Study Suggests Muslim Job Discrimination in Red States

[silverscreenselect]

A recent study showed that Muslims were considerably less likely than Christians to get called for job interviews in red states, but that no similar discrimination existed between gays and straights. Researchers at Carnegie-Mellon created four fictitious candidates with identical resumes. However, their social media profiles varied, so that one was shown to be Christian, one Muslim, and in a different study, one straight and one gay. In states that had the highest percentage of votes for Romney, the Christian candidate was eight times as likely to be called for an interview as the Muslim candidate. However, there was no appreciable difference between straights and gays. There was no appreciable difference between Christian and Muslim callbacks in the ten states in which Obama received the highest percentage of votes in 2012.

Racial or religious discrimination in employment decisions based on social media profiles is of course illegal and the EEOC is taking a greater interest in this, but it occurs anyway, even though labor attorneys strongly advise their corporate clients against it. One thing this should demonstrate to anyone on this Board is to take a very careful look at any social media profile you have if you're looking for a job and scrub it if there's anything at all that would not suggest you wouldn't be a great fit for that job.

http://www.benefitspro.com/2013/12/02/m ... =100284621

[Bob Juch]

If they ever find the Bored, many here would be screwed.

[Bob78164]

It's obviously Obama's fault. This would never happen if he'd convert to Islam the way the Republicans keep asking him to. --Bob

[Bob Juch]

They've also found that "black names" hurt job appicants too. Shirleys get called back more often that Shaniquas.

[elwoodblues]

It must really be rough if you are a Muslim who is over fifty. I'm not sure which part of that would be worse.

[silverscreenselect]

It must really be rough if you are a Muslim who is over fifty. I'm not sure which part of that would be worse.

That may explain why this guy hasn't gotten a callback from Fox News yet:

[Bob Juch]

It must really be rough if you are a Muslim who is over fifty. I'm not sure which part of that would be worse.

That may explain why this guy hasn't gotten a callback from Fox News yet:

Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf is retired and living in the UAE. He could probably get a job with Al Jazeera if he wanted.

[Estonut]

A recent study showed that Muslims were considerably less likely than Christians to get called for job interviews in red states, but that no similar discrimination existed between gays and straights. Researchers at Carnegie-Mellon created four fictitious candidates with identical resumes. However, their social media profiles varied, so that one was shown to be Christian, one Muslim, and in a different study, one straight and one gay. In states that had the highest percentage of votes for Romney, the Christian candidate was eight times as likely to be called for an interview as the Muslim candidate. However, there was no appreciable difference between straights and gays. There was no appreciable difference between Christian and Muslim callbacks in the ten states in which Obama received the highest percentage of votes in 2012.

Racial or religious discrimination in employment decisions based on social media profiles is of course illegal and the EEOC is taking a greater interest in this, but it occurs anyway, even though labor attorneys strongly advise their corporate clients against it. One thing this should demonstrate to anyone on this Board is to take a very careful look at any social media profile you have if you're looking for a job and scrub it if there's anything at all that would not suggest you wouldn't be a great fit for that job.

http://www.benefitspro.com/2013/12/02/m ... =100284621

The researchers had no way of knowing how many employers actually did a search of social media before deciding whether to interview a candidate, but they estimated that between 10 percent and 33 percent of the employers did so.

[Bob Juch]

A recent study showed that Muslims were considerably less likely than Christians to get called for job interviews in red states, but that no similar discrimination existed between gays and straights. Researchers at Carnegie-Mellon created four fictitious candidates with identical resumes. However, their social media profiles varied, so that one was shown to be Christian, one Muslim, and in a different study, one straight and one gay. In states that had the highest percentage of votes for Romney, the Christian candidate was eight times as likely to be called for an interview as the Muslim candidate. However, there was no appreciable difference between straights and gays. There was no appreciable difference between Christian and Muslim callbacks in the ten states in which Obama received the highest percentage of votes in 2012.

Racial or religious discrimination in employment decisions based on social media profiles is of course illegal and the EEOC is taking a greater interest in this, but it occurs anyway, even though labor attorneys strongly advise their corporate clients against it. One thing this should demonstrate to anyone on this Board is to take a very careful look at any social media profile you have if you're looking for a job and scrub it if there's anything at all that would not suggest you wouldn't be a great fit for that job.

http://www.benefitspro.com/2013/12/02/m ... =100284621

The researchers had no way of knowing how many employers actually did a search of social media before deciding whether to interview a candidate, but they estimated that between 10 percent and 33 percent of the employers did so.

I would think the name alone would be the cause. Perhaps they need to compare Christian Arabs with Muslim ones.

[silverscreenselect]

I would think the name alone would be the cause. Perhaps they need to compare Christian Arabs with Muslim ones.

According to the article, the information about the candidates, including the pictures, were identical, and they were all male, US-born Caucasians. The only difference was information on the social media page.

Four fictitious job candidates were created, each with a name to indicate someone who is male, U.S.-born and Caucasian. The candidates had identical resumes. The researchers also created social network profiles for each of the candidates that revealed either his sexual orientation or whether he was a Muslim or Christian. All other information, including the profile photograph used for each candidate, was the same.

[Estonut]

I would think the name alone would be the cause. Perhaps they need to compare Christian Arabs with Muslim ones.

According to the article, the information about the candidates, including the pictures, were identical, and they were all male, US-born Caucasians. The only difference was information on the social media page.

Four fictitious job candidates were created, each with a name to indicate someone who is male, U.S.-born and Caucasian. The candidates had identical resumes. The researchers also created social network profiles for each of the candidates that revealed either his sexual orientation or whether he was a Muslim or Christian. All other information, including the profile photograph used for each candidate, was the same.

But they have no way of knowing, let alone did they provide any evidence, that the employers broke the law and viewed that information. This whole study is bullshit.

[Bob78164]

I would think the name alone would be the cause. Perhaps they need to compare Christian Arabs with Muslim ones.

According to the article, the information about the candidates, including the pictures, were identical, and they were all male, US-born Caucasians. The only difference was information on the social media page.

Four fictitious job candidates were created, each with a name to indicate someone who is male, U.S.-born and Caucasian. The candidates had identical resumes. The researchers also created social network profiles for each of the candidates that revealed either his sexual orientation or whether he was a Muslim or Christian. All other information, including the profile photograph used for each candidate, was the same.

But they have no way of knowing, let alone did they provide any evidence, that the employers broke the law and viewed that information. This whole study is bullshit.

The difference in treatment of otherwise-identical candidates is evidence, albeit indirect. When you see smoke, you don't need to be close enough to feel the heat of the flames to know that there's a fire. --Bob

[BackInTex]

When you see smoke, you don't need to be close enough to feel the heat of the flames to know that there's a fire. --Bob

Not always.

[Bob78164]

When you see smoke, you don't need to be close enough to feel the heat of the flames to know that there's a fire. --Bob

Not always.

"When you hear hoofbeats think horses, not zebras." --Bob

[silverscreenselect]

But they have no way of knowing, let alone did they provide any evidence, that the employers broke the law and viewed that information. This whole study is bullshit.

Because employers rarely admit to treating employees differently due to race, disparate statistical treatment is often the only way of proving a case of racial discrimination. Courts have accepted statistical evidence since the Civil Rights Act was first passed. It's not proof of discrimination, but it's evidence that the employer has to rebut in some way.

[BackInTex]

Although Muslims make up less than 2 percent of the U.S. population, they accounted for about one-quarter of the 3,386 religious discrimination claims filed with the EEOC in 2011.

Statistically that is about as expected. If a group is 98% of a population you wouldn't expect them to be discriminated based in their identity much with only a 2% chance of being different.

In more Republican-leaning states

and

10 states with the lowest proportion of Mitt Romney voters

Now why wouldn't they quantify the number of states they are calling "Republican leaning". If it is 24, the number Romney won the popular vote in, then the article says nothing about 16 states (50 - 10 -24). The results in those 16 states could be that no Muslims got interviews. We don't know.

[Estonut]

But they have no way of knowing, let alone did they provide any evidence, that the employers broke the law and viewed that information. This whole study is bullshit.

Because employers rarely admit to treating employees differently due to race, disparate statistical treatment is often the only way of proving a case of racial discrimination. Courts have accepted statistical evidence since the Civil Rights Act was first passed. It's not proof of discrimination, but it's evidence that the employer has to rebut in some way.

OK. Were these employers given the chance to rebut? Were they asked why they made the choices they made? If not, --> bullshit.

[silverscreenselect]

OK. Were these employers given the chance to rebut? Were they asked why they made the choices they made? If not, --> bullshit.

This was not a discrimination lawsuit. This was a sociological study designed to see if there was a correlation between religion and whether people got callbacks for job interviews. It would follow that they wouldn't send two resumes for the same person with the same picture for the same job. They would pick a couple of thousand similar job openings with different employers and send the Christian resume to half of them and the Muslim resume to the other half.

Obviously, considering that only 17% of the Christians got callbacks for jobs, there are a lot of reasons for an employer not to call somebody back, and you can't use that study to show any one particular employer did or did not discriminate. However, the disparity was far greater than what it should have been statistically, which means that the odds are overwhelming that some other factor accounted for the difference. And, since the only other factor was the religion as shown in the social media profile, there's a very strong possibility that's the reason.

I would expect that other researchers will conduct similar studies in the future, and we will see if it remains valid. One possible reason that the survey might not be valid is if the sample was biased (which is what I and a lot of people suggested about the 2012 election and definitely occurred in the infamous magazine poll of 1936 that predicted Landon would beat FDR). You'll note my headline for the thread was that the study "suggests" job discrimination against Muslims.

[silverscreenselect]

The study was originally reported last week in that well-known liberal outlet, The Wall Street Journal, and it's been widely reported at various business, legal, and polling/survey sites as well as liberal political and Islamic websites. Here's the link to the Journal article and the location where you can download the study itself (it's very difficult reading unless you're a whiz with statistics):

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1 ... 4255139392

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm? ... id=2031979

[BackInTex]

Of course logic is missing. I'm sure they were not the only ones sending in resumes. There were likely real people needing jobs and the ratio of real Christian applicants and real Muslim applicants may or may not align with the population but would dilute the Muslim callback %.

In other words the applications reviewed by the employers wouldn't have been 50/50.

[silverscreenselect]

Of course logic is missing. I'm sure they were not the only ones sending in resumes. There were likely real people needing jobs and the ratio of real Christian applicants and real Muslim applicants may or may not align with the population but would dilute the Muslim callback %.

In other words the applications reviewed by the employers wouldn't have been 50/50.

BiT, if you'd been around in the 1960s, you'd be arguing that there was no proof cigarette smoking causes cancer.

[Estonut]

Of course logic is missing. I'm sure they were not the only ones sending in resumes. There were likely real people needing jobs and the ratio of real Christian applicants and real Muslim applicants may or may not align with the population but would dilute the Muslim callback %.

In other words the applications reviewed by the employers wouldn't have been 50/50.

BiT, if you'd been around in the 1960s, you'd be arguing that there was no proof cigarette smoking causes cancer.

This study is like one that might have been done in the 60s to suggest that cigarette smoking causes cancer without asking the cancer patients if they actually smoked cigarettes.

[BackInTex]

Of course logic is missing. I'm sure they were not the only ones sending in resumes. There were likely real people needing jobs and the ratio of real Christian applicants and real Muslim applicants may or may not align with the population but would dilute the Muslim callback %.

In other words the applications reviewed by the employers wouldn't have been 50/50.

BiT, if you'd been around in the 1960s, you'd be arguing that there was no proof cigarette smoking causes cancer.

So in other words "Great point BiT. I can't argue it, but the study says what I believe so the study must be accurate and reflective of the truth."

[silverscreenselect]

This study is like one that might have been done in the 60s to suggest that cigarette smoking causes cancer without asking the cancer patients if they actually smoked cigarettes.

The problem with a lot of discrimination is that it's unconscious. Employers don't say and they often don't even consciously think I won't hire someone because he's black or Muslim, but they come away with a "feeling" that the white or Christian candidate just somehow will be a better fit, or more of a team player.

Statistics is just a valid a science as chemistry or physics within its own limitations. If 17% of Christian candidates get a callback, then statistics says approximately 17% of similarly qualified Muslim candidates should get a callback. If the number that actually receives a callback differs from 17% by a significant amount, then the odds are high that there is some reason for the discrepancy other than pure chance. There are limitations, of course:

1) Outliers do occur. It's highly unlikely that I would win a Kindle when our company held its drawing but I did. That's why other scientists will repeat this study to see if they can duplicate its results. If they do, then the idea that it's an outlier becomes nearly nonexistent.

2) The fact that there is some reason does not mean discrimination. It requires further investigation to determine if there are other possible causes, but the more tightly controlled the experiment is, the less likely it is.

[Estonut]

2) The fact that there is some reason does not mean discrimination. It requires further investigation to determine if there are other possible causes, but the more tightly controlled the experiment is, the less likely it is.

That's my point exactly. The testing group themselves said they were assuming that 10 to 33% of the employers viewed the planted social media data. They don't narrow it down any closer than that, nor do they explain why they'd even assume that. This experiment was barely controlled at all.