Since ancient times, human rights has always been a topic of common concern around the world, some vulnerable groups have been treated unfairly because of age, race, sex, sexual orientation, religious, disability and other types of discrimination. However, what is relieved, a great number of countries enacted the anti-discrimination laws to keep fair. This article is about the introduction of the anti-discrimination laws, especially focus on the US anti-discrimination laws. There are hree parts of this article. The first part is about the nature of anti-discrimination laws. The second part introduces the laws and agencies of US anti-discrimination laws. The third part explains the rationale for this law. The last part is the personal evaluation of the US anti-discrimination laws. Nature of antidiscrimination laws Anti-Discrimination Law is a new legal department that emerged along with the flourishing development of the Civil Rights Movement after the end of the Second World War.
There are about 20 countries which have anti-discrimination laws such as Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, European Union, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, International, New Zealand, Russia, United Kingdom, South Africa, and United Stated. Even though Anti-discrimination acts vary from country to country, they are all designed to prevent discrimination and protect the rights of vulnerable groups. In this article, I will discuss about the Anti-discrimination laws in United States.
The laws and agencies involved in the US anti-discrimination laws, US anti-discrimination laws covers a wide rage such as age discrimination , civil rights, employment discrimination Pregnancy discrimination and so on. Laws and agencies a chart of anti-discrimination laws which were enacted and related agencies Discrimination acts Year Agency Age Discrimination Act 1975 Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). Age Discrimination in Employment Act 1967 Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), United states department of labor Americans with Disabilities Act 990 the U. S. Department of Justice, Department of Transportation, Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP), 101st United States Congress California Fair Employment and Housing Act 1959 California Federal Savings & Loan Ass’n v. Guerra Civil Rights Act 1866, 1871,1957,1964,1968,1991 U. S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) Employment Non-Discrimination Act 2013 113th Congress Equal Pay Act 1963 EEOC ,the 88th US Congress Fair yment Act 1941 Committee on Fair Employment Practice, Office of Production Management
Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act 2008 EEOC office,the 110th United States Congress Homeless Bill of Rights 2013 Rhode Island, Connecticut and Illinois Immigration Reform and Control Act. 1986 U. S. Department of Justice, Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices Pregnancy discrimination 1964 U. S. Congress Rehabilitation Act 1973 the 93rd United States Congress Lloyd-La Follette Act 1912 United States Congress Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act 2009 the 111th United States Congress New Jersey Anti-Bullying Bill of Rights Act 2010 Democratic and Republican legislators, organizations Garden State Equality
Detail explanation of some anti-discrimination laws Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is a law enforced by the U. S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). The law protects employees against discrimination because of their race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. It also prohibits discrimination in all employment situations which include hiring, firing, promoting, job assignments and so on. Even the practices which seem neutral but actually do harm to the vulnerable groups are included in Title VII.
Title VII applies to many different categories of groups such as the federal government and employment agencies. Age Discrimination in Employment Act. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) is a law that is also enforced by EEOC and it can be found at 29 U. S. C. 621-634. It prohibits discrimination because of age against employees who are 40 years old or more. The employment situations it covers are the same to Title VII. Americans With Disabilities Act. The Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) is at 42 U. S. C. 12101-12213, enforced by the U. S. Department of Justice and the EEOC.
It requires employers must treat people with disabilities fairly in all aspects of employment such as hiring, interviewing, training and so on. The Law not only protects disabled applicants and employees but also protects those who was disabled in the past and those are not willing to tell the truth. Equal Pay Act. The Equal Pay Act, at 29 U. S. C. 206(d) which is also enforced by EEOC. It requires employers to give employees equal pay for their equal work, whatever employees are male or female. When employees do work of equal value under similar conditions, jobs need equal skills and efforts employees make.
Detailed introduction of some important agencies US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). Agencies play an important role in enforcing laws. From the laws we introduced in the second part, we can see that one of the most common and famous agencies is US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). The U. S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is responsible for enforcing federal laws. The agency can supervise the implementation of anti-discrimination laws. For example, it can help make sure if the employees are treated fairly regardless of their race, sex, color and religions.
The EEOC has the authority to investigate charges of discrimination. Its role is to investigate the allegations fairly and assess the allegation accurately. If the investigators find the existence of discrimination, they will try to settle the charge. If they failed, they are also able to file a lawsuit to protect the rights of protected groups. Furthermore, they also work to prevent discrimination before it occurs through education, training and assistance. The purpose sponsors of regulation want to achieve In general, anti-discrimination laws are enacted in order to make the right of people to be treated equally.
The sponsors of regulation in many counties made a statement that people must be dealt equally regardless of sex, age, race, ethnicity, nationality, disability, mental, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity/expression/dysphoria, sex characteristics, religious, creed, or individual political opinions in consumer transactions and in political participation. However, different antidiscrimination laws are enacted for different special purposes. Next, I will discuss the purposes of several individual laws in detail. Americans With Disabilities Act.
The “medical model” of disability presumed that a person with a disability could not be reintegrated into society. On society’s existing term, the person would remain excluded from much of mainstream society. Therefore, the law protects disabled people in all aspects of their life, including employment, communications, governmental activities and public accommodation. The Department of labor believes that people who are disabled need good jobs too. So the Department of Labor has several agencies that can help disabled people find meaningful work and start their own successful careers like normal people.
The agencies not only can help employers hire people with disabilities but also help they stay within the law when hiring disabled people. Equal Pay Act. The congress finds that there are lots of problems about wage differentials due to sex in production of goods or in commerce such as decreasing the employees’ wages and standard living for their health and preventing the labors who are available from maximum utilization. And then lead to labor disputes which burden the commerce. Therefore, the agency enacted the law to prevent the unfair competition and reduce the burdens on commerce.
Expected and actual effects of the regulation The anti-discrimination laws have lots of effects on society. Take race and sex discrimination laws as an example. The state race and sex discrimination laws focus on equal pay. Some evidence show that race discrimination laws have positive effects on earnings of black relative to white. According to Eberts and Stone (1985) who used the panel data to shows that the relative rates of promotion to administrative positions of male and female public school teachers after the EEOA was declined.
Beller (1979) used models for earnings of male and female with the survey data for 1974, 1971, and 1967. She finds that few evidence can prove that measures of Title VII can reduce the sex wage gap prior EEOA (in 1972). But there is strong evidence shows that the measures made effects after EEOA. Here are two charts about the descriptive statistics of employment and log earnings from 1940 to 1960 which can show us the positive effects of race and sex discrimination laws.
However, some other researchers believe that the positive effects are caused for other reasons. For example, many people consider that the federal antidiscrimination policy helped spur black economic progress in the United States in the mid-1960s. But Donohue and Heckman (1991) argue that the progress was not only due to the discrimination acts enforced by EEOC, but also due to the efforts to combat wage discrimination and broader federal efforts extending beyond the labor market. Additionally, the race and sex discrimination laws still have some limitation.
A bulk of corporations are not willing to employ female labors because the relative price of female labors increased which is due to the equal pay law. Becker-type model shows that an equal pay constraint acts like a relative price increase for the protected group, which could reduce their employment. In the race and Sex discrimination laws, the predicted effects on the employments should be divided into two aspects. On the one hand, the prohibition of discrimination in many aspects such as hiring, terms of employments , earnings protected the employment of the minority.
One the other hand, if the most important purpose is solving the difficulties of protected workers, the effects of increasing cost can also deter hiring. Conclusion The anti-discrimination law is the most efficient way to protect the vulnerable groups. And it is indeed has many positive effects up to now. However, it also has some aspects need to be improved such as the general equilibrium effects of race and sex discrimination laws. If the anti-discrimination laws can be more comprehensive, teh vulnerable groups will be treated more fairly.
