Employment Equity, Punishment Flashcards
Employment Equity
Policies put in place during the Trudeau (senior) administration to ensure equitable access to federal positions for historically marginalized groups to “require federal jurisdiction employers to engage in proactive employment practices to increase the representation of four designated groups: women, people with disabilities, Aboriginal peoples, “
The policy seeks to address discrimination. Requires policies/practices to address disadvantages experienced by designated groups (Aboriginals, Visible Minorities, Persons with Disabilities, Women).
The policy requires; reasonable accommodation of difference, active recruitment policies, and annual reporting.
To promote an environment free of barriers, the act requires accommodation;
- E.g. wheel chair access for persons with disabilities
- Ensuring software and websites are accessible to those with hearing or visual impairments
- Sign Language or interpreters
- Modifying policy to permit service animals
Active Recruitment (recruitment, retention, hiring, etc);
- Recruitment in Aboriginal communities
- Advertisements in language specific publications
- Apprentice programs directed at Aboriginals
Employment Equity is controversial
We tend to think that the best and brightest get the best jobs
- And that no one should simply be given employment
- And that historically, white men dominated job markets – so if we are now multicultural, should we see more minorities and women? And if not, what do we do?
Employment Equity: Justifications
Compensatory Justice: A backward looking justification, because women and visible minorities have suffered past discrimination, employment equity policies compensate them for lost opportunities. But for past discrimination, women would have had better positions, more income, wealth, etc.
Utilitarian: Employment equity is justified because it would create a diverse workforce. Women add value to firm behavior and outcomes; if there are minorities and women in firms, they can mentor and attract more!
Distributive Justice: A form of justice that seeks a fair distribution of the benefits and burdens of society. Current outcomes suggest the playing field isn’t equal, and that the aim of distributing positions and offices by merit is far from being achieved.
Distributive Concerns
Pay Gap: Women make less than men make, for the same work! Visible Minorities make less than white males!
Women are underrepresented in many industries, and name discrimination affects minorities.
Objections: Compensation
Backward looking:
Those that discriminated are gone, and the beneficiaries no longer need compensation.
Surely males today wouldn’t do the things their predecessors did so why should they be made to suffer compensation?
And surely the women that stayed in the firm no longer need the advantage.
Furthermore, today’s women and visible minorities should not receive the advantages of employment equity for the wrongs suffered by past women and minorities!
Objections: Forward Looking
Diversity in itself is just one value, but there are others that compete with diversity.
Disutilities would follow in creating resentment and jealousy for males past over for women and minorities.
Male anger at women or whites at minorities lead males to spend fewer times with women and minorities.
The policy elevates unqualified persons who would undermine firm performance.
Objections: Distributive Justice
If the policy seeks to tilt the field towards designated groups, that seems unfair to white males!
Punishment: Incarceration
When thinking about punishment, we should focus on incarceration (as opposed to fines, ostracism, or other forms of informal responses to violations of legal norms)
Why is Punishment Controversial?
For one thing, the apparatus is quite expensive!
Social costs in terms of deprivations and intrusions of liberty are immense (stop and card policies, solitary confinement, eavesdropping and search abilities, mistaken and abuses of power by policing authorities).
Immense amounts of power given to individuals whose discretion is not transparent and often unchecked (Attorneys, Judges)
Locking people up seems to disproportionately affect the poor, the uneducated, black, and indigenous men, women, and children, while the rich go free!
The long term effects on families of those incarcerated in lifetime earnings and mobility and their ability and interest to participate in democratic institutions.
Justifications for Incarceration
Kantian style arguments: to respect the autonomy of persons we owe them an opportunity to pay for their crime.
-Punishment is what they deserve for their transgression
Furthermore, it incapacitates them and keeps us safe from them!
Utilitarian arguments:
Deterrence: if we punish severely we deter the person from doing crime from doing it again! (specific deterrence)
-If we deter severely, we deter future persons from doing crime in the future (general deterrence)
Incarceration also gives us an outlet for our emotional responses to wrong.
A private system of retribution would generate a never ending cycle of violence and vendettas
And crimes too severely punished given the nature of the crime.
Against Incarceration
Deterrence: Looking people up doesn’t deter them from crime, also harshly sentencing someone doesn’t deter the public.
Incarceration simply makes prisoners more dangerous by depriving them of their freedom
(E.g. solitary confinement)
Kantian arguments: it’s almost impossible to determine whether a person deserved the punishment they received. Often the amount of time served is too lenient or too severe.
The notion of desert cant specify an appropriate sanction. And if you choose an eye for an eye, we would have strange results.
Finally, incarceration provides an outlet for human emotions, but the emotions of revenge are misguided, and never satisfied.
The Social Costs of Incarceration
The entire apparatus of punishment is expensive and extremely intrusive, and incarceration doesn’t make us safer
