Federal Anti-Discrimination Laws 1
Discrimination Laws: Benefits and Costs in the Workplace
Business Options: Adopt or Prohibit Anti-discrimination Laws
Felicia Ford
Professor Lateefah Muhammad
LEG500036VA016-1192-001: Law, Ethics & Corp. Governance
March 11, 2019
Federal Anti-Discrimination Laws 2
Analyze Benefits and Costs of Voluntarily Prohibiting Federal Anti-Discrimination Laws
In lieu of the Supreme Court declaring all laws prohibiting discrimination in the workplace to
be unconstitutional, this evaluation has been prepared to address what recourse employers have
going forward in to the future. Since the Supreme Court ruling allowed employers to voluntarily
adopt hiring practice to diversity their workforces with the inclusion that the practices adopted
did not include express preferences based upon immutable characteristics. Immutable characters
are classified as any particular fixed physical quality, determinable to be embedded and
inherently related to particular populaces. Said immutable characters are distinctive and set the
populace apart from other parts of society which do not share the immutable characteristic. The
immutable characteristic is utilized by civil rights law and includes these individuals in protected
classes. The individuals belonging to the protective classes are considered those that must be
protected from civil or criminal proceedings focused on individuals bearing the immutable traits.
The Title VII Protected Classes of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Pub. L. 88-352) Vol
42(2000e) as amended in the U.S. code, employment discrimination based on race,
color, religion, sex and national origin is prohibited. Race or color identification is
understood to be any category circumscribed by law as persons of: African American or
black, Caucasian or white, Hispanic, Asian, Indian Americans (Eskimos, Native Hawaiians,
and Native Americans).
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In order to ascertain what benefits and costs employers have prohibiting federal anti-
discrimination laws, a review of those original laws and the agencies responsible for enforcing
them. The federal anti-discrimination laws were outlined in Section 11.1.1, of Title VII with
other federal laws which aggressively prohibited employment discrimination on the basis of age,
color, disability, genetic information, national origin, race, religion, sex, and union worker
affiliation. For now, as instructed by the justices, the protected classes with immutable
characteristics or immutable traits will still be included under Title VII and other laws.
The laws were constructed to protect employees from employer retaliation. The U.S. Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission is a federal agency that administers and enforces civil
rights laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints
based on an individual’s race, children, national origin, religion, sex, age, disability, sexual
orientation, gender identity, genetic information, and whistle-blowing or retaliation for reporting,
participating in, opposing a discriminatory action or policy.
The agency had jurisdiction over employers that employ fifteen (15) or more employees for
twenty (20) or more weeks in the preceding or current calendar year, and prohibits
discrimination in any aspect of employment, including: terms of employment; hiring and
terminating employees; compensation, assignment, or classification of employees; transfer,
promotion, layoff, or recall; job advertisements; recruitment; aptitude and other testing.
In addition to the EEOC, The Immigrant and Employee Rights Section (IER), enforced the
anti-discrimination provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 8 U.S.C. section
1324b. Regulations concerning this law is detailed at 28 C.F.R. Part 44. This federal law
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specifically prohibits citizenship status discrimination in hiring; termination, or recruitment or
referral systems for a fee; national origin discrimination in hiring, firing, or recruitment or
referral program for a fee; unfair documentation practices during the employment eligibility
verification process; use of form I-9 and E-Verify; use of retaliation or intimidation measures.
The IER shares jurisdiction over national origin discrimination charges with the EEOC. The
EEOC investigates national origin discrimination claims against employers that employ fifteen
(15) or more employees, and the IER investigates national origin discrimination claims against
employers, smaller in scale and with more than three (3) but less than fifteen (15) employees.
The vast majority of employment discrimination cases have occurred regarding gender
discrimination and racial discrimination. On the other spectrum, discrimination cases exercised
against individuals with disabilities and age discrimination have increased. After the twin towers
were destroyed on September 11, 2001, discrimination instances rose against individuals because
of religious practices or national origin. Therefore, originally there were no benefits to
voluntarily prohibiting federal anti-discrimination laws involving hiring and firing, national
origin, sexual harassment, sexual orientation or (trans-gender transitions: was not classified as a
protected class, but lawsuits and rulings have been favorable on hiring/firing basis of sex).
Currently, employers can now prepare internal policies concerning how they’ll treat their
own employees or those applying for their company positions without encountering the same
lawsuits, ramifications and retributions under Title VII. Businesses can operate their companies
without having to consider all the legal restrictions and complications of the past. However, if
employers do not practice the stipulation required by the court, they may still incur a cost,
Federal Anti-Discrimination Laws 5
according to Jennings (2018), legal measures from individuals or groups (with previous
protection under the law who want those measures reinstituted and are willing to fight) and the
immutable characteristics group that feel they’ve experienced:
disparate treatment, disparate impact, and pattern or practice of discrimination…, the class
action suit has been a way for a large group of plaintiffs to establish their claims with little or
no individual cost for litigation.
The costs to employers who voluntarily prohibit federal anti-discrimination laws may still
involve legal suits against their company, consequences of consumers boycotting their business
and loss of revenue and a blemished reputation. In addition, employers that choose to voluntarily
violate the anti-discrimination laws involving hiring and firing, national origin, sexual
harassment or (immutable characters individuals or groups such as: race, African Americans or
Hispanics and women) can encounter fines and penalties as high as $50,000 for small scale
companies and a maximum penalty of $300,000 for larger scale companies with five-hundred
(500) employees or more.
In the pursuit to uphold Title VII laws, the EEOC monetary charges were tracked in the
Hiscox Guide to Employee Lawsuits. In the 2017 guide, the data was studied and revealed that
the average total cost of claims that resulted in a settlement payout for the defense was $160,000.
Seeking monetary restoration was often the first step in the legal process. And the average
length of an employment related claim was 318 days. So, these types of cases can also cost
companies legal expenses, man-hours and time away from company business. In fact, the entity
procured $398 million from employers for successful employment discrimination cases.
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Amongst those settlements, EEOC addressed 6,696 sexual harassment claims and secured $46.3
million for the victims of sexual harassment.
Benefits and Costs Prohibiting a form of Discrimination not Covered under Federal Anti-
Discrimination Laws
Currently, transgender persons are not considered a protected class under Title VII. By
employers continuing to ignore the emergence of this group as one that may fit in to the
immutable characteristic or trait protected classification may be a mistake. Due to the fact that
the group undergoes recognized procedures and surgeries which cause an apparent change
shared by all transgenders and noticed by the general population which sets the group distinctly
apart from other individuals in the general population. Under the laws enforced by EEOC, it is
illegal to discriminate against someone (applicant or employee) because of that person’s race,
color, religion, sex (including gender identity. Title VII just provides general protections for
transgenders, but are not entitled to file lawsuits as a protected class.
Federal Anti-Discrimination Laws
Most instances of job discrimination are outlawed in one or more of these federal statutes:
▪ The 1963 Equal Pay Act Amendment to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLS). This
amendment covers only gender discrimination, i. e., paying women less than the wage paid
to men doing the same job.
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▪ Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination against employees for
reasons of race, color, gender, religion or national origin. Technically, this act applies only
to businesses with more than 15 employees and engaged in interstate commerce. As
“engaged” has been defined in case law, this includes almost every employer because,
sooner or later, there will be a customer from another state.
▪ The (1990) Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) prohibits discrimination against
employees with disabilities, providing that the disability doesn’t prevent an employee from
doing the job
Other amendments and related statutes prohibit discrimination for reasons of pregnancy, age,
union membership, bankruptcy and credit history.
Legal Consequences of Job Discrimination
Job discrimination is handled by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).
The penalties differ from one kind of discrimination to another, but in general the maximum civil
penalties range from $50,000 for smaller firms to $300,000 for companies with 500 employees
