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Walker signs bill revoking equal pay for women

DreamOnDemOn said:
RJ, why do you always include this kind of ignorant value judgement in just about everything you write? It doesn't add anything to the conversation.
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Says the person who blame everything on force and fraud....
 
RJKarl said:
Without damages few lawyers will take such cases. It leaves the statute without much teeth.

It's like making the penalty for bank robbery pay back what you tole at an fee the bank incurs.
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But it says right in the bill: the court can still award attorneys fees. I don't know how common that is in WI, but you're right, if they're never awarded, lawyers won't take these cases. Which leads me to believe they'll be awarded in successful cases.

I know we've moved beyond the WI bill now, but it doesn't take away the right to sue for discrimination. Even Scott Walker isn't in DreamOn world.
 
Prof, think about it for minute. A woman works for a X Corp, who has in house counsel. She sues them. In house counsel understands all the company can lose is her back pay and attorney's fees. He also knows unless it's a slam dunk case that if he makes the opposing attorney spend hundreds of hours in response to depositions, motions and all sorts of other stuff on a questionable case it will go away.

If all attorneys in Milwaukee know X Corp will bury them in paper, they will be less likely to take cases if there are no damages.
 
RJKarl said:
Prof, think about it for minute. A woman works for a X Corp, who has in house counsel. She sues them. In house counsel understands all the company can lose is her back pay and attorney's fees. He also knows unless it's a slam dunk case that if he makes the opposing attorney spend hundreds of hours in response to depositions, motions and all sorts of other stuff on a questionable case it will go away.

If all attorneys in Milwaukee know X Corp will bury them in paper, they will be less likely to take cases if there are no damages.
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But attorney's fees include all the hours billed to respond to defense motions. For plaintiffs' lawyers who bill hours, the more paper the better.
 
Several years ago I was managing attorney for a small government agency. I hired and managed primarily young lawyers fresh out of law school. I made certain presumptions about prospective employees based on my experience with past employees, but those presumptions went against what I had originally believed. If I had the government looking over my shoulder and questioning my employment decisions, it would have definitely harmed the program.

After a few years of managment, I found that grads of UGA Law (based on my experience with 3 prior employees) were generally hardworking, qualified, professional, and worked well with others. I also found that grads of Emory Law (based on 2 prior employees) were qualified and professional, but they tended to spend more time on self-marketing, they avoided some of the unpleasant aspects of the job (jail visits, Juvenile Court, appellate work, etc.), and they tended to "cherry pick" cases to try in order to pad their win-loss record in court. I hired 3 graduates of Georgia State Law, and while 1 was exceptional in ability and work ethic and probably my best employee ever, the other 2 were just plain lazy, unable to learn, and unable to work well with their co-workers. I never ran into a situation where a Mercer Law grad was the most qualified (and I got few applications from Mercer grads), so I never hired a Mercer Law grad.

Therefore, I subconsciously favored UGA grads, I subconscously avoided Emory grads, and GSU grads were hired but subject to greater scrutiny in the application process.

If the government had been requiring me to hire more Emory grads to "level the playing field", I could have likely ended up with a bunch of prima donnas who didn't want to get their hands dirty, and some things such as jail visits wouldn't have been completed on schedule. If the government had been requiring me to hire at least one Mercer grad, I would have been forced to decline other objectively more qualified applicants in order to do so. If the government had required me to check with prior employers about candidates' job performances as closely as I did with GSU candidates, then I would have unnecessarily spent too much time with that process.

After a couple of years I realized that although a significant percentage of our clients were black, the office had never had a black attorney because no black attorney had ever applied (apparently young black professionals preferred to work in Atlanta rather than Athens). So with my next vacancy, I posted a listing in the Daily Report (the Atlanta lawyer's newspaper) in addition to the standard online job posting sites. I received one application from a black candidate. He was bright and professional, but had had a little trouble with the bar exam. I hired him anyway with the understanding that he would initially be doing tasks, such as client conferences and jail visits, that didn't require a law degree until he passed the bar exam. He did an exceptional job and his personality was a huge asset for the office, and in a sense he became "the face" of the office (I would also take him with me to speak to school groups and civic clubs about the indigent defense program). Although the other staff members had to pitch in more in Court since he couldn't make court appearances yet, none of them resented it. Six months later he failed the bar exam again, but I still kept him because he was so productive and he finally passed the next time. If the government had been looking over my shoulder to pick "the most qualified candidate", I would have been unable to jump other applicants who had already passed the bar and would have been legally prohibited from hiring him. And the office would have lost out on what became a huge asset.

The bottom line is that we all make presumptions based on prior experiences, and those presumptions are probably intellectually lazy and not always correct, but they're not always sexist or racist.
 
IF they win.

Also given that's the case, do you think most lawyers won't at least demand a retainer and some ongoing fees?

If it's a contingency, they see the possibility of making much ore than just their fees. If it's hi way, they are taking a much bigger gamble.
 
Boogity's post and others bring up a question.

How many of you who do hiring/firing hold job fairs at HBCUs (or Hispanic Serving Institutions if they're near you) or post job notices in publications likely to draw black or Hispanic readers?
 
PhDeac said:
Boogity's post and others bring up a question.

How many of you who do hiring/firing hold job fairs at HBCUs (or Hispanic Serving Institutions if they're near you) or post job notices in publications likely to draw black or Hispanic readers?
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I never did until I saw a specific need in my office for a black attorney. And it was a positive experience.

Now that I am in sole practice, I only hire paralegals and support staff and I hire local because paralegals (unlike lawyers) don't make enough money to relocate their residence. I normally post jobs with the paralegal department at the local community college (which is presumably race-neutral) and I've never received a resume from a black applicant for paralegal. There are no local publications geared toward the black or hispanic community here.
 
BoogityBoogity said:
After a few years of managment, I found that grads of UGA Law (based on my experience with 3 prior employees) were generally hardworking, qualified, professional, and worked well with others. I also found that grads of Emory Law (based on 2 prior employees) were qualified and professional, but they tended to spend more time on self-marketing, they avoided some of the unpleasant aspects of the job (jail visits, Juvenile Court, appellate work, etc.), and they tended to "cherry pick" cases to try in order to pad their win-loss record in court. I hired 3 graduates of Georgia State Law, and while 1 was exceptional in ability and work ethic and probably my best employee ever, the other 2 were just plain lazy, unable to learn, and unable to work well with their co-workers. I never ran into a situation where a Mercer Law grad was the most qualified (and I got few applications from Mercer grads), so I never hired a Mercer Law grad.

Therefore, I subconsciously favored UGA grads, I subconscously avoided Emory grads, and GSU grads were hired but subject to greater scrutiny in the application process.
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Where is SmallSampleSizeDeac when you need him?
 
DreamOnDemOn said:
Until the first enterprising rich capitalist pig notices this situation and hires from pool B, kicking the other rich capitalist white pigs to the curb. Instant mixing of the pools. Look for other reasons for "discrimination".
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Again, no. If this were the case, you would have seen non-white men in corporate America positions of power before legislated was enacted in the 60s. I assure you, people were just as 'enterprising' prior to 1965. Why did no one do as you suggest?

And regarding other posts, courts do enforce racism laws in other avenues of society. You can't purposefully segregate your school system, you can't ban interracial marriage, you can't not admit a student to a public school just because of their race or (usually) their gender. These laws are good things. Or do you dispute that too?

I would like to get to a point in our society where we don't need discrimination laws at work. Fortunately we've gotten to the point where segregation isn't as prevalent in schools and you don't see many cases anymore. Unfortunately the numbers indicate there are still issues in the workforce. I would like to be optimistic and say that marketforces would correct this discrimination as you and others seem to think. Sadly, the history of our nation (not too distant history btw) indicate otherwise, yes? We only began to diversify corporate America once LEGAL remedies became available. Not sure what part of this you don't see.

The trend is moving in the correct direction, and so too is our society in terms of hiring, so hopefully we won't need these laws at some point in the future.
 
BoogityBoogity said:
The bottom line is that we all make presumptions based on prior experiences, and those presumptions are probably intellectually lazy and not always correct, but they're not always sexist or racist.
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Yes. No one is arguing that. And associations and assumptions from schools is a tad different than assumptions based on race or gender when it comes to hiring.

When the courts recognize that Georgia State grads are an insular minority in need of political redress due to discrimination we can talk.

Racism/sexism existed and was profuse in corporate America prior to civil rights legislation.
The "Free Market" did not correct this -- it actually reinforced this.
Legislation was impacted because our country realized it was counterproductive to discriminate against people based on race or gender.
This has led to a diversifying of the workforce where people are actually looked at based on their merits whereas the free market ignored them before.
We are not where we should be yet but we're making progress.

Some people are arguing this is a bad thing. OK.
 
Eagles_Legendz said:
Yes. No one is arguing that. And associations and assumptions from schools is a tad different than assumptions based on race or gender when it comes to hiring.

When the courts recognize that Georgia State grads are an insular minority in need of political redress due to discrimination we can talk.

Racism/sexism existed and was profuse in corporate America prior to civil rights legislation.
The "Free Market" did not correct this -- it actually reinforced this.
Legislation was impacted because our country realized it was counterproductive to discriminate against people based on race or gender.
This has led to a diversifying of the workforce where people are actually looked at based on their merits whereas the free market ignored them before.
We are not where we should be yet but we're making progress.

Some people are arguing this is a bad thing. OK.
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This.

Some of these posters act as if the free market is something they and their conservative movement uncovered recently.
 
Yep. Until government intervention, my ancestors were bought and sold on the free market.
 
BoogityBoogity said:
So with my next vacancy, I posted a listing in the Daily Report (the Atlanta lawyer's newspaper) in addition to the standard online job posting sites. I received one application from a black candidate. He was bright and professional, but had had a little trouble with the bar exam. I hired him anyway with the understanding that he would initially be doing tasks, such as client conferences and jail visits, that didn't require a law degree until he passed the bar exam. He did an exceptional job and his personality was a huge asset for the office, and in a sense he became "the face" of the office (I would also take him with me to speak to school groups and civic clubs about the indigent defense program). Although the other staff members had to pitch in more in Court since he couldn't make court appearances yet, none of them resented it. Six months later he failed the bar exam again, but I still kept him because he was so productive.
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Was it Darius mercedes little by any chance?
 
And after that how did the free market solve child labor, working conditions and safety, quality of food and medicine, pollution of streams and rivers? I guess the argument is that we should have just left it all alone and it would have 'worked itself out' huh?
 
The free market just outsources jobs to places that use child labor and don't regulate working conditions and safety.
 
WakeandBake said:
And after that how did the free market solve child labor, working conditions and safety, quality of food and medicine, pollution of streams and rivers? I guess the argument is that we should have just left it all alone and it would have 'worked itself out' huh?
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No, theres a big difference between health and safety regulations (which are needed), and regulations interfering with the right to contract (which are not needed to the extent proposed in this thread). If I as a 40-something white man applied for a job at Michelle African Hair Braiding, for example, and I was the most qualified candidate, should the law require them to hire me? Of course not. If a Public Defender's office sees a specific need for a black staff attorney, should the law require them to hire a more qualified white candidate? Of course not.

I'm not sure how many people posting here actually own businesses and hire employees, but things are different in the real world. Businesses don't magically generate revenue, but do so based on the effort and abilities of their employees. Let me break it down for you:

(1) The female applicant is more qualified than the male candidate.
(2) The sexist boss hire the male candidate. Its an irrational decision, but he does it anyway.
(3) The male candidate underperforms in his job, leading to a loss of revenue and profit for the company (he was the least qualified, remember?).
(4) The female candidate is hired by a competitor of the sexist boss. She performs exceptionally in her job (being more qualified). As a result, the competitor gains more business.
(5) As a consequence, the sexist boss's company loses market share, which leads to a greater loss of revenue and profit.
(6) The competitor is happy and promotes the female who generates revenue to a position of management, because the competitor is self-motived with an eye toward maximizing profit.
(7) The sexist boss is unhappy and will be out of business in a matter of years. He'll likely blame the government, but it wasn't the government who put him out of business.
 
BoogityBoogity said:
No, theres a big difference between health and safety regulations (which are needed), and regulations interfering with the right to contract (which are not needed to the extent proposed in this thread). If I as a 40-something white man applied for a job at Michelle African Hair Braiding, for example, and I was the most qualified candidate, should the law require them to hire me? Of course not. If a Public Defender's office sees a specific need for a black staff attorney, should the law require them to hire a more qualified white candidate? Of course not.

I'm not sure how many people posting here actually own businesses and hire employees, but things are different in the real world. Businesses don't magically generate revenue, but do so based on the effort and abilities of their employees. Let me break it down for you:

(1) The female applicant is more qualified than the male candidate.
(2) The sexist boss hire the male candidate. Its an irrational decision, but he does it anyway.
(3) The male candidate underperforms in his job, leading to a loss of revenue and profit for the company (he was the least qualified, remember?).
(4) The female candidate is hired by a competitor of the sexist boss. She performs exceptionally in her job (being more qualified). As a result, the competitor gains more business.
(5) As a consequence, the sexist boss's company loses market share, which leads to a greater loss of revenue and profit.
(6) The competitor is happy and promotes the female who generates revenue to a position of management, because the competitor is self-motived with an eye toward maximizing profit.
(7) The sexist boss is unhappy and will be out of business in a matter of years. He'll likely blame the government, but it wasn't the government who put him out of business.
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again, if that was the case in the real world, why are there so few women in high level corporate positions? And why didn't that happen at all in businesses before the 1970's?
 
lots of women decide to be mom instead of working towards a high level corporate BS position. the rantings of anti stay at home mothers aside (looking at you while you lurk awakegirl), that's a more valuable choice.
 
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