The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) was put in place to prevent discrimination in hiring processes in the United States. This blog will offer a brief overview of the work that the EEOC does to create equal opportunities for all workers, and what has been done to tackle discrimination that is embedded in the system.
During the 1960s, the vast majority of charges filed were involving race discrimination. This was in situations such as hiring and promotion. Through the EEOC’s experience of these trials, the commission saw that there were not all intentional and overt acts that consciously discriminated against black workers.
They found that discrimination also took place through policies and practices that disproportionately and negatively affected minorities, for example women. They saw that the policies that were regarded as neutral, had a negative and unequal affect on employment opportunities.
As a result of these findings, the EEOC issued a set of guidelines in 1966. It prohibited certain types of policies and practices that negatively affected minority groups. This paved the way for the challenging of previously accepted practices that led to unconscious discrimination.
These practices have shaped employment legislation to this day, and it now means that you as a worker have many rights to a claim in seemingly subtle discrimination scenarios. If there are practices that are taking place within your workplace that you think are excluding certain minority and protected groups, you may be able to make a claim because of the work that the EEOC has done in regards to unconscious discrimination.
Source: EEOC.gov, “Shaping Employment Discrimination Law,” accessed Aug. 23, 2017