Gender Discrimination in the Workplace
This essay will discuss the ongoing issue of gender discrimination in the workplace. It will cover historical and current perspectives, highlighting the challenges and progress in achieving gender equality in professional environments. Also at PapersOwl you can find more free essay examples related to Civil Rights Act Of 1964.
How it works
One of the greatest disputes in the United States today involves gender discrimination in the workplace. Issues such as unequal pay, pregnancy discrimination, and sexual harassment are all covered by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Title VII. However, in many businesses, the discrimination based on gender continues to occur.
Title VII prohibits job discrimination in all aspects of the workplace, from firing procedures to promotion and benefits. This law applies to businesses with fifteen or more employees, however companies with less than that are not immediately discounted from this employee protection.
Explicitly, companies cannot advertise or label jobs as male or female without proving that the gender of the applicant is absolutely essential to the job’s requirements. In addition, businesses cannot have two separate seniority lists based on gender, or not promote someone based on their gender (Miller, 495).
In order for a plaintiff to succeed in a gender discrimination case, they must prove that gender discrimination was the determining factor in the employer’s choice to either hire, terminate their employment, or promote them. In order to do this, the plaintiff and court must investigate all circumstances regarding the suit, and the environment surrounding the suit (Miller, 495). Without the undeniable proof that the employer’s choice was made based on gender, the defendant can argue that there were external factors involved, and the decision was made fairly based on employment history, performance, or a variety of other factors.
One of the major issues within the spectrum of gender discrimination is pregnancy discrimination. Within Title VII, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act expanded the concept of gender discrimination to include protecting against employers who discriminate based on pregnancy. This act states that “any woman that is undergoing pregnancy, childbirth, or any related medical conditions must be treated the same as other persons not so affected but similar in ability to work (Miller, 495).” The Pregnancy Discrimination Act protects women from all employment aspects, including benefits.
The largest dispute under gender discrimination involves wage discrimination, which is covered by many separate laws. The Equal Pay Act requires employers to pay males and females doing the same work the same wages, or equal pay. For example, two teachers, one male and one female, at the same elementary school teaching the same grade level should receive the same pay grade. When deciding if the Equal Pay Act has been violated, the court will investigate many aspects of the two jobs, including the content of the job and not the description of the job.
Since many factors go into determining pay, if the court finds that the wage was determined by seniority, the merit system, or any other external factors, then the employer did not violate the law. This makes it difficult for the plaintiff to prove without a doubt that their wage was determined by gender explicitly. Employers, or the defendant, often argue that there were other factors involved in order to win the wage discrimination suit.
l law regardless of when the discrimination began (Miller, 495).” Before this act, the Supreme Court had ruled that the time period for a plaintiff to file a complaint was limited to only 180 days after the employer’s decision of pay. However, since Congress overturned this previous ruling, the plaintiff has an almost unlimited amount of time to file a complaint while still working for the employer with a discriminatory wage.
While most cases of gender discrimination in the workplace are filed due to hiring, firing, or wages, in some cases employees who resign voluntarily may claim that they were “constructively discharged (Miller, 496).” This means that the employer caused the plaintiff’s work environment to be so miserable that anyone in the plaintiff’s position would have quit as well. In order to prove constructive discharge, the plaintiff must prove an intolerable working environment, and that the employer was aware of but did not fix within a reasonable amount of time. The plaintiff must also show the court causation, or that the defendant’s discrimination caused the intolerable working conditions. Basically, the plaintiff has to prove that they willingly left their employment because gender discrimination in the workplace made their employment intolerable by any reasonable person standard.
In terms of general employer liability, if there is a scenario in which the employer knows that an employee is being discriminated against based on gender, and they do not act to fix it at all or within a reasonable person’s time, then they are liable for the discrimination and possible harassment. This includes if a customer or coworker is the one committing the discrimination. If it is to the employer’s knowledge, they must act upon it.
Remedies under Title VII vary based on situation, and the facts presented. However, if the plaintiff proves that gender discrimination occurred, then they may be awarded with reinstatement into their previous job, back pay, retroactive promotions, and damages. In cases involving intentional discrimination, the plaintiff may be awarded with compensatory damages. If the defendant treated the plaintiff with malice or reckless indifference to their rights, the plaintiff may receive punitive damages as well. However, there is a $50,000 cap on damages from employers with on hundred or less employee (Miller, 499).
In order for the plaintiff to file a claim, they must file a charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission before they can file a lawsuit for discrimination. This being said, depending on where the discrimination occurred the time period that they have to file a charge can vary. The initial process can be fairly simple, as the EEOC allows employees to file a charge of discrimination through their website. When filing the inquiry, questions will be asked in order to decide whether or not they are the right agency to assist in the claim of gender discrimination. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission also allows the employee to file an inquiry in person, by phone, at a state or local fair employment practice agency, or by mail. After the inquiry is submitted, the EEOC will interview the employee (EEOC). After the employee files the charge with the EEOC, they investigate the inquiry, and they will give out a Notice of Right to Sue. After the plaintiff receives the right to sue, they have ninety days to file their lawsuit with in court. However, if they are filing under the Equal Pay Act, they don’t have to file a charge or obtain a notice of right to sue from the EEOC before filing. Instead, the plaintiff can go directly to the court as long as they file the suit within two years from the day the pay discrimination took place (EEOC).
Unfortunately, many cases have been filed under gender discrimination. Recently, Nike was accused of “intentionally and willfully discriminated against [women] with respect to pay, promotions, and conditions of employment (Golden).” This suit was filed in August of 2018, was seeking a class-action status, and was led by previous Nike employees Kelly Cahill and Sara Johnson from the Beaverton, Oregon headquarters. They claimed that Nike was marginalizing women and avoided giving them promotions, and judges them more than men. They said that in turn this meant women had lower salaries, bonuses, and stock options. The women in this branch of Nike complained to human resources about this discrimination, and even some harassment including sexual assault. Human resources ignored these claims, and mishandled the situation completely.
Nike responded by announcing that president Trevor Edwards was going to retire, since he was specifically named in the lawsuit for creating a “hostile work environment (Golden).” Later, they announced that they had fallen short in the area of hiring new women employees, as well as promoting current ones. In her lawsuit, Cahill said that the environment of Nike was one where women were left out, treated with hostility, and were spoken to in demeaning ways. She had told human resources about her complaints four times before resigning in 2013. Overall, the group of women was requesting changes in pay, a court-appointed monitor, back pay, and punitive damages (Golden).
With all of this information on this case, I believe that Cahill could also claim that she was constructively discharged. This is due to her claim that the work environment was hostile, and unfriendly. If she could prove to the court that any reasonable person would also quit, then she can prove that Nike was an intolerable working environment, and that the employer was aware of but did not fix within a reasonable amount of time. Since she reported it to human resources multiple times, Nike was aware of the issues but did not fix them.
Another gender discrimination case involving Walmart occurred in 2011 when Betty Dukes, a cashier who started working as a Walmart cashier in 1994, got promoted to the position of customer service manager. She was soon demoted back to cashier after several disciplinary violations, however Dukes claims that she did not violate company policy and was instead demoted for “invoking internal complaint procedures and that male employees have not been disciplined for similar infractions (Walmart v. Dukes).” In this case, it may have been difficult for Dukes to prove that in this case she was in fact a victim of gender discrimination, and not just a poor employee.
In the courts investigation however, they found that women filled 70% of hourly jobs in Walmart stores, but only 33% of management positions (Walmart v. Dukes). Even with this information, and much more, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Walmart, because the plaintiffs did not have enough in common with each other to create a class. This case in particular shows how difficult it can be to defend the employee against the corporation the plaintiff worked for. Defendants often fight against the case by saying that the employee was actually just acting against company policies or was simply not as good as the employees of the opposite gender.
Dawnn McCleary-Evans filed against the Maryland Department of Transportation’s State Highway Administration, because she believed that they were refusing to hire her for the two positions she applied for based on her race and gender. She said that she was highly qualified for either position she applied for, but the hiring committee was biased and had already chosen their candidates. However, throughout the court’s investigation it was discovered that McCleary-Evans did not have sufficient facts to prove her claim. Therefore, the district court ended up granting the Maryland Department of Transportation’s motion to dismiss the case (McLeary-Evans v. Maryland Department of Transportation). This is yet another example of how hard it can be to prove allegations of discrimination in the workplace, and how easy it can be for the defendant to disprove the facts the plaintiff is trying to bring to light.
In another case, Linda Quigg claimed that the Thomas County School District and the school board both discriminated and retaliated against her. She filed this claim due to the fact that they refused to renew her employment contract and also filed an ethics complaint against her. The district court ruled summary judgement to the school district on all of Quigg’s claims. On her appeal, Quigg said that the court used the incorrect evaluation methods to review her mixed-motive case that also relied on circumstantial evidence. The final verdict agreed that the district court was wrong to grant summary judgement, however they also found that the court was right to dismiss the rest of her discrimination claims, as well as the retaliation claims (Quigg v. Thomas County School District).
Plaintiff-Appellant Ya-Chen Chen was an assistant professor at the City College of New York (CCNY), which is in the City University of New York (CUNY) system. She was also Interim Director of Asian Studies between 2008 and 2009, during which she had an altercation with a student. Administration told Chen that they thought she had handled the situation inappropriately, however Chen disagreed and told the board how she felt. In July 2009, CCNY told Chen that she was not going to be interim director again. They also later decided that she was not going to be reappointed as an assistant professor for the following year.
Chen tried to appeal this decision twice, but was unsuccessful. She then filed a suit against CUNY, and the administrative staff, by arguing that they violated Title VII and the Equal Protection Clause, since they discriminated against her on the basis of her race, gender, and national origin, as well as retaliated against her for her internal complaint. The district court granted summary judgements to the defendants on all claims, and the US Court of Appeals affirmed this decision (Ya-Chen Chen v. CUNY). This case seemed to be fairly cut and dry, there is no point in the scenario where Chen was blatantly being discriminated against, and the only conflict was about her misconduct with a student, which is normally grounds for dismissal in the nature that it occurred in this case.
In my opinion these gender discrimination laws are extremely important. I have had many people who are close to me struggle with bosses that would pay them less than their male counterparts. The wage gap is currently a major issue in this country, and I feel as though after reading the outcomes of some of these cases the laws are not doing enough to protect against it. An adjusted wage gap works with factors such as hours worked, occupations chose, education, and experience. In adjusted wage gap terms however, the average woman’s salary is only 78% of the average man’s salary (Vagins).
In addition to these gender discrimination issues, I think that the enforcement is too he-said she-said. In many of the cases I read throughout this paper, I found that the plaintiff often lost due to insufficient evidence which seems to be an issue when deciding the cases. Therefore, I think that the enforcement of these laws should be altered in some way.
In order for businesses to protect themselves against violating these gender discrimination laws, they need to treat every gender with respect. If businesses would take care of their employees equally, and eliminate these problems in the workplace when they are brought to their attention, then they wouldn’t be subject to these lawsuits.
Gender, race, and religious discrimination are all major issues in the United States, and they always have been. The gender discrimination laws cover a broad array of problems from pregnancy discrimination, unequal pay, and harassment issues. While Title VII, the Equal Pay Act, and many others have accomplished a lot and made large strides in protecting employees, there are still enforcement issues with proving the discrimination versus the defendants’ argument that usually includes the employee’s experience, previous altercations on the job, or education level.
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Gender Discrimination in the Workplace Essay
In the gender discrimination at workplace essay below, you will discover the different forms of bias and judgement present at places of work in the USA and Saudi Arabia.
Introduction
Gender discrimination in the workplace continues to be a disturbing problem to various women in USA and the rest of the world as well. It is considered to be quite widespread and virtually every woman must have suffered from one form of discrimination or another due to her gender.
Even in the current age, women still experience discrimination in their places of work and despite having similar skills as their male counterparts; they still can earn a two third of what the men can earn irrespective of their qualification and experience which might be same as or more than that of men.
Gender discrimination in the work place is the favoring of one gender against the other in terms of recruitment, job assignment, and termination of employment, compensation and promotion.
Discrimination in the work place may be intentional or unintentional and might be prompted by prejudice or ignorance. Women and men are always subjected to different treatment in the work place; in some circumstances, men may be treated more than women while in some other cases women are treated better than men.
Despite the fact that both men and women joint the work place with predetermined gender differences which is used as a basis for the preferential treatment they receive, it is in rare circumstances that gender differences in the treatment of both men and women is associated with preexisting perceptions (Bell, McLaughlin & Sequeira 67).
This essay will document gender bias and gender discrimination in the context of social and physical and the social confines of the work place that is experienced at work in the context of United States of America and Saudi Arabia.
Traditionally, gender discrimination emphasized sex discrimination and the two were used synonymously. The most powerful form of discrimination in a work place is when a particular group is adversely affected by the procedures that are followed in making decision or during work place practices.
It might be agreed that work practices may not be intentioned to discriminate against any group, but they might have the impact of offering fewer opportunities to either gender (Mayer 1).
Gender discrimination, sexual harassment and glass ceiling
There is a relationship between gender discrimination, glass ceiling and sexual harassment and all the three are hindrance to women occupying executive or managerial positions.
There are three main forms of gender discrimination, namely: overt discrimination, sexual discrimination and glass ceiling. All the three negatively impact on the status of women.
Women have been the victims of gender discrimination in various business organizations in the United States of America despite efforts of numerous legislations and strong feminist activists to combat it.
Overt Discrimination
This is understood as the use of gender as a parameter for making employment related decisions. This form of discrimination was the objective of Title VII in the USA which formed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
This Act prohibited all forms of sex-based discrimination in matters of employment like hiring, promotion and firing. Examples of over discrimination are the refusal by employees to hire women or the practice of paying women low wages due to their gender.
Over discrimination has led to occupational sex segregation in the Saudi Arabia. The stereotyping of particular job as for women or men are evident in the US where women makeup the majority of nurses, flight attendance and secretaries which are characterized by low pay, short career ladder and low status while men make up the majority of pilots, physicians and executives.
In the USA, women are considered to occupy low organizational status and low organizational status and power (Gregory 209).
Sexual Harassment
This is another form of gender discrimination and manifests itself in employment based discrimination. There are two guidelines that define the illegality of sex harassment, these are: quid pro quo and hostile environment harassment.
Quid pro quo involves the inducing of a woman through employment so as to receive sexual factors or compliance. It is the coercive form of quid pro quo that is considered as gender discrimination.
Most of this form of gender discrimination is perpetuated by managers and supervisors of an organization. Hostile harassment on the other and is witnessed when sexual favors can interfere with employees’ work performance or when sexual behavior is used to create an intimidating work environment. Sexual harassment is considered as a tool for occupational sex segregation.
Glass Ceiling
This is considered as a fundamental factor that hinders women from accessing employment and status. Glass ceiling affects women in an organization.
Glass ceiling are understood as those invisible man-made barriers which hinder women from progressing beyond certain levels. In the US for example, it is estimated that women make up 30 percent of managers but only 5 percent make up the executive managers.
These factors are linked to gender stereotypes. It is difficult to eradicate glass ceiling by use of legislation (Bell, McLaughlin and Sequeira 70).
Gender Discrimination in the United States of America
Gender discrimination in the United States of America is an ancient phenomenon since it assumes the dimension of discrimination against women which is global.
Just like in other various parts of the world, gender discrimination is ripe in the USA. It is global knowledge that the position of women is marginalized in the society in various aspects of production.
Women are guaranteed limited access to education, they lack power to own property, they have limited exposure to education and training facilities and they have limited opportunities for employment than men.
The reluctance of the USA to ratify the Convention on the Elimination on All Forms of Discrimination against Women which was adopted by the United Nations is a clear indication of how deeply entrenched gender discrimination is in the USA.
However despite the inability of the USA to ratify the CEDAW, they have enacted legislations and numerous statutes which are aimed at safeguarding of women from all forms of discrimination and particularly in the working environment.
Previously, it was the duty of the states to define the kind of employment that women were entitled to do. All aspects of discrimination in the USA was taken care by the Title VII but despite of this, and in spite of the fact that women are gaining entry into the labor force, there still exists inequalities in wage structure.
Gender discrimination is experienced when one gender is given preference or is treated less than the other gender. Women on several occasions are given little preference than men because of their sex.
Wage equality and sexual harassment are the predominant forms of gender discrimination. Despite various regulations to promote equality, there are still some cases of discrimination in work place.
Women do not measure up to men in various aspects of employment particularly regarding income, the rate or frequency of employment and the range of occupation. Glass ceiling exists to prevent women from being discriminated upon (Bell, McLaughlin and Sequeira 69).
Gender discrimination in the work place is a common phenomenon in the United States of America. Women find it difficult to secure employment as compared to men.
This is associated with the snaky behavior of women in the USA. There are existent laws that provide for protection against any discrimination in their workplace.
This however has not prevented employees from facing various forms of harassment and discrimination in employment based gender.
In the USA, sex discrimination rare its ugly face in various forms and the common form of gender discrimination id the exclusion of women from the labor market just because of the fact that they are women.
It involves the association of particular jobs as for men only of for women only or by application of the glass ceiling rule that defines how far women should go in the corporate or government ladder (Dipboye and Colella 174).
The most widespread form of gender discrimination is sexual harassment. This happens when an employer connects the job status of the employee to their sexual suggestion.
This is totally contrary to laws of employment which prohibit the subjecting of women to sexually charged or hostile work place environment.
Sexual harassment includes posting on obscene photos that can offend fellow workers, slur on the appearance of the fellow workers or making derogatory comments in respect to women’s pregnancy (Brayton 1).
The prohibition of gender discrimination under title VII was considered as relieve for all women and a new dawn of seeking inequality in the work place but still the practice is widespread.
It is estimated that in the USA, the female gender are still occupied with jobs that are deemed to be typically for women like secretaries, administration scale workers as well as sales clerks.
According to the women’s policy research institute in Washington, for every $75 cent that a lady earns, a man earns $1. Gender discrimination has been implemented by some multinational companies operating in the USA and which claim that they are protecting certain bilateral treaty provision that gives them leeway to employ staff of their own choice. This might be a recipe for discrimination (Mayer 1).
In the USA women suffer from gender discrimination in a various work place spheres like hiring, promotion and salary. In terms of hiring, few women find employment as compared to the population of women who graduate from College.
With regards to promotion, women occupy lower positions. Women are not represented in the top hierarchy of various organizations and the problem is not due to the fact they are not adequately trained but because they are discriminated because of their gender. Salary wise, women often make little money that the one made by their male counterparts (Isaacs 1).
Gender Discrimination in Saudi Arabia Work Place
In the case of Saudi Arabia, their current policies and programs are geared towards the emancipation of women in the labor market. Despite the efforts by the government to ameliorate the position of women in the spheres of employment, women are still the minority in the work place and it is estimated that they make approximately 15 percent of the population in the labor force.
The marginalization of women in the work place is linked to the existing legislative, social, occupational and educational constraints that hinder the participation of Saudi women in the labor market.
Gender based discrimination in Saudi Arabia is evident in the statistics of job population; men occupy approximately 85 percent of the labor force.
Women in Saudi Arabia account for the large group of the unemployed population. Gender discrimination in the Saudi work force market has its roots in the country’s education system which fails to prepare women for managerial positions and other competitive roles in the society.
Saudi laws guarantee that a woman is entitled to work but the same laws specify the environment that women should apply their labor and this is considered a form of sex segregation where women are placed in certain positions that are considered feminine in nature and are less fit for men. In the private sector for example, women have access to narrow range of jobs mainly in private business and banks (AlMunajjed 4).
Though Saudi Arabia has made significant progress in combating discrimination in the work place, the progress has never been even and specifically in areas like women in paid employment and their treatment of migrant workers.
Women in the Saudi Arabia are experiencing difficulties in their entry into the labor force. It is estimated that the rate of women participation the workforce in Saudi Arabia has been on the rise.
Women are a minority in occupying jobs in the managerial positions and they experience restriction in their choice for labor market and employment. Women experience a lot of harassment in the work place and they also suffer from offensive comments.
Violence, discrimination and segregation are some of the common practices that affect woman in Saudi Arabia and it is deeply rooted in the Muslim tradition and the rigid social stratification structure which insubordinates women and makes them to appear impure or inferior to men.
Gender discrimination has made it hard for Saudi women to secure employment, to secure better training or to get equal pay for their work done. There is also widespread discrimination against women in terms of hiring and recruitment.
Various employers have refused to accommodate the needs of women that are occasioned by their gender but which conflict with work practice for example pregnancy (International Labor Office 3).
In Saudi Arabia, gender discrimination and inequalities apply to women’s employment opportunities. Traditionally in Saudi Arabia, business and government sector are predominantly preserve of men and they were limitedly exposed to family oriented systems, in this regard, men differed from women based on their perceptions, the beliefs and the expectations of a typical Saudi Arabian work pace. Yes, gender discrimination and segregation is prevalent in Saudi Arabia but it is being slowly eliminated.
Manifestation of Gender Discrimination
Overall, gender discrimination is reflected in the following areas:.
Pay gap: there is often widespread discrimination and bias in the distribution of bonus and performances which may be related to the salary, it has been established that women are paid lower salaries than their male counterparts for similar work done.
This equality is reflected in their entire career life. Consequently, in the salary cadre women concentrate on lower jobs in their occupations.
Recruitment, conditions of services, retention and promotion: there is a lot of occupational segregation in terms of career development in Saudi Arabia and US.
It has been established that men occupy two-third of the management, professional and senior jobs. There is also a likelihood of men progressing up the career ladder faster than their female counterparts, which is a reflection of discrimination in the work place.
Recruitment: gender discrimination is also evidenced in the recruitment and the selection process. In this circumstance, men dominate highly paying jobs while women are recruited to occupy the low paying jobs.
In Saudi Arabia, informal recruitment and personal referral are the common modes of recruitment. These informal methods of recruitment have the tendency of propagating women exclusion in certain job fields.
Consequently, women are more likely to be asked questions which touch on their family background during the recruitment and this is considered an issue of gender discrimination.
Progression in career paths: women are in most circumstances trapped in lower paying jobs. Women can only be promoted to supervisory positions but their male counterparts have the likelihood of being promoted to managerial posts.
Work place culture: there are several culture issues that form the basis of gender discrimination in the work place. Networking activities and sports only place focus on male dominated sports.
These cultural issues may be stereotyping and sexist in form. This alienates women hence creating exclusionary feeling of undervaluing their participation and confidence.
The practice and culture of long working for long hours serves to discriminate against those employees who have tight family responsibility who, on several occasions are women (Equality and Human Rights Commission 9).
Theories of Gender Discrimination in the Work Place
There are various theories that are used to account for gender discrimination in the work place. There are certain cases of discrimination bias which are encouraged by the structures and practices of an organization as well as the environment and the dynamics what individuals operate.
Gender discrimination can also be depicted in the established rules of success where men are promoted or employed based on their performance while ladies secure employment or promotion based on their appearance.
There are various theories that seek to explain the prevalence of gender discrimination on the workplace. These theories are the sex plus theory, rational bias theory and the disparate treatment theory.
Sex plus theory is defined by the gender and the marital status of the employee. Gender discrimination can also be evidenced on the benefits provided by an employee to workers.
Most employees fail to factor in the fact that female employees have special sex based disabilities and health care demands like bearing children and pregnancy. This unique sex based features of women should be made so as to enable women to fully participate in the labor force and failure to address this needs can amount to discrimination (Brayton 1).
Disparate Treatment Theory
This theory holds that employers are directly accountable and are responsible for their organizational structures and the institutional practices that may enable the practice of discrimination bias in the work place.
There are situations where women managers with similar qualifications and same training and experience as their male counterparts and in similar positions earn fewer wage.
Modern organizations are slowly embracing team work which leads to the increase in the number of individuals who are charged with the art of decision making.
The increased use of team work to make decisions has heightened discrimination bias which affects the ability of women to develop or grow within the organization.
It may be hard to imagine or understand how organizational structure or the practices of institutions or the dynamics of work place can lead to gender discrimination.
There is disparate treatment theory which occurs when individuals are treated differently due to their group or association to particular group.
Examples of disparate treatment theory are: the unwillingness of employees to hire women due to their gender, the reluctance by the management of an organization to place women in career track positions, offering of small salary to an employee just because she is a woman and the asking of male like questions to female candidates during an interview.
Consequently, there is the traditional version of disparate treatment theory which defines discrimination in the work place as an individual and measurable practice.
It explains work place discrimination as intentional. According to the theory, individuals are consciously motivated to practice discrimination; it argues that discrimination is product of decision by an individual with stereotypical belief towards particular group of individuals.
Disparate treatment theory explains discrimination by unraveling the mind and the decisions of the individual actor and what motivates him to discriminate.
Various kinds of disparate treatment theory are: individual disparate treatment theory and systemic disparate treatment theory. It is important to comprehend disparate treatment theory in terms of dissimilarities as opposed to the conscious motives to discriminate for equity to be realized in the work place. There is also disparate impact theory which describes discrimination in form of consequences and not the motive (Green 94).
Rational Bias Theory
Another theory is that examines the prevalence of discrimination in the work place is the rational bias theory. Despite of numerous efforts to promote equality in the place of work, discrimination against certain groups still occurs, women have particularly bore the brunt of gender discrimination.
This results in women doing poorly than men in terms or economic strength, income and unemployment. This discrimination is reflected in their salaries where women earn less than men.
This theory predicts discrimination may be influenced by situations or circumstances whereby a demonstration of bias may attract rewards or sanctions.
According to the proponents of the theory, external pressure from the superiors can justify gender discrimination, it explains that there can be valid forms of discrimination which have basis in fact and which relies on particular stereotypes to arrive at a predictive accuracy (Larwood, Szwajkowski and Rose 9).
Sex plus Theory
This is the theory that captures all forms of gender based discrimination on account of pregnancy in the work place. The theory explains all forms of discrimination of pregnant women, it is considered out of law to terminate the contract of an employee due to pregnancy.
This theory argues that any sexual behavior in the office by an employer should be accompanied by a proof that the discrimination was not only driven by gender but by additional characteristics.
This form of discrimination holds the employers accountable when it happens that they have discriminated against women, sex plus discrimination is clearer and it happens when an employer does not discriminate against all the females and it only deals with subset or a category like Married woman.
It also covers the discrimination of women based on their marital status. This theory is used to describe a situation where an employee is categorized by the employer based on sex and another physical characteristic (Shetreet 255)
To overcome gender discrimination in the work place in Saudi Arabia, it is imperative for the government to introduce various reforms which will prepare women for competitive jobs.
This should include labor market reforms that will seek to promote gender equality as well as to create a favorable environment that can favor the participation of Saudi women in senior and managerial jobs which were traditionally preserved for men.
It is the responsibility of human resources management to enforce anti-discrimination policies in the company. This has never been the case because the organization’s management considers gender discrimination as a casual topic and hence is unable to prevent other forms of gender discrimination.
Most corporate organizations relegate the matter of gender discrimination to the periphery hence making its enforcement hard. Gender discrimination is often sustained by variables which are inherent and indigenous to the company and the company’s work environment.
There may be some circumstances where working conditions in a work environment dominated by men and work and lifestyle which is structured to fit male have the net effect of adversely impacting on the female workers. It is the corporate policies and practices of a company that sustain or eliminate the presence of gender discrimination in a work environment.
Gender discrimination in the work place needs to be addressed because it affects talent utilization in the work place as well as the quality of employee experiences.
It is imperative to understand the dynamics and other underlying issues in gender discrimination so as to prevent it. Gender discrimination is an organizational problem and it mentally and psychologically affects women who feel that they are discriminated against. This experience can lead women to have a negative perception about the organization.
Works Cited
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Brayton, Purcell. “Workplace Harassment and Employment Discrimination”. Brayton Law, 2011. Web.
Dipboye, Robert and Colella Adrienne. Discrimination at Work: the Psychological and Organizational Bases . New York, NY: Rutledge, 2005. Print.
Equality and Human Rights Commission. “Sex discrimination and gender pay gap report of the Equality and Human Rights Commission”. Equality and Human Rights Commission , 2009. Web.
Green, Tristin. “Discrimination in Workplace Dynamics: Toward a Structural Account of Disparate Treatment Theory”. Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review 38.1 (2003): 91-157.
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- Problem of the Gender Discrimination in the Workplace
- "Gender and Representation" by Chow Rey
- Gender Inequality and the Glass Ceiling
- Glass Ceiling Presentation in the Scholarly Research
- The Glass Ceiling Phenomenon Analysis
- Gender inequality in Canada
- Australian Gender Pay Inequalities and Its Reasons
- Gender and Diversity in the Workplace
- Women are paid less for equal work
- The Gender Wage Gap
- Chicago (A-D)
- Chicago (N-B)
IvyPanda. (2019, March 27). Gender Discrimination in the Workplace Essay. https://ivypanda.com/essays/gender-discrimination-at-workplace/
"Gender Discrimination in the Workplace Essay." IvyPanda , 27 Mar. 2019, ivypanda.com/essays/gender-discrimination-at-workplace/.
IvyPanda . (2019) 'Gender Discrimination in the Workplace Essay'. 27 March.
IvyPanda . 2019. "Gender Discrimination in the Workplace Essay." March 27, 2019. https://ivypanda.com/essays/gender-discrimination-at-workplace/.
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IvyPanda . "Gender Discrimination in the Workplace Essay." March 27, 2019. https://ivypanda.com/essays/gender-discrimination-at-workplace/.
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