Effects of Women's Rights Laws on Corporations

[Creepy-theticalanti]

.

[aisa]

now, first disclaimer: apologies, as I haven't read this wall of text (nothing personal, I'm just in a shitty mood today in general...)

basically the first thing that comes to mind when I hear the word "corporation" is - burn them all down to the ground. That's of course biased as I have my own personal very negative experiences with corpo world and mobbing.
But yeah, burn them down to the ground, let's cut electricity and go back to raising actual sheep instead of trying to make people into sheep... ekhm.

[marooned]

perhaps these "differences in talent" are too negligible to matter much in the grand scheme of things. this really seems to be a question of what makes a corporation successful. probably it just needs a certain amount of highly talented individuals and everyone else can be average and it will still function fine. the highly talented ones can all be white males and it shouldn't affect a thing (especially in a society where being white and male is privileged anyway!) - in fact all the employees can be white males as long as there is enough talent among them. (this is my "theory")

i think that people who say privilege doesn't come into play are wrong. i mean, there have been studies on this sort of thing. like for instance the (old!) one referenced here about black names vs. white names: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/black-na...resume-burden/

privilege is a real thing. and it's not easy to see the biases at work because most people aren't trying to be biased "these days." i'm sure most people think they're being "objective."

i'm not knowledgeable about laws in hiring. where i work there aren't quotas or anything like that... i don't think there are laws about who to hire either? it's just that (ahem, qualified) people may be invited to interview? or apply based on demographics in an attempt to try to balance out the inequality. this doesn't mean they will be hired. it's just trying to get the pool of applicants to match the demographics in a field percentage-wise at least. (i really don't know the laws)

[bolong]

Basically, it goes like this: Let's say you have Corporation A and Corporation B. Corporation A is perfectly fair and just and hires the best people with the most talent, while Corporation B is sexist and tends to hire men, even if there is a female with more talent. Corporation B interviews a man and a woman, with the woman having more talent. Corporation B hires the man. The woman interviewed by Corporation B applies to Corporation A and gets hired there. Now, Corporation B has to compete against better talent - resulting in a competitive disadvantage. By not hiring the best talent available, the success of their company becomes endangered. By having less talent, and being unable to deliver a better quality product at the most competitive price, they slowly lose market share, lose their profitability, and eventually go out of business or change their policies and start hiring the best talent, whether it's in men or women, in order to compete.

This is basically the argument made by right-wing capitalist Republicans, arguing for deregulation. They present the above argument that the market itself is enough of a corrective action to change behavior as businesses in the private market compete for profit. Why? Because the competitive market and the picky consumer makes them accountable. They will also argue that when there's more government, less competition and less accountability, sexism tends to increase.

They'll also make another logical argument - sometimes the fair/right people have to waste resources defending themselves against lawsuits because of equal rights laws: Let's say Corporation A, the fair organization, interviews a man and a woman. The man has more talent. Corporation A hires the man. However, the woman feels slighted and discriminated against. She doesn't apply elsewhere for someone else to hire her, but she starts a lawsuit against Corporation A, accusing them of being unfair in the hiring process. Eventually, Corporation A wins this lawsuit and successfully shows that they were fair during the hiring process. However, they had to spend millions of dollars in legal fees, attorney costs, etc., that ultimately take away from the product they are delivering to the consumer (might have to raise prices to pay for legal costs) - so the consumer suffers, as well as everyone working at Corporation A, even though they had done the right thing.

Some of the equal rights laws punish the good guy, hurt productivity, and are bad for the economy.

There is a counter argument though, typically made by the Democrats that call for more regulation, that I wish to present just as equally, for the sake of debate:

The above scenarios describe a situation in which the 'market' punishes the companies who discriminate, but it makes a big assumption that there is the presence of a Corporation A who is fair and just. What if there is no Corporation A who is fair? Or what if there aren't enough Corporation A's with open spots for the women with more talent?

What if, in an industry as a whole, many companies collude against women or share a common stereotype that men have more talent? What if an extremely talented woman applies to multiple corporations but doesn't get hired at any of them? When will there be corrective action or any fairness?

While some equal rights laws may punish the good guy in Corporation A, they also have an effect in punishing the bad guy in Corporation B. If for some reason, the motivation for money isn't enough, Corporation B now has to change or modify their hiring process in order to be more fair to women, and balance the costs of possibly violating the equal rights laws against their personal views of men being more talented than women.

Because of women's rights laws, many women have been given the opportunity to get hired at Corporation B, showcase their talent, and help change the minds of Corporation B and change their viewpoints. So the equal rights laws also provide a corrective action to the market, and they help defend women from being discriminated against.

Thoughts and/or comments?

Um, you're fucking stupid. The employment status of one man and one woman is, first of all, not going to have any impact on the economy.

Second, there's no point considering a scenario in which every business is like corporation A, or like corporation B. There are tons of organizations like corporation B, who nonetheless have no problem using women to further their agenda. Ever heard of Sarah Palin?

There are also many corporation As, who hire competent women but then relegate those women to the most menial tasks available.

So, what I'm trying to say is... What's your point, exactly?

[Ron Mexico]

Um, you're fucking stupid. The employment status of one man and one woman is, first of all, not going to have any impact on the economy.

Second, there's no point considering a scenario in which every business is like corporation A, or like corporation B. There are tons of organizations like corporation B, who nonetheless have no problem using women to further their agenda. Ever heard of Sarah Palin?

There are also many corporation As, who hire competent women but then relegate those women to the most menial tasks available.

So, what I'm trying to say is... What's your point, exactly?

Do you find it necessary to call somebody "fucking stupid" because they have a different opinion than you? You can address what he said without acting rude and disrespectful.

[CandleGirl]

Please forgive me. I have nothing to add at this time. But I want to read back over what you've said when I'm not so tired and see if I can come up with anything. So I'm commenting now to make it easier to find this thread later. What I will say now is I've recently begun familiarizing myself with libertarian philosophy and very beginner-beginner Austrian economics. I grew up in very liberal California and paid very little attention to politics. So it has really stretched my brain to be learning to see from this perspective. I've also been reading evolutionary psychology, some laymen-level game theory, about logical fallacies, and it all seems to tie together nicely.