This fall, the 11th Circuit upheld an employer policy banning dreadlocks in the workplace; the court ruled that dreadlocks are not an “immutable characteristic of black persons,” and as such, an employer’s decision to rescind an offer based on the employee’s h... More »
It’s a difficult time to be a Muslim in America. Since the tragic events of September 11, 2001, Muslim Americans have faced greater scrutiny, with recent global events triggering further anti-Muslim rhetoric in the United States and abroad. According to a 20... More »
Jonathan R. Harkavy, a lawyer, arbitrator and mediator, has taught labor and employment law at Wake Forest School of Law and corporate finance at Duke Law School and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Law. He has written and lectured wi... More »
This is the final post in a three-part series. This is the last in a series of three posts on the prominent perverse consequences argument against “Banning the Box.” The argument is that efforts to curtail employer exclusion of people with criminal records in... More »
This post is the second in a three-part series. This is the second in a series of three posts on the prominent perverse consequences argument that “Banning the Box” inadvertently exacerbates the racial inequality it purports to redress. The first post critici... More »
This post is the first in a three-part series. Nothing sells like a perverse consequences argument. The movement to “Ban the Box” has run into an objection familiar from debates over the minimum wage and affirmative action: this policy could exacerbate exactl... More »
After the passing of Justice Antonin Scalia earlier this year, many rushed to evaluate his legacy (for good or for bad). While Justice Scalia’s missing vote in Freidrichs v. California Teachers Association drew a great deal of immediate attention, few discuss... More »
Automation has captured the aspirations and anxieties of both companies and cultural commentators: while the promises of automation might include improved quality of life and lower prices, the peril of potential unemployment looms large. As the discussion cont... More »
Ben Levin, a frequent contributor to the blog, has a great new piece up at Time arguing that the President’s ban-the-box proposal, while cause for celebration, doesn’t go far enough. According to Ben, the proposal’s main limitations include t... More »
Last week, the comment period closed on the EEOC’s proposed revision of the Employer Information Report. Also known as EEO-1, the Employer Information Report records the demographic information of employees. The EEOC’s revision seeks to expand data collectio... More »
Three years ago, a HuffPost/YouGov poll found that 69% of Americans (incorrectly) believed that firing an employee for being gay was already illegal. Now, in a post-Obergefell legal regime, those Americans would likely find it even more incredible that the fe... More »
Many articles have been written about a diversity crisis in Silicon Valley, perhaps due to tech firms’ initial resistance to releasing employee demographics. Enter Tracey Chou, an early Pinterest engineer, who launched a (still running) Google spreadsheet of ... More »