Should socioeconomic class be a protected characteristic?

[MSC]

2 hours ago, Peterkin said:

I don't think that will be necessary, thank you.

Way to steer into the intellectual rigidity I guess..

[swansont]

13 hours ago, MSC said:

Fair question: Quality of attire, dialect/accent, self disclosure based on specific interview questions eg: "Can you tell me of a time you overcome adversity or achieved something difficult?" or simply having a personal connection with the interviewer wherein they have knowledge of your circumstances from before you even applied.

Admittedly it's not going to come up in the hiring process all the time. The point is it can and has before came up. The discussion revolves around determining what ought to happen when it does come up.

You can't rent/borrow good clothing? Your accent makes you rich or poor?

If you have hiring criteria that aren't related to how the person will do their job, you will end up with bad hiring practices, and that will be a drag on your company.

If this were widespread, I would imagine there would be complaints about the discrimination. You say it has come up - do you have evidence of this? Is it more than an isolated case or two? 

What ought to happen? If a company decides they only want to hire rich people, they can hinder themselves that way. There are other companies out there that will hire better candidates and be more competetive in most cases, all else being equal.

[MSC]

4 hours ago, swansont said:

If this were widespread, I would imagine there would be complaints about the discrimination. You say it has come up - do you have evidence of this? Is it more than an isolated case or two? 

So to be clear: you're asking me to prove to you, that classism and judgemental people exist? Are you saying you don't believe either exist?

4 hours ago, swansont said:

You can't rent/borrow good clothing? Your accent makes you rich or poor?

So the first question is actually a good example of class discrimination. What if someone answers "No, I can't rent good clothing and nobody will lend me clothes for my job interview tomorrow."? What then? For that matter, what to you are good clothes? Designer stuff or just functional attire? What if a group of ten interviewers all have different ideas on what is and isn't good clothing? 

As for the second question, I at no point stated that your accent makes you rich or poor. What I meant, is that accent, dialect, word choice and colloquialisms can and are used by some to determine class. This isn't news to linguists or psychologists.

Also, when I say discrimination I mean both direct and indirect, as per the legal definitions. Which covers discrimination of malicious, ignorant and callous intent. 

Quote

What Is Classism

Classism is differential treatment based on social class or perceived social class. Classism is the systematic oppression of subordinated class groups to advantage and strengthen the dominant class groups. It’s the systematic assignment of characteristics of worth and ability based on social class.

That includes:

• individual attitudes and behaviors;
• systems of policies and practices that are set up to benefit the upper classes at the expense of the lower classes, resulting in drastic income and wealth inequality;
• the rationale that supports these systems and this unequal valuing; and
• the culture that perpetuates them

Classism is held in place by a system of beliefs and cultural attitudes that ranks people according to economic status, family lineage, job status, level of education, and other divisions.

Middle-class and owning- or ruling-class people (dominant group members) are seen as smarter and more articulate than working-class and poor people (subordinated groups). In this way, dominant group members (middle-class and wealthy people) define for everyone else what is “normal” or “acceptable” in the class hierarchy.

People who are poor/working class sometimes internalize the dominant society’s beliefs and attitudes toward them, and play them out against themselves and others of their class. Internalized classism is the acceptance and justification of classism by working class and poor people. Examples include: feelings of inferiority to higher-class people; disdain or shame about traditional patterns of class in one’s family and a denial of heritage; feelings of superiority to people lower on the class spectrum than oneself; hostility and blame towards other working-class or poor people; and beliefs that classist institutions are fair.

People who are middle-class and wealthy sometimes internalize the dominant society’s beliefs and attitudes toward them, and play them out against others.  Internalized superiority is the acceptance and justification of class privilege by middle-class and wealthy people.  Class privilege include the many tangible or intangible unearned advantages of “higher” class status, such as personal contacts with employers, “legacy admissions” to higher education, inherited money, good childhood health care, quality education, speaking with the same dialect and accent as people with institutional power, and having knowledge of how the systems of power operate.

A person from the more privileged classes can be a class ally—a person whose attitudes and behaviors are anti-classist, who is committed to increasing his or her own understanding of the issues related to classism, and is actively working towards eliminating classism on many levels.

- https://classism.org/about-class/what-is-classism/

So right away, in the very first paragraph it states clearly that classism is differential treatment based on social class or perceived social class. I think it's great that you feel you would not engage in this, but you cannot speak for everyone else. Debates on class are some of the oldest debates we have, and you're asking me to prove to you that it exists? The evidence all points towards it existing. Why don't you prove it doesn't exist? Since that claim would put you in the minority and is not the consensus of the majority on this subject whatsoever. 

Important question for you: How probable do you think it is, that class discrimination happens on a regular basis? What would a basic probability calculation say I wonder?

If a company wants to hurt itself by only hiring rich people, a claim I don't agree with by the way, that is one thing. If it does this by rejecting, discriminating, wasting the time of and hurting suitable applicants perceived to be lower class, that is another. 

The thing is, I'm entirely confident that there is enough evidence out there that proves me correct. I am not confident you will take it seriously if it comes from me. Based on your animosity towards pretty much anything I say and disdain for any attempt to be diplomatic with you I make. 

[iNow]

9 minutes ago, MSC said:

If this were widespread, I would imagine there would be complaints about the discrimination.

9 minutes ago, MSC said:

So to be clear: you're asking me to prove to you, that classism and judgemental people exist?

How is it not obvious to you that it was a request for complaints about the topic?

EDIT: Initial quote is from Swansont but was misattributed to MSC due to editor bug.

10 minutes ago, MSC said:

The thing is, I'm entirely confident that there is enough evidence out there that proves me correct.

Oh, well so long as YOU'RE confident, I suppose that's good enough for everyone else.

Edited March 10, 2022 by iNow

[swansont]

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

So to be clear: you're asking me to prove to you, that classism and judgemental people exist? Are you saying you don't believe either exist?

I want you to show that wealth-based hiring discrimination is widespread. That's how other protected classes were afforded their status. And there are exceptions

"employers may consider membership in a protected class when making employment decisions if there is a business necessity for doing so, or if membership in a protected class is a bona fide occupational qualification."

https://subscriptlaw.com/protected-classes/ 

 

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

So the first question is actually a good example of class discrimination. What if someone answers "No, I can't rent good clothing and nobody will lend me clothes for my job interview tomorrow."? What then? For that matter, what to you are good clothes? Designer stuff or just functional attire? What if a group of ten interviewers all have different ideas on what is and isn't good clothing? 

Then it sounds like everyone has a problem. You could not be a member of the "poor" and be affected.

IOW, you're fighting a certain kind of bias. Like "long-haired freaky people need not apply"
Nothing illegal about that

 

 

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

As for the second question, I at no point stated that your accent makes you rich or poor. What I meant, is that accent, dialect, word choice and colloquialisms can and are used by some to determine class. This isn't news to linguists or psychologists.

Your accent does not guarantee to what class you belong. There's only correlation. You would be discriminating on the basis of that accent, not on the financial status.

IOW, consider "My Fair Lady" (yes, it's fiction, but consider the plausibility of a similar scenario)

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

Also, when I say discrimination I mean both direct and indirect, as per the legal definitions. Which covers discrimination of malicious, ignorant and callous intent. 

- https://classism.org/about-class/what-is-classism/

So right away, in the very first paragraph it states clearly that classism is differential treatment based on social class or perceived social class. I think it's great that you feel you would not engage in this, but you cannot speak for everyone else.

I don't believe I said I wouldn't engage in it, nor do I think I spoke for anyone else

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

Debates on class are some of the oldest debates we have, and you're asking me to prove to you that it exists?

No, I asked for evidence that socioeconomic status was explicitly impacting hiring practices. You are weaving a bit of a man of straw here.

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

If a company wants to hurt itself by only hiring rich people, a claim I don't agree with by the way, that is one thing. If it does this by rejecting, discriminating, wasting the time of and hurting suitable applicants perceived to be lower class, that is another. 

You don't agree but you also agree? I don't understand.

 

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

 

The thing is, I'm entirely confident that there is enough evidence out there that proves me correct.

Let's see it then. evidence of rejecting candidates solely because of whether they are rich or poor.

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

I am not confident you will take it seriously if it comes from me.

I'm not asking that it come from you, per se. I don't think an individual would personally have generated that sort of data, and otherwise it would just be anecdotes. I would expect you to point me to credible sources of information.

39 minutes ago, MSC said:

Based on your animosity towards pretty much anything I say and disdain for any attempt to be diplomatic with you I make. 

I'm not sure where this is coming from. This is a science site. Surely you should expect challenges to nebulous claims.

[MSC]

https://www.beapplied.com/post/social-class-discrimination-and-fairness-in-recruitment

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0003122416653602

Quote

This article demonstrates how class origin shapes earnings in higher professional and managerial employment. Taking advantage of newly released data in Britain’s Labour Force Survey, we examine the relative openness of different high-status occupations and the earnings of the upwardly mobile within them. In terms of access, we find a distinction between traditional professions, such as law, medicine, and finance, which are dominated by the children of higher managers and professionals, and more technical occupations, such as engineering and IT, that recruit more widely. Moreover, even when people who are from working-class backgrounds are successful in entering high-status occupations, they earn 17 percent less, on average, than individuals from privileged backgrounds. This class-origin pay gap translates to up to £7,350 ($11,000) lower annual earnings. This difference is partly explained by the upwardly mobile being employed in smaller firms and working outside London, but it remains substantial even net of a variety of important predictors of earnings. These findings underline the value of investigating differences in mobility rates between individual occupations as well as illustrating how, beyond entry, the mobile population often faces an earnings “class ceiling” within high-status occupations.

- from the second link above. 

@swansont

Knock yourself out. Just to be clear though: When I read a claim made by someone on here, unless I'm already familiar with the contemporary literature, I do the person making the claim the courtesy of researching it myself. Sure I don't have to do that, burden of proof is usually on the person making the claim, but it does save everyone time and makes you much less likely to appear obtuse and pedantic for the sake of being pedantic. 

Yes this is a science forum, but this is the philosophy section. Which means we also utilize deductive methods of arriving at conclusions, as well as inductive methods. We also practice the principle of charity, wherein we put our dialogical counterparts claims into their strongest format before we refer to them. That is just how this is done in an academic setting. I don't like all of the methods either, but I do them, because they do help and they do increase your ability to retain a higher level of objectivity than you would if you did not use them. 

Do you want more evidence? I'm happy to find more over the course of the week. Keep in mind however, that since it is not currently illegal to discriminate on this basis, you won't find any case law on it. 

It's ironic to me, that the most scientific way of getting more data on this, would be to actually make it a protected characteristic for a few years and see what happens in the court system as a result. If the law was in place, and 1000 cases fail, I'll concede that it doesn't happen. As it stands, there is more evidence that it does happen than there is that says it doesn't. I've looked, but I've found zero studies claiming class discrimination in employment does not happen, in both rejections and wage disparities. Can you find any?

 

@MigLI'm so mad at you right now! You aren't making fun of us all and lightening the mood enough! Do better brother, do better. Your humour is sorely needed! Roast me dammit!

[MSC]

2 hours ago, iNow said:

Oh, well so long as YOU'RE confident, I suppose that's good enough for everyone else.

Is sarcasm called for? I'm not doing anything wrong by wanting to open a discussion and expect the truth to speak for itself.

 

[swansont]

1 hour ago, MSC said:

Knock yourself out. Just to be clear though: When I read a claim made by someone on here, unless I'm already familiar with the contemporary literature, I do the person making the claim the courtesy of researching it myself. Sure I don't have to do that, burden of proof is usually on the person making the claim, but it does save everyone time and makes you much less likely to appear obtuse and pedantic for the sake of being pedantic. 

I'm not being pedantic. It's outside of the realm of my experience, and doesn't pass the smell test. It sounds like a movie-plot problem. Which is why I ask.

Your links are about class and classism, not whether someone is rich, though of course there is overlap. I responded to your questions

"What is to stop me from deciding only rich people can work for me?"

and 

"Should there be some kind of affirmative action for those with a long family history of poverty?"

 For example: one of the bullet points in the first link is 

• 18% of privately-educated graduates earn over £30,000 within 6 months of starting work - compared to 9% from state schools.

None of that tells you if the individual in question is rich or poor, and says nothing about whether there was discrimination on this basis in the hiring process, so this says nothing about what I asked.

What that statistic says is that you will probably get a better job if you can go to a private school. Doesn't say anything about being rich, or whether you were hired on that basis.

1 hour ago, MSC said:

It's ironic to me, that the most scientific way of getting more data on this, would be to actually make it a protected characteristic for a few years and see what happens in the court system as a result.

Since all you would have to do is not ask the applicant if they were rich or poor, I'd say it's likely to have zero effect. You can reject protected classes based on them not being qualified for the job. The same applies here. 

[MSC]

36 minutes ago, swansont said:

I'm not being pedantic. It's outside of the realm of my experience, and doesn't pass the smell test. It sounds like a movie-plot problem. Which is why I ask.

Your links are about class and classism, not whether someone is rich, though of course there is overlap. I responded to your questions

"What is to stop me from deciding only rich people can work for me?"

and 

"Should there be some kind of affirmative action for those with a long family history of poverty?"

 For example: one of the bullet points in the first link is 

• 18% of privately-educated graduates earn over £30,000 within 6 months of starting work - compared to 9% from state schools.

None of that tells you if the individual in question is rich or poor, and says nothing about whether there was discrimination on this basis in the hiring process, so this says nothing about what I asked.

What that statistic says is that you will probably get a better job if you can go to a private school. Doesn't say anything about being rich, or whether you were hired on that basis.

Since all you would have to do is not ask the applicant if they were rich or poor, I'd say it's likely to have zero effect. You can reject protected classes based on them not being qualified for the job. The same applies here. 

Class is implied by use off the word rich. I shouldn't have to explain that. To me it just seems like you're making an argument about semantics here. If the word choice bothers you that much, then assume I meant middle to upper class. Who do you know that can afford to go to private schools that is not middle/upper class? Assuming it's a school not run by a religious organization. As far as I'm aware, nobody in my area growing up got into a private school unless it was a school specifically for disabled children. My high-school was supposed to get a new building (because the current one is literally sinking into a brae) over a decade ago. The land developers sat on that land for 6 years until they were no-longer contractually obligated to build it and they gentrified the area instead and forced a lot of good working class people out. Not particularly relevant to this discussion I guess but maybe telling you it will help you understand why I believe I am just trying to speak what seems to be the truth to me, in good faith. 

You really need to read both of the links I sent you, thoroughly. You asked for them, so you need to at least respect them enough to reflect on them and read them carefully. I didn't write them, so if you want to counter the claims made in them, you'll need to find evidence in support of whatever your counter claims are. This is a two way street. You are not my peer, my boss, my professor or my parent. You're a fallible human being capable of being rude and callous, as am I. All I know of you, is how you behave toward me. I'm a fuckin open book. I don't know what any of your intentions are, but have you considered that how you are choosing to communicate with me is to blame for these misunderstandings wherein you keep making me feel like you just don't like me and are mostly antagonistic toward me? 

I get it, you're one of those people who believe brutal honesty is the best policy, but you also strike me as the type that focuses more on the brutality than the honesty. Compassionate honesty, now that is the diplomatic way to do it. I'm trying to work on that myself. I'm genuinely trying to be kinder and work on my temper. I really do want to understand you better, because I don't want nor like being upset with you. Am I just not getting your style of communication? What's going on?

 

37 minutes ago, swansont said:

It's outside of the realm of my experience, and doesn't pass the smell test

Well it's not outside the realm of mine. Maybe you have anosmia? 

Are you actually going to read the study? Or just the parts you think will prove me wrong? (when they don't)

What is it that motivates you to debate this with me by the way? What do you want from this dialogue? What is your stake in this discussion? Do you stand to gain from a fairer and more equitable world or would it mean you have to share more?

[Phi for All]

2 hours ago, MSC said:

What is it that motivates you to debate this with me by the way? What do you want from this dialogue? What is your stake in this discussion? Do you stand to gain from a fairer and more equitable world or would it mean you have to share more?

Please check your paranoia at the door, and step away from the thread if you need to.

[swansont]

3 hours ago, MSC said:

As far as I'm aware, nobody in my area growing up got into a private school unless it was a school specifically for disabled children

Let’s be clear that parents typically pay for school. So growing up middle/upper class may have little to no impact on your wealth when you go to get a job.

You’re talking about different things as if they are identical, and they aren’t 

3 hours ago, MSC said:

Well it's not outside the realm of mine.

Were you asked about your wealth during a job interview, or did you ask when interviewing someone else?

Quote

Are you actually going to read the study? 

One was paywalled, and I’m just humble civil servant. The abstracts of both are clear enough that they don’t address the claim in question.

You are free to quote from them if you think they do. In keeping with academic rigor.

 

Quote

 if you want to counter the claims made in them, you'll need to find evidence in support of whatever your counter claims are

I’m not claiming they are wrong, and I’m not making any counter claim. I’m simply asking for evidence that your scenario - hiring only the rich - is something that is widespread enough that it makes sense to protect people from it.

What’s the demarcation of “the rich” anyway? How much money do you need in the bank to qualify?

3 hours ago, MSC said:

Maybe you have anosmia? 

I suggested I was smelling BS, so clearly this missed the mark.

[MSC]

55 minutes ago, Phi for All said:

Please check your paranoia at the door, and step away from the thread if you need to.

Or you could tell swansont to obey the rules of the forum and argue in good faith for once? Those were fair questions to ask. Nothing to do with paranoia. I've laid out where my biases stem from on this subject so why shouldn't I ask others about there's? Or is it offensive to call someone fallible now?

If mods are allowed to break the rules here, then this place isn't worth a damn. I am sick of putting in a lot of time and effort into writing here, only to have the majority of it ignored. 

You guys forgot to add a rule: Never report a mod or we will gaslight you and call you paranoid whenever you accurately call out their antagonistic behavior and lack of forum etiquette.

How can you expect users to want to express themselves or share information in good faith when the mods can't even do the same? 

Why is it that I am expected to answer any question swansont asks me but he doesn't have to answer anything I ask him? Where is the fairness there? Are you really incapable of seeing this from my point of view? Did you learn nothing the last time this happened and you banned me for a year for demanding an apology for him calling me a liar? My mind hasn't changed on that, I was still in the right then and I am now. 

You know what, just perma ban me this time. I don't care anymore. I've given every opportunity to Swansont to try to have a respectful dialogue with me and he spits it in my face every time. So Ban me permanently please, even though I've not broken a single rule in this thread. 

 

51 minutes ago, swansont said:

Were you asked about your wealth during a job interview, or did you ask when interviewing someone else?

Just read the damn links. I'm not answering anymore of your questions until you have answered mine.

[swansont]

11 hours ago, MSC said:

Or you could tell swansont to obey the rules of the forum and argue in good faith for once?

Where's the bad faith? I am asking you to provide evidence of something which I have not observed myself, and sounds fanciful.

You are acting like nobody is allowed to disagree with you or question your claim.

11 hours ago, MSC said:

Why is it that I am expected to answer any question swansont asks me but he doesn't have to answer anything I ask him?

I'm not making any assertions here. What questions should I be compelled to answer if I am not staking out a position?

[TheVat]

Class and ethnicity get quite muddled in the USA.  Personnel people can form biased opinions of candidates whose speech patterns suggest to them a lower class upbringing.  If they reject, it is correlated with ethnic groups that have higher poverty rates.  So a Black person may come into an interview knowing they are fighting the "bigotry of lowered expectations."  An interview subject who looks like Gwyneth Paltrow could have a verbal stumble and the interviewer may interpret that as nervousness.  A Black prospect has the same verbal stumble and the interviewer might see that as poor communication skills.  IOW, though the bias here, on the surface, appears to be racial, it is also about class: Gwyneth is presumed to belong to a "higher" class than LaShondra.  Racism, in the US, attaches class.

 

IOW bias and bigotry are about perceived clusters of traits (fairly obvious statement).  If a Black prospect walks through the door and speaks in a posh British accent (RP, "Received Pronunciation"), that's going to alter the perception of a biased American personnel director who has been using skin color as a marker for a certain class origin.  It's not what gets asked in an interview, it's more what colors (NPI) the perceptions at the outset of the interview.  

Even without ethnic differences, speech patterns are very hard to ignore.  Imagine two ethnically European prospects are late and one rushes in, saying "There seemed to be some sort of street festivities and Third Avenue was utterly impassable," and the other says, "Man, they got some big do goin on down there," it's likely the hearer may settle into some class assumptions.  

[Peterkin]

2 hours ago, TheVat said:

Class and ethnicity get quite muddled in the USA.

They do to a large extent in the UK, too, I understand, though it's slightly easier to be Black or Indian there than Polish or Afghan. 

However, they also have a huge block of prejudice against the working-class poor - more or less deliberately revived by the conservative [privatizing, mass unemployment causing] factions of the Thatcher era. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10408011-chavs

Quote

media and politicians alike dismiss as feckless, criminalized and ignorant a vast, underprivileged swathe of society whose members have become stereotyped by one, hate-filled word: chavs.

In the US, while trade unions were ruthlessly crushed, the working people were deprived of their class identity [solidarity] and swept under a giant, lumpy social carpet - still trod-upon, but no longer named. In Canada, they were 'elevated' to "the middle class and those working hard to join it": the working class wasn't vilified; it just became  invisible and inaudible.

[MSC]

On 3/11/2022 at 5:33 AM, swansont said:

Where's the bad faith? I am asking you to provide evidence of something which I have not observed myself, and sounds fanciful.

You are acting like nobody is allowed to disagree with you or question your claim.

I'll concede that I misspoke before. This discussion is mainly around the question: Should socioeconomic class be a protected characteristic? You've made no comment on that claim, and are focusing one one thing I said, around all of the other things that I and others have said. I would like to hear your opinion on the central question. However, if you decide to answer that question in the negative, based on one mistake in my argument for it, you would be assuming that the whole cannot be correct because of the fault of one part. If is false of the part, then the central claim "Socioeconomic class ought to be a protected characteristic." Must also be incorrect. 

I still have little doubt, based on what I have read, that class discrimination is still a big enough problem in employment and education to warrant more protections for those who need it most. 

If I thought nobody was allowed to disagree with me or question me, I wouldn't post here at all. There is something to be said for how you disagree with me, and how you convincing you are at arguing for an alternative perspective. It's not my job to help you reach the threshold of convincing me I am wrong (of which there is an achievable threshold, just ask my wife 😂).

On 3/11/2022 at 5:33 AM, swansont said:

I'm not making any assertions here. What questions should I be compelled to answer if I am not staking out a position?

In my personal opinion; it's very hard to play devils advocate without implying or inferring a claim. Without knowing your opinions, judgements and conclusions on the matter, then I don't really know what it is I'm arguing against or where you are coming from. That is key detail for me. I don't know, to me it feels intellectually dishonest. You obviously have an opinion on the matter, knowing what it is explicitly gives our dialogue a better chance of ultimately being fruitful for both of us, whomever is in the right or wrong. 

On 3/10/2022 at 5:43 PM, swansont said:

Were you asked about your wealth during a job interview, or did you ask when interviewing someone else?

A person does not need to be asked for assumptions to be made. Some people are also proud of a working class background, the very notion that I'd need to hide it and not talk about challenges overcome from that background, just goes to show there us a prominent fear of us having it held against us, without consequence because our interviewer happened to go to Eaton and grew up with their parents calling lower classes scum or the great unwashed and little to no legal protections in place to restrict or restrain them from doing so. 

Just keep this in mind, while you are by no means obligated to agree with me, I am similarly not obligated to agree with you. We can also agree to disagree and leave it at that. 

On 3/10/2022 at 5:08 PM, Phi for All said:

Please check your paranoia at the door, and step away from the thread if you need to.

Just want to explicitly state; thank you for telling me to step away. I needed that.

Secondly, those questions are motivated by methodology as opposed to paranoia. Although admittedly by anger at the time too. To me, they are questions motivated by inquiries into the phenomenology of belief. Mapping out where beliefs come from, requires a certain amount of dialogical psychoanalysis to determine cognitive behaviors. 

[dimreepr]

19 hours ago, MSC said:

In my personal opinion; it's very hard to play devils advocate without implying or inferring a claim.

not really... Are you sure???

[MSC]

15 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

not really... Are you sure???

Sorry, I should probably expand and say it is difficult, unless you're a man of as few words as disreepr. 

Better? 😆 but yes, I'm fairly sure. Or at least I'm fairly sure it is hard for me to play devils advocate, period. 

[swansont]

19 hours ago, MSC said:

I'll concede that I misspoke before. This discussion is mainly around the question: Should socioeconomic class be a protected characteristic? You've made no comment on that claim, and are focusing one one thing I said, around all of the other things that I and others have said. I would like to hear your opinion on the central question. However, if you decide to answer that question in the negative, based on one mistake in my argument for it, you would be assuming that the whole cannot be correct because of the fault of one part. If is false of the part, then the central claim "Socioeconomic class ought to be a protected characteristic." Must also be incorrect. 

I disagree with your position that socioeconomic class should be a protected class.

Not because there is no discrimination, though. Classism is a problem. Some people are snobs.

The problem as I see it is that protected classes are groups of people who are trapped in their group (though they might not agree with my wording of being trapped, and I don't mean any disrespect by it) What I mean is that if you are of a particular race or skin color, or are a woman, or you follow a particular religion, or are above a certain age, etc. there is no way (other than via extraordinary means for one or two categories) out of being in that category.

That's not so with socioeconomics. It's not easy, but it's possible to go from being poor to being middle class, and you can go from middle to upper class. And you can go in the other direction with poor planning or bad luck.

Further, the solution of applying this to hiring practices is too small. The friction of being poor happens continually, and isn't just an issue of when someone is hired. 

 

19 hours ago, MSC said:

 In my personal opinion; it's very hard to play devils advocate without implying or inferring a claim. Without knowing your opinions, judgements and conclusions on the matter, then I don't really know what it is I'm arguing against or where you are coming from.

My issue here is not so much that I disagree with the broader thesis about classism (because I don't) as that I think you aren't making a good argument for assigning protected class status for hiring purposes.

 

 

[Peterkin]

20 hours ago, MSC said:

Should socioeconomic class be a protected characteristic?

Of course it should not. To enact a law that "protects" poverty is to establish poverty as an inherent characteristic of a designated group of people, and thereore enshrine poverty as a necessary and inevitable feature of human society.

Poverty needs to be eradicated, not legally perpetuated.

[MSC]

5 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

Of course it should not. To enact a law that "protects" poverty is to establish poverty as an inherent characteristic of a designated group of people, and thereore enshrine poverty as a necessary and inevitable feature of human society.

Poverty needs to be eradicated, not legally perpetuated

This is genuinely one of your better counter-arguments. I'll have to reflect on it more, but those are some really good points. My first thoughts in response: A law protecting impoverished people, would be more about protecting the people than protecting poverty. I could also argue that it is a way of protecting the pipelines out of poverty. 

It can also be said that if you are born into poverty, it is an inherent characteristic of your past/upbringing, but yes, not your entire being as you point out. 

Not all of my immediate thoughts completely convince me that your point is moot. So I will definitely need to think on it more and get back to you. 

How seriously would you take precedent setting case law on this? If I can find cases where poverty came up as an important factor in a civil court, do you think that would give more to the discussion?

24 minutes ago, swansont said:

The problem as I see it is that protected classes are groups of people who are trapped in their group (though they might not agree with my wording of being trapped, and I don't mean any disrespect by it) What I mean is that if you are of a particular race or skin color, or are a woman, or you follow a particular religion, or are above a certain age, etc. there is no way (other than via extraordinary means for one or two categories) out of being in that category.

Good point to make, as I said to Peterkin I will have to reflect on it more. 

Do you think there is a legislative means of protecting those in poverty more than we currently do, without making it a protected characteristic? 

We both agree classism is a problem, so going from there, how do we mitigate the problem, if we assume making it a protected characteristic is not a good solution?

27 minutes ago, swansont said:

My issue here is not so much that I disagree with the broader thesis about classism (because I don't) as that I think you aren't making a good argument for assigning protected class status for hiring purposes.

Realizing that is your position now. I'm sorry for snapping at you before.. again.. my anger management is still a work in progress. I think I have a shorter cooling off period now though and am more patient since my daughter was born.

[MSC]

2 hours ago, swansont said:

My issue here is not so much that I disagree with the broader thesis about classism (because I don't) as that I think you aren't making a good argument for assigning protected class status for hiring purposes.

Have thought about this for the past couple of hours now. I believe there is an alternative to the main question. 

How would you feel about the idea of legally enforced policy changes to companies found guilty of committing concrete harm to the lives of lower class communities/individuals, policy changes that revolve around hiring more people from those sorts of backgrounds (but still qualified) into executive/management positions?

The change to the question, makes it more like: Should the judiciary have more power to force companies to change the makeup of their leadership, when the current leadership has led the company into acts that are harmful to others?

[swansont]

10 minutes ago, MSC said:

Have thought about this for the past couple of hours now. I believe there is an alternative to the main question. 

How would you feel about the idea of legally enforced policy changes to companies found guilty of committing concrete harm to the lives of lower class communities/individuals, policy changes that revolve around hiring more people from those sorts of backgrounds (but still qualified) into executive/management positions?

The change to the question, makes it more like: Should the judiciary have more power to force companies to change the makeup of their leadership, when the current leadership has led the company into acts that are harmful to others?

Again, I think this is getting into the game too late. 

If you grow up poor the system is stacked against you all the way through your youth. A company can hire a middle/upper-middle class worker just by virtue of the fact that they are likely to have better credentials. They can afford to have gone to better schools, gotten tutors to help, and been able to afford a low-paying internship to get experience, because they are supported by their family.

It's hard to show that an employer harmed candidate A if they can show candidate B (whom they hired) has a better resumé.

Or harm to candidate C, who had to drop out and work to support a family, without getting to go to college. That's not the fault of Acme Products Inc.

I think what you really need is to have programs that level the playing field from the start.

[Peterkin]

2 hours ago, MSC said:

A law protecting impoverished people, would be more about protecting the people than protecting poverty.

That would depend on what it's protecting them from. Discrimination in housing? Yes, that would be useful and helpful, but I believe the problem is better addressed by good public housing than court proceedings against slumlords. Bullying by police and unequal sentencing in criminal court? Maybe, but if the enforcement agencies are part of the problem, they're unlikely to enforce the solution. Coercion by employers? Again, yes, but that problem was so much more effectively addressed by the trade union movement that the working class developed sufficient political and economic clout to alter the balance of power, so it had to be scuttled. Lack of educational opportunity? Fortify public education, from daycare to PhD programs.

22 minutes ago, MSC said:

Should the judiciary have more power to force companies to change the makeup of their leadership, when the current leadership has led the company into acts that are harmful to others?

I doubt that would make an appreciable difference. Imagine the difficulty of bringing charges and providing proof, plus the length of time such civil actions would take to settle. Seems wasteful. Seems to me, a government that has the ability to pass legislation that effective protects the underclasses could more easily change the tax structure to fund the programs that address all of these class problems at once, rather than slog through reform case by local case. 

Edited March 15, 2022 by Peterkin

[MSC]

1 hour ago, swansont said:

Again, I think this is getting into the game too late.

I'm of the opinion that a multi-faceted approach, of everything you and peterkin have suggested, plus what I have suggested is the best approach. 

Since you used the analogy of a game, should we assume that early game, mid-game and late game require the same strategies and tactics as each other? I'm actually thinking about the long game. Most philosophers are very long game orientated. We kind of have to be, as our debates tend to rage on across millenia. So I think part of what motivates me toward multi-faceted approaches, is wondering if the people of the future will think that I or we have done enough. I don't know if there will be a God to judge me, but my descendants probably will. As much as I may try to not let that bother me, the idea of being held in contempt by future generations leaves a bad taste in my mouth and is a powerful motivator for me. 

Is there a deterrent value to be considered when broaching the subject of class discrimination in any setting that is appropriate? You say, not in employment, what about in education?

1 hour ago, Peterkin said:

doubt that would make an appreciable difference. Imagine the difficulty of bringing charges and providing proof, plus the length of time such civil actions would take to settle. Seems wasteful. Seems to me, a government that has the ability to pass legislation that effective protects the underclasses could more easily change the tax structure to fund the programs that address all of these class problems at once, rather than slog through reform case by local case.

That's assuming their is only one front to the problem. In my reply to Swansont, I referenced a multi-faceted approach in a long game, and suggested that may be more effective. 

The way I see it, is that no-matter what route we try to go down to truly address the problems, there is going to be a number of herculean tasks in making it work (mainly convincing people to even try). 

Hypothetical scenario: imagine Class was made a protected characteristic today. What might some of the negative consequences of that action be?