1. Discrimination

2. Understanding Discrimination
Relative Deprivation
Conscious experience of a negative discrepancy
Between legitimate expectation & present actuality
Absolute Deprivation
Standard minimum level of subsistence below which families should not be expected to exist
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3. Understanding Discrimination
Denial of opportunities & equal rights to individuals and groups
Because of prejudice or for other arbitrary reasons
Total Discrimination
Combination of current discrimination with past discrimination
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4. Hate Crimes
Race apparent motivation for the bias in approximately 51 percent of the reports,
Religion, sexual orientation, & ethnicity accounted for 11–20% each
Vandalism & intimidation most common crimes
Crime against people: 58 percent of incidents involved assault, rape, or murder
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5. Institutional Discrimination
The denial of opportunities and equal rights to individuals and groups
Results from normal operations of a society
Institutional forms of discrimination are committed collectively against a group
May be unconscious - it is not a function of awareness of discrimination
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6. Examples of Institutional Discrimination
Standards for assessing credit risks do not work for Hispanics and African Americans
IQ testing favors middle-class children
Many jobs eliminate a person with felony records or past drug offenses,
Which disproportionately reduces employment opportunities for people of color
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7. Examples of Institutional Discrimination
The criminal justice system is dominated by Whites
Find it difficult to understand life in poverty
Hiring practices often require several years of experience at jobs
Only recently opened to members of subordinate groups
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8. Discrimination Hits the Wallet
Informal Economy (Irregular/Underground Economy)
Transfers of money, goods, or services that are not reported to the government
Irregular economy - operates outside the boundaries of the regular economy
Job stability, wages, working conditions or benefits
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9. Discrimination Hits the Wallet
Regular labor market operates according to the principles of the conventional labor market
Dual Labor Market Model
According to this model, minorities have been relegated to the informal economy
Informal economy offers few safeguards against fraud or malpractice
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10. Discrimination Hits the Wallet
Few fringe benefits such as stability, wages, health insurance, and pension
Criticized for promoting unfair and dangerous working conditions
Workers are ill prepared to enter the regular economy permanently
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11. Discrimination Today Discrimination is widespread in the U.S.
Sometimes results from prejudices held by individuals, but more significantly:
Is found in institutional discrimination and the presence of the informal economy
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12. Discrimination Today Quantifying discrimination is problematic
1. Identifying the different treatment of minorities
2. Determining the cost of discrimination
Distribution of income as a measure of discrimination
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13. Eliminating Discrimination
Two major sources for the elimination of discrimination:
Governmental agencies and policies
Roosevelt’s 1943 and the Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC)
Supreme court decision Brown v. Board of Education
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14. Eliminating Discrimination
Voluntary associations
State’s Rights
Each state is sovereign in most of its affairs
And has the right to order them without interference from the federal government
Since 1964, several acts and amendments have been made to the Civil Rights Act
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15. Eliminating Discrimination
To cover the many areas of discrimination left untouched; Criminal Justice and Housing
Redlining
The pattern of discrimination against people:
Trying to buy homes in minority and racially changing neighborhoods
Applied to areas other than housing
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16. Wealth Inequality: Discrimination’s Legacy
Past discrimination carries into the present and future
No inherited wealth is element of the past
Less opportunity of Blacks to accumulate assets
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17. Wealth Inequality: Discrimination’s Legacy
Income
Salaries and wages
Wealth
Encompasses all a person’s assets, land, stocks, and other types of property
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18. Environmental Justice
Efforts to ensure that hazardous substances are controlled so that:
All communities receive protection regardless of race or socioeconomic circumstance
Issues of environmental justice not limited to metropolitan areas
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19. Environmental Justice
Abuse of Native American reservation land
Tribal lands regarded as dumping grounds for toxic waste that go to the highest bidder
Controversy within the scientific community over potential hazards
Complexity of the issues in terms of social class and race are apparent
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20. Environmental Justice
Executive order (1994)
Requires all federal agencies to ensure that low-income and minority communities have:
Access to better information about their environment and have an opportunity in shaping:
Government policies that affect their community’s health
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21. Affirmative Action
Positive effort to recruit subordinate-group members, including women
Jobs, promotions, & educational opportunities
Today, has become a catchall term for racial preference programs and goals
Lightning rod for opposition to programs that suggest consideration of women/minorities
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22. Affirmative Action Explained
Has been viewed as an important tool for reducing institutional discrimination
Federal measures aimed at procedures that deny equal opportunities, even if:
Not intended to be overtly discriminatory
Lack of minority-group/female employees may in itself represent unlawful exclusion
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23. Examples of Affirmative Action and Institutional Discrimination
Height & weight requirements that are:
Unnecessarily geared to the physical proportions of White males
Seniority rules, when applied to jobs historically held only by white males
Nepotism-based membership policies
Restrictive employment leave policies
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24. Examples of Affirmative Action and Institutional Discrimination
Rules requiring only English be spoken at the workplace
Standardized academic tests or criteria
Preferences shown by law and medical schools
Credit policies of banks and lending institutions
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25. The Legal Debate
In the 1978 Bakke case (Regents of the University of California v Bakke)
By a narrow 5-4 vote, ordered the medical school of the University of California at Davis
To admit Allan Bakke, a qualified White engineer who had originally been denied admission
Solely on the basis of his race
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26. Reverse Discrimination
An emotional term because it conjures up the notion that somehow:
Women and minorities will subject White men in the U.S. to the same treatment received by:
Minorities during the last three centuries
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27. Reverse Discrimination
Supporters of affirmative action
Informal social networks, personal recommendations & family ties
White men will have a distinct advantage built on generations of being in positions of power
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28. The Glass Ceiling
Barrier that blocks the promotion of a qualified worker
Because of gender or minority membership
Block lateral moves to areas from which executives are promoted
Contribute to women not moving to decision-making positions in nation’s corp. giants
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29. The Glass Ceiling Determinants of the Glass Ceiling
Lack of management commitment to establishing system, policies, and practices
For achieving workplace diversity and upward mobility
Pay inequities for work of equal or comparable value
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30. The Glass Ceiling
Sex, race, and ethnic-based stereotyping and harassment
Unfair recruitment practices
Lack of family-friendly workplace policies
“Parent-track” policies
Limited opportunities for advancement to decision-making positions
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31. The Glass Ceiling Glass Escalator
Refers to the male advantage experienced in occupations dominated by women
Men who chose to enter female-dominated occupations are often rewarded with
Promotions and positions of responsibility coveted by their fellow female workers
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