March 18, 2014

De Blasio's $100 million handout in disparate impact FDNY case

From the New York Post:
De Blasio agrees to $98M FDNY discrimination suit settlement 
By Selim Algar, Philip Messing, Beth DeFalco and Bob Fredericks 
Abandoning a legal battle hard-fought by his predecessor, Mayor de Blasio on Tuesday agreed to have the city shell out more than $100 million to a group of 1,500 minority firefighter applicants who sued over FDNY entrance exams that were found to be biased. 
De Blasio made no secret of his desire to settle the controversial case upon taking office in January and the Vulcan Society and its lawyers took full advantage, scoring $98 million out of a $128 million cap on the city’s financial exposure.
The generous settlement amount doesn’t include at least $3.7 million more the city will be on the hook for in fees to the plaintiffs’ lawyers. 
“I think it was pretty clear that they were going to get what they wanted with de Blasio — or something close to it,” said an FDNY union source. “There was no way this was going to make it to court. The only question was the amount and we got that answer today.” 
... If evenly distributed the payout would be about $65,000 for each member of the class action. 

Here's an interesting subject for a social science study: I've joked in the past that suing for discrimination could be called AARP: "African-American Retirement Planning." But somebody really ought to do a study of this question since blacks tend to do a bad job at saving for their retirement, and discrimination payouts are highly publicized in the black community by lawyers and politicians. It would be worth knowing what percentage of blacks expect to win a discrimination settlement at some point in their lives, and for how much. And then compare these expectations to the realities, which I suspect are more paltry.
In a related maneuver that reveals the extent of City Hall’s new orientation, city Corporation Counsel Zachary Carter was granted permission to have controversial Judge Nicholas Garaufis administer the plump payout and determine the lawyer fees. 
Garaufis presided over the case, ruling in 2011 that the FDNY — and then-Mayor Mike Bloomberg, specifically — intentionally discriminated against minority applicants. 
But an appeals court tossed the portion of his ruling that characterized the discrimination as intentional and assigned a new judge, citing Garaufis’ lack of impartiality. That key legal point directly impacted financial damages and the reputation of the FDNY. A new hearing with a different judge had been scheduled for later this month but was scuttled with the settlement deal. 
De Blasio, who has pushed a tax-the-rich plan to pay for pre-K, gushed after agreeing to the whopping hit to taxpayers. 
“The brave men and women of the FDNY work tirelessly to keep us safe from harm’s way, and our administration is committed to ensuring every New Yorker who seeks to take on this heroic role has a fair opportunity to join the ranks,” he said in a statement. 
Asked later whether he weakened the city’s ability to negotiate a fiscally responsible settlement, the mayor dodged the issue, saying: “I think the numbers [on hiring] speak for themselves. We strive for a government that really looks like New York City,” he said. “ And that just hasn’t been true at the fire department. So we need to move forward. I think the settlement is part of how we move forward.” 
Vulcan Society attorneys were awarded $3.7 million in fees by Garaufis but are in the process of seeking additional payment.

Here's a 2009 New York Times article explaining why the test was so horribly biased:
Racial Bias in Fire Exams Can Lurk in the Details

By DIANE CARDWELL 
Published: July 23, 2009 
When a Federal District Court judge in Brooklyn ruled Wednesday that New York City had discriminated against black and Hispanic applicants to the Fire Department, he argued that two entrance exams, used in 1999 and 2002, adversely affected minorities and had little relation to firefighting.

On the surface, the tests — versions of which remained in use until 2007, according to the court — do not appear racially biased. Each exam consists of 85 multiple-choice questions about firefighting practices: the order in which a firefighter should don gear in an alarm; what the rear of a building would look like, based on its facade; the right situations in which to say “mayday” rather than “urgent” over the walkie-talkie. 
But a closer look shows that the exams also required applicants to read and understand long passages, often containing technical terms, and then answer questions about them. One question, for instance, follows a 250-word description of the use and maintenance of portable power saws and asks which type of blade must be put out of service. 
The choices: A) A carbide tip blade missing nine tips; B) a carbide tip blade with three broken tips; C) an aluminum oxide blade measuring 12 inches; D) a yellow silicon carbide blade measuring nine inches. (The correct answer is A). 

Here's the old, evil test. Here's the opening of the reading passage about how to pick the right chainsaw to use so that you can rescue people from fiery deaths without ripping your face off because it bucks:
One tool used by firefighters to fight fires is the portable power saw. The power saw improves operational efficiency by aiding firefighters with cutting operations at fires and other emergencies. The portable power saw comes equipped with three cutting blades. Carbide tip blades are used when cutting through tar-covered roofs, wood flooring and similar materials. Carbide tip blades must not be used on steel objects, such as metal security doors, auto bodies, and metal window bars, since the tips of the blade may come loose and cause an injury to the firefighter using the saw or bystanders. Aluminum oxide blades are used to cut through various types of steel, such as metal security doors, auto bodies, and metal window bars. Silicon carbide blades are used to cut concrete and other masonry materials.

The first question was:
Q. Which type of blade must a firefighter use with a portable power saw to cut a metal security door? 
A. A carbide tip blade
B. A silicon carbide blade
C. An aluminum oxide blade
D. A carbide tip or aluminum oxide blade 

The NYT continued in 2009:
In big cities across the country, firefighter entrance exams have tended to favor applicants already steeped in the ways of the job, like “people whose dads and uncles are firefighters,” said Richard Primus, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Michigan. That, he said, has perpetuated the disproportionate representation of whites in those firefighting forces. 
Besides, Professor Primus added, some of that knowledge is not needed to become a good firefighter. “Much of what appears on written exams for firefighters is legitimately material that we should want firefighters to know,” he said, but some of it tends to be knowledge that “firefighting junkies have, even though it is not really necessary for fighting fires.” 
At issue in the New York case, legal experts said, was not so much whether the exams themselves were biased. Rather, the law requires that if a test has the effect of disproportionately excluding minorities, then the skills it measures must be necessary to the job — a standard that the judge, Nicholas G. Garaufis, found the city did not meet. 
Ruling in a lawsuit brought by the Justice Department in 2007, Judge Garaufis wrote that in creating the test, the city convened a panel of firefighters who identified 21 “task clusters” to be tested, like evaluating a fire scene or searching for victims, and 18 “abilities,” like memorization, deductive reasoning and spatial orientation.

In reality, the test could be passed one of two ways: being smart enough to comprehend technical firefighting passages or by studying firefighting techniques ahead of time.

But, that's discriminatory to the tune of a hundred million clams.
   

69 comments:

Anonymous said...

I suspect that those receiving the payouts will be broke again within two years.

Anonymous said...

New York will go bankrupt again before Bolshevik Bill's term is up.

If I lived in New York City or had a business in New York City I'd be making serious plans to move to New Jersey right now.

biff said...

I work with a dedicated firefighter, wrists like my knees, dead steady, studies firefighting all the time, talks firefighting off duty all the time. First guy through the door half the time (with his crew there's lots of competition), never makes mistakes. He saved a lady's life by cutting through her car door recently. If your house was on fire you'd much rather it was him on the crew than me. If you lived here it would be, because he's on a crew that responds to neighbourhood fires a lot.

He has severe 'spelling' problems. He flunks tests. He isn't a reader.

He's white.

Dennis Duffy said...

I took that test-- Totally biased against the Irish. Urgent/mayday, dummies

Anonymous said...

Has ay one ever done a study to determine the costs of affirmative action? Does our society pay a price for placing pople in jobs for which they are not really qualified?

Anonymous said...

Forget "black retirement planning" - this is another case where the radical left is rigging the litigation process so that they are managing both sides of the case - see Pigford, the recent DHS hiring of several pro-amnesty lawyers to "enforce" our immigration laws, the FBI non-investigation into the IRS scandal, or the refusal of various state attorneys general to defend their marriage laws in court. The left is winning by pretending to by surrendering to their own.

Anonymous said...

They won the ghetto lottery. Given how most blacks manage their money, I am confident most of them will soon be broke.

countenance said...

A promotion test for the St. Louis Fire Department (notice I said promotion, not entrance) that was said to be racially biased had such difficult questions like these:

The hydrant and the fire are 90 feet apart. All of your hoses are 30 feet long. How many hoses must you connect to be able to reach between the two points?

It wasn't a trick question, either. Simple division.

Sheila said...

Let the denizens of NY (TWMNBN) pay out of their a**!s for this. They put this guy in office; this payout is merely the beginning of their just rewards. Further, please let the hiring of all these poor enriched applicants commence and let the g-d**n city burn to the ground. Schadenfreude is about all I can enjoy these days, but I enjoy it I do. No apologies, no regrets. Let it all burn.

Anonymous said...

Comprenshun are rascist!

Anonymous said...

You know, just because this is small potatoes compared to the indignities and sometime horrors Blacks suffered under slavery and Jim Crow, it doesn't mean that this isn't horribly unjust and stupid in and of itself. I mean, millions of dollars in discrimination payments for a practice that isn't in any way, shape or form, in intent or in practice, discriminatory??

Anonymous said...

"I suspect that those receiving the payouts will be broke again within two years."

And that's why the people who sported this—the non-blacks, that is—are so keen on it.

Where do you think all the money will go? Most blacks rent; that's money from middle-class taxpayers to upper-class landlords. The blacks'll just hold it for a few months.

And what about the guys who own car dealerships?

Hunsdon said...

biff said: He's white.

Hunsdon said: Well, that settles that, doesn't it? You know one good firefighter who don't read so good, and who's white to boot, and that proves . . . what, again, exactly? That firefighting exams are racist?

Hunsdon said...

I was distracted by biff's comment. What I originally meant to say when I clicked over is set forth below.

We are a fundamentally unserious people.

Anonymous said...

@biff

Sounds like he'd ace a multiple choice test.

Anonymous said...

The black applicants refused to study for the test. This is what my friend said about the tests in the Boston police department 20 years ago. He was a civilian employee at the BPD

My take is they (blacks and some Hispanics) lack reading comprehension skills so they chuck the study materials. They also are unable to memorize what they read. So don't study and sue later. Meanwhile the white guys are hitting the books, memorizing lots of potential questions and answers and doing well on the exams.

These tests are fair but don't give the racial mix the loony libs and race agitators, La Raza (the clan with a tan) want

Anonymous said...

The questions either predict performance or they do not. If they don't, then the disparate impact claim has merit.

Anonymous said...

"If evenly distributed the payout would be about $65,000 for each member of the class action ...
"African-American Retirement Planning."


I wonder. I was thinking about the similarities with one of the possible Ukraine scenarios where oligarchs stage a coup to get looting rights from the new government and it made me wonder what percentage of the money from all these discrimination lawsuits ended up with the lawyers?

I'm going to guess almost all of it.

Just another scam.

Whiskey said...

What did I tell you about NYC? No different than Detroit. Place will be in the toilet in two years tops. It is a Black run city.

Not only is NYC eating up pc and diversity and Black crime tolerance, there will be no Rudy Restoration. After De Blasio, wecome Hizoner Al Sharpton.

Ed said...

No study but here in DC a big case involving the fire department is being covered extensively. An elderly black man was in some sort of cardiac distress near a firehouse. When the young black cadet was approached to assist he didn't do anything to assist. The man died.

It turns out the young cadet is part of some diversity program to bring DC high school graduates into the program. Over the years this program has spawned murderers and other criminals, however there have been some successes.

http://m.washingtonpost.com/investigations/aftermath-of-77-year-olds-death-brings-focus-to-dc-fire-cadet-program/2014/02/08/e8dde484-8d0d-11e3-98ab-fe5228217bd1_story.html

Big Bill said...

Remember the trick, kids. If you want to slip someone some money and you can't do it legally, just have them file suit for some dopey injury and then enter into a settlement agreement in which you give them the money to settle the suit. The court just "blessed" the transfer.

eah said...

that were found to be biased

Some dishonesty there.

I wonder what would happen were they to track the results of every exam in every class in every college or university in the country, and then correlate those results with the race/ethnicity of each examinee. How many of those exams would be "found to be biased"?

jody said...

they're always looking to 'move forward'. but never looking to 'put this behind us'. that would indicate they are done moving forward. which they never are, as long as whitey is around to shake down.

Silver said...

"He has severe 'spelling' problems. He flunks tests. He isn't a reader. "

My dad's much the same. He was an electromechanic technician, and forever tinkering with some kind of electrical gadget. I never took much interest in his work, but I remember one day coming across some of his 'notes.' I was astonished by how much he seemed to know about circuits and diagrams and the maths involved and things like that. I know he could hardly write to save his life, and while he'd occasionally flick through a newspaper I never saw him with a book in his hand. Still, although tests of reading comprehension may not be the perfect way to select personnel, I don't see that there's a more efficient method.

Anonymous said...

" Still, although tests of reading comprehension may not be the perfect way to select personnel, I don't see that there's a more efficient method."

Exactly. What GFFs comment shows, not for the first time, is that high IQ people lack empathy with real dummies. There is dim, and then there is, what my father (also a practical man) would call, 'dim as a Toc-H lamp.'

Gilbert P

Ed said...

It's not really simple division though the word "connected" could throw the whole answer off.

I could easily see the answer being two as opposed to three if the questioner assumes that a test taker should know one hose is already connected to the source of water.

doombuggy said...

The term for this is "urban decay".

Anonymous said...

An old high school friend has been working on Wall Street and living in Manhattan for 30 years. He just told me he's retiring and moving to his summer place in the Hamptons. Warren Wilhelm was the final straw for him.

The Anti-Gnostic said...

“The brave men and women of the FDNY work tirelessly to keep us safe from harm’s way, and our administration is committed to ensuring every New Yorker who seeks to take on this heroic role has a fair opportunity to join the ranks,” he said in a statement.

What an incredibly slippery and disingenuous statement. Liberals are pathological.

Fernandinande said...

They won the ghetto lottery.

I think of it as "slipped in pee-pee":

Kahn: Why do they call you Lucky?

Lucky: True story: I was at Costco one day and all of a sudden, nature called. Yelled is more like it. So I high-tailed into the John and there's some sensitive guy changing his little boy's diaper on one of them baby ironin' boards, and don't you know, I slipped on pee-pee and broke two vertebrae which had to be fused together. I'm in constant pain, but by God I got me a $53,000 settlement.

Elvin: This son' bitch is never gonna have to work another day in his life.

Anonymous said...

Steve:

OTx2

1. Being Black at the University of Michigan. The Black Student Association makes 7 demands. The "negotiations" must be concluded in 7 days. If the demands are not met, they will take "physical actions on the University of Michigan’s campus".

2. East Detroit High School kid (KeAir Smith) drowns in pool because he jumps (or is pushed) off diving board. Now, the inevitable witch hunt to criminally prosecute the substitute who failed to save him (almost certainly because the substitute, himself, could not swim well). Oh, and the civil lawsuit by a notorious plaintiff's attorney.

Michigan is channeling you.

Steve from Detroit



Fernandinande said...

How many of those exams would be "found to be biased"?

They're "biased" in the other direction:

http://www.lagriffedulion.f2s.com/dct.htm
"In truth, standardized tests overpredict job and school performance for minorities. Consequently the tests work to their advantage."

Anonymous said...

Biased in favor of those who can do the job, I hope

doombuggy said...

Has ay one ever done a study to determine the costs of affirmative action? Does our society pay a price for placing pople in jobs for which they are not really qualified?

Also, where is the wonderful upside from all the "inclusion" AA was supposed to engender? It's been going on 50 years since the civil rights era, and I don't see a whole lot of good will/economic performance/increased social capital from all the expenditure.

Anonymous said...

The problem was not that blacks did not do as well on the test, which is true, but necessarily evidence of discrimination. It is that they did not do as well on the test, AND the City's own experts conceded that the test did not measure what you needed to know to be a good firefighter. On tests geared more to oral reasoning and problem solving, what you need in a fire situation, blacks do better than whites. NYC has been the only major city in the country that has not managed to integrate its fire department.

Anonymous said...

You'd be hilarious if your weren't sooo sad....let me explain and hope your racism can admit when you're wrong. You bigots need to understand it's not about a so called "dumbing down" of the test to accommodate minorities. It's infers that even when minorities passed with flying colors their scores were passed over and potential positions within the fire department were not given to minorities and passed to their white counterparts with low testing scores.....Your racism just shows that it was not all in vain....get over yourselves

Anonymous said...

Truth: Test did not measure what it takes to be a good firefighter AND the post-test screening process (which includes character references) is racist and does favor those with connections in the Department. The new test DOES measure what it takes, and minority applicants still need to pass it (and physical tests) to get it. If you are pre-determined to view this as liberalism or reverse-racism, so be it.

Anonymous said...

Sailer is being dishonest. The lawsuit is not about the rigor of the test but instead has to do with discriminatory hiring practices.

Legacy hires-whites with family ties-were given preferential treatment.

Also, you have to work realy hard to maintain a 90(!)% white institution in the most diverse city in America.

FredR said...

"What did I tell you about NYC? No different than Detroit. Place will be in the toilet in two years tops."

lol no

Svigor said...

Let's be clear here, firefighting is a European forte: it involves burning calories, substantial and unpredictable risk to life and limb, and rewards high IQ and executive function. Elite soldiering, more or less. Jews, East Asians, and other "Mercurian" populations aren't up to the first two requirements, and NAMs aren't up to the last two. That leaves Europeans as the perfect fit. Which makes the job a prime target for the usual suspects.

We strive for a government that really looks like New York City

What are they gonna do? Drag Jews in by the hair and handcuff them to fire trucks?

Anonymous said...

" If your house was on fire you'd much rather it was him on the crew than me. " - but on balance, I'd rather have a guy who has demonstrated that he knows what hes doing when it comes to saving my life.

Anonymous said...

"On tests geared more to oral reasoning and problem solving, what you need in a fire situation, blacks do better than whites." - So for solving the quandry of disparate impact, what are you going to do with your first trillion?

jody said...

speaking of shakedowns, jesse jackson has finally aimed his sites on tech. he probably won't get much traction, but there it is. the glaring gap steve often writes about: how tech companies get away with 'not looking like america' and how liberals never attack them for it. well jackson has noticed, and has gotten around to attacking them for it.

doombuggy said...


they're always looking to 'move forward'. but never looking to 'put this behind us'.


In a somewhat cohesive society we should be happy to move ahead and be fair from this point on. But this is all about compensating for past injustices; a process that never ends and only engenders more conflict.

The aesthetic of conflict is strong.

dries said...

FDNY is sued for past "discrimination" against minorities & current discrimination, as white applicants are kept out of NYFD to make room for less qualified blacks & latinos.

NYC's Corrections Dept. is 90% minority. Why is that OK? Even by government standards, where black employees are always over-represented, this is insanely high number.

Svigor said...

NYC's Corrections Dept. is 90% minority. Why is that OK? Even by government standards, where black employees are always over-represented, this is insanely high number.

Because NAMs or Jews/Mercurians (in this case, NAMs) can do the job. It's not a European niche. European niches get the axe first.

Anonymous said...

It won't be just New Yorkers footing the bill. It will just be passed off to those who live and do business in NYC. Wall Street makes hundreds of billions of dollars managing state pension funds. Every American taxpayer is paying for those hard-working, six-figure-earning, teachers, cops and firefighters who retire on disability (i.e., they pay no income tax). And all of their pension funds are handled by those masters of the universe wearing $10k Huntsman suits and driving million-dollar Bugattis. Wall Street lives large thanks to [doubly-screwed] middle class America.

Anonymous said...

"Legacy hires-whites with family ties-were given preferential treatment.

Also, you have to work realy hard to maintain a 90(!)% white institution in the most diverse city in America."

Strangely that argument is never applied to the New York media and banking mafia?

Otis said...

jody said..."speaking of shakedowns, jesse jackson has finally aimed his sites on tech. he probably won't get much traction, but there it is...well jackson has noticed, and has gotten around to attacking them for it."

You assume Jesse gives a crap about anything but Jesse. Nah, this won't go anymore. Jesse will get some money and a board seat or two and that'll be that.

DR said...

"Every American taxpayer is paying for those hard-working, six-figure-earning, teachers, cops and firefighters who retire on disability (i.e., they pay no income tax). And all of their pension funds are handled by those masters of the universe wearing $10k Huntsman suits and driving million-dollar Bugattis. Wall Street lives large thanks to [doubly-screwed] middle class America."

This is sophomoric economic analysis. You're claiming that asset managers are subsidized by the over-market pay that public employees receive. You might as well claim that public pensions subsidize Apple because many public employees buy iPhones.

Asset managers are paid to invest money that people save. This is true whether it's a state pension or a private 401k. The management fees are about the same regardless (actually pensions usually get discounts because of size).

Let's assume that public employees got paid less. That would mean taxpayers would have more money left over. Some of which they would invest, and hence would go to asset management fees.

Unless you make the case that public employees have significantly higher savings rates than private employees, there's no reason to believe that Wall Street benefits one way or another.

Cail Corishev said...

jesse jackson has finally aimed his sites on tech.

A classic "can they both lose?" situation.

Sir Isaac Newton said...

One hose suffices, if you have enough water pressure ;-)

Silver said...

"On tests geared more to oral reasoning and problem solving, what you need in a fire situation, blacks do better than whites."

Interesting thesis. You could be onto something.

(1) Das rayciss! [oral reasoning]

(2) You're right. Here's $150,000,000! [problem solved]

Anonymous said...


"NYC's Corrections Dept. is 90% minority. Why is that OK? Even by government standards, where black employees are always over-represented, this is insanely high number."

First of all, inmates are likely 90% minority, too. Anyway, how are you going to make whites want to apply for those jobs? It is kind of like the dreamers who want equality in all kinds of jobs that certain groups don't want to do. Blacks in physics and math, women in plumbing and concrete contracting, etc. Sure there are a few but in general, they don't want those careers, and liberal dreamers can't make them want them.

Jonathan Silber said...

For the Black Man, there's good money to be made failing tests and waiting for a table at Denny's.

Anonymous said...

"The problem was not that blacks did not do as well on the test, which is true, but necessarily evidence of discrimination. It is that they did not do as well on the test, AND the City's own experts conceded that the test did not measure what you needed to know to be a good firefighter. On tests geared more to oral reasoning and problem solving, what you need in a fire situation, blacks do better than whites. NYC has been the only major city in the country that has not managed to integrate its fire department."

It seems to me that we are rapidly sliding into a third world economy and soon all of the United States of America will like Detroit.

hallelujah the Frankfurt School commies have won!!!

europeasant

Anonymous said...

Countenance said:

"The hydrant and the fire are 90 feet apart. All your hoses are 30 feet long. How many hoses must you connect to reach between the two points?"

I called over my eight year old nephew and asked him this and he correctly said three. What a bizarro world we live in. I HAD NO IDEA DIVISION WAS RACIST!

P.S. I completely agree with that one poster who said that blacks don't study. I've seen this myself. Whether it is a lack of reading skills (blacks are not really known as library-bookworm types anyways), a lack of discipline, or whatever.

Anonymous said...

WOW! I wish I could take some test, fail it, and then get paid $65,000.00 for it!

(But since I am white, that isn't going to happen.....).

Anonymous said...

The "saw" referred to is a cut-off machine, not a chainsaw. Use of carbide-tipped blades on cut-off machines is extremely dangerous and is strongly discouraged by manufacturers, except in firefighting.

Lefty Lawyer said...

I think two issues are being conflated here.

The first is whether allowing lawsuits under a disparate impact theory should be allowed. For better or worse, the law allows it.

The second issue is whether given the current state of the law, whether NY was wise to settle for what it did - taking into account whatever the chance was of being hit for a verdict that exceeded what they agreed to pay out. In other words, did the class have a good case under disparate impact law as it exists? I don't think that is clear at all from the article.

Unknown said...

That question from the test you showed uses nothing more than the level of English high school seniors should understand. Simple direct sentences. Three things to remember. Easy. Only a paranoid dimwit would think questions like that are racially discriminatory. If the mayor thinks that, he must think blacks are intellectually inferior. How can it be racist to require that firefighters read at the high school level?

Rev. Right said...

Anonymous said...
"Forget "black retirement planning" - this is another case where the radical left is rigging the litigation process so that they are managing both sides of the case - see Pigford, the recent DHS hiring of several pro-amnesty lawyers to "enforce" our immigration laws, the FBI non-investigation into the IRS scandal, or the refusal of various state attorneys general to defend their marriage laws in court. The left is winning by pretending to be surrendering to their own."
----------
Here's yet another example, in which the Obama administration colludes with environmental groups to block off large areas of private land to oil and gas production.

These environmental groups file suit against the federal government, claiming a particular energy project will endanger a protected species. The government immediately concedes winnable cases and the settlement becomes part of the law, a law Obama could not get past congress.

Under the Obama administration, the feds have entered into a consent agreement with the environmentalists to rush forward a judgment on an unprecedented number of species. A 2012 Chamber of Commerce study found record numbers of such "sue and settle" cases under Obama.

You have to give credit to the Left, they are relentless.

Rust never sleeps.

Silver said...

"The first is whether allowing lawsuits under a disparate impact theory should be allowed. For better or worse, the law allows it."

Just a fact of nature that one must stoically accept, I take it. If only human beings had it within our power to decide the laws we shall be governed by. Alas, who are humans to think they deserve a say in what the law, for better or worse, allows?

Silver said...

"You have to give credit to the Left, they are relentless."

And culturally powerful. But a large part of their cultural power stems from mainstream conservatism's decision to undertake a scorched earth retreat on cultural issues in a bid to defeat the left on economics. It's been successful so far but it was never really going to be anything more than a delaying tactic.

Anonymous said...

So post-test character references are also racist because NAMs have, on average, more character issues such as firings, criminal histories, bad credit, etc. More disparate impact! Let's do away with reference checks all together.

Anonymous said...

Silver "a large part of their cultural power stems from mainstream conservatism's decision to undertake a scorched earth retreat on cultural issues in a bid to defeat the left on economics. It's been successful so far"

Isn't that the whole point? The cultural defeats actually help enable the economic victories "for the right". But the economic victories "for the right" involve depressing wages via both unskilled and skilled immigration, and potentially something the US hasn't seen since its founding - a huge division between the elite and Joe Public.

Sort of thing you see in Brazil, or in most of South America for most of the last hundred years, or in Europe before 1840-odd.

Anonymous said...

"He has severe 'spelling' problems. He flunks tests. He isn't a reader."

Reminds me of a lot of jobs that are hands on and competently done by guys who once give a paper and pencil simply can't at all reflect the same performance.

Are there any studies of this kind of phenomenon?

Silver said...

"Isn't that the whole point?"

Well, yes. I thought that was my point. I only meant their strategy has been "successful" on their terms, not mine.

Who knows, maybe the swiftness of the cultural collapse can help cultural conservatives. The cultural right was massively outgunned so it probably would have lost the culture wars anyway, so maybe it's better to have had that collapse sooner rather than later.

The only alternative in earlier years would have been to go racial but that would have had to contend with the fact that civil rights era racial fantasies die hard. And then there's also the confounding factor of the apparently irrepressible "respectable conservative" inclination to prove that I may be a "racist," but I'm no racist!

Sean said...

The only unusual thing is there was a ruling of deliberate racism in this case from Garaufis. I believe he has a reputation for that sort of thing. But, he surely is not the only one; a lot of judges who would do no different to what Garaufis did and call it deliberate, especially now. A simple disparate impact judgement and level of compensation is inevitable, fighting it only opens the door to a ruling of deliberate racism.

As Scalia said: "Our charge is to give effect to the law Congress enacted. By enacting [Title VII disparate impact provisions], Congress allowed claims to be brought against an employer who uses a practice that causes disparate impact, whatever the employer's motives ...If that effect was unintended, it is a problem for Congress, not one that federal courts can fix.

And that means it's implicit in the law of the land that every institution in society is thoughoughly racist, whatever the people running them say or think.