Emma Tyler, Chapter 5, Question #6

I found the passage about "rational discrimination" in the employment/hiring aspect of economics  to be quite interesting and a bit disturbing. First off, I thought the passage was interesting in that it brought up  a new viewpoint that I had never considered before. When there is statistical evidence, such as the evidence that 28 percent of black males are more likely to have served time in prison as opposed to 4 percent of white males, I can now see the viewpoint that the employer, who only cares about one thing-in this case if the applicant has served time or not, could come from. They may not hire the black male because he has a higher percentage possibility of having served time in prison. However, this does not give employers an easy way out. Just because "rational discrimination" exists doesn't mean it's okay. As Wheelan continues to dissect this circumstance, he writes "'employers who check criminal backgrounds are more likely to hire African-American workers, especially men.'" (108) To me, after this quote, I see this concept as something that is no longer plausible. In the case of deciding between two applicants, if the employer is given the chance to see the applicant's criminal record, the discrimination against African-American men will go down. This "rational discrimination" is really just playing more into broad statistics, that are not always true, and it can devastatingly effect an entire demographic. However, now that the situation of checking criminal records has been somewhat resolved (allow employers access to that information and African-American males will not be as discriminated against) we are then confronted with the issue of how to not discriminate against all men who have served time in prison. Discrimination seems to be a never ending cycle, with new people to discriminate against everywhere you turn.