spend 5 hours with a DSS agent explaining all the crap on my credit, Ive gotten most of it removed, but theres still about 3 grand worth of stuff I havent been able to get off, and Im working on just settling it now because Im tired of dealing with it.
Why should I be barred employment because someone else is dishonest?
Forgot about that one too. Credit check is so friggin stupid you really have to be stupid to consider it a valuable employment tool. It can take years to clean up once incident of ID theft or false reporting.
Oh I also forgot aside from the major medical I have on mine from years ago one last year was from a doctor my wife went to see. Since we were paying cash for the visit we got a certain cash rate quote over the phone. Im not going to get into personal family business but my wife ended up walking out of the visit in tears, and was crying for about 2hrs after she got home. The doctor was a complete bitch who we had an odd toddler checkup previously for. The doctor sent us a bill for FOUR TIMES what the price said over the phone was said to be. I called, and left a message twice to ask about it with no response. About a month and a half after the visit we got a bill from a collector for the four times the said cash price. Its on my credit now with zero recourse as an unpaid bill. The doc got pissed my wife walked out on her, and decided to charge us her full rate like insurance was paying for it rather than the cash price we were told. Its not really a credit report when you have things listed on there that have nothing to do with credit at all. Now civil disputes for CASH transactions can go on there if someone hands it over to a collections agency. Since its on my record from a collections agency there is little I can do but pay it…but its on my credit report for SEVEN years since it was immediately sold to a collections agency less than 2 months after the “sale”.
Well, if nothing else a prospective employer would demand a rational explanation… basic credit check IS a terrible tool, but there are worse ones - the one area where government interference may be least harmful would be revising processes to deal with credit bureaus and forcing some transparency in how they go about reporting.
Since we’re sharing “How my credit got fucked and it wasn’t my fault” anecdotes I’ve got a good one.
When I was 17 and working for my Dad’s computer consulting business during the summer he needed me to go to the best buy and pick up some hardware for a job he was doing. As the hardware was going to billed on to the customer and therefore be tax deductible he of course wanted me to use the company credit card. He called up the credit card company and added my name as an “Authorized User” so I could do just that. I ran the errand for him, gave him back his card, and never thought of it again.
5 years later my Dad had to declare bankruptcy while I was at college.
You can probably see where this is going, right? When I came back from college a year later I opened a bank account with a local bank after getting a job. As part of the account opening process they pulled up my credit report and discovered… surprise! I’d taken a huge whack because the CC reported me as a cardholder who had defaulted on them in the bankruptcy. :mad::rolleyes: