Categories:
Discrimination
Case Study
You are applying for a part-time job as bookkeeper at a community organization. At the beginning of the interview, the director says she is pleased with your qualifications and the amount of experience you have in the non-profit sector. Part way through the interview, the director asks you if you have children and if you are married. When you share that you and your husband have five children, the director asks about your finances. You feel uncomfortable with these questions and answer as briefly as you can. The director no longer sounds enthusiastic, and the interview ends quickly. Later you receive an email saying you are not being offered the position.
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Are you experiencing discrimination under the Code?
It depends. The director asked you questions about parts of your identity protected by the Code: if you are married (your marital status), if you have kids (your family status) and your finances (source of income). Your answers to these questions changed the tone of the interview and you did not get the job despite being qualified. If the decision not to hire you was based even partially on your answers to the interviewer’s questions about your family status and lawful source of income, the decision not to hire you would be discrimination. The director would need to give other reasons that are entirely unrelated to your family status and source of income for not offering you the job in order to prove they did not discriminate against you.