Reasoning not to hire based on pregnancy or other medical condition

Question

Legalities aside. I've always wondered why a business would employ someone who is pregnant just to give them maternity leave for three months when they wouldn't even have completed their probation.

What is the logic behind it?

If I have 5 roughly equal candidates and I know one will need to be covered (and paid) for 3 months shortly after arrival, I still have 4 other candidates. The difference with existing staff is I have a proven, trained and valuable employee by then.

If I'm advertising a position for a cook, cleaner, data entry, clerk, or almost ANY position in the 99% of the job range niche, I'll have plenty of people to choose from, I have more difficulty filtering them out than finding them. Logically to me (in the absence of convincing answers) pregnancy would be a filter. I want the food cooked every day, the office cleaned, the data entered, the filing done etc,. not a moon trajectory calculated.

So if I knew a lady is pregnant I'd cross her off the list. I cannot think of a single reason not to. If she started work and I found out that she hadn't disclosed she was pregnant beforehand she would be lucky to make it through her probation period. I'd get rid of her then if not sooner.

Different story if it's an existing staff member who gets pregnant of course. One of my ladies has had 4 kids and another on the way, I have no issue with paying maternity leave and my contribution when the office passes the hat will at least double everyone elses combined.

Importantly because I know when she is due, I have already organised for her tasks to be covered when the time comes. If I didn't know then not only would I be paying a new hire but I'd also have to pay someone else to cover. Two people receiving pay for one job with no guarantee that the first will be any good at the job or even that the proven mercenary person will even return after 3 months. Makes more sense to give the job full time to the second person from the outset unless I'm missing something.

SUMMARY:- All else being equal what logical reason would a business have to hire a pregnant lady instead of discriminate against her being hired based on her pregnancy. If she hid her pregnancy to land the job, what logical reason would they have for not seeing that as a sign of self-serving dishonesty.

Answer 1

All else being equal what logical reason would a business have to hire a pregnant lady instead of discriminate against her being hired based on her pregnancy.

You don't know for sure in any new hire's case how they will turn out over a course of time. You go with your gut a bit when hiring -- logic doesn't always play as significant a role in some cases.

As a hiring manager you check references, and interview the candidate as best you can. If I were hiring, I would have to be convinced that this person was going to be an excellent hire before I paid for many weeks of salary before getting a significant return.

This is the case for someone who is pregnant (assuming I know or they feel like revealing) or even someone who already has a long vacation they paid for and cannot reschedule. Having said that, I have seen it happen multiple times.

If she hid her pregnancy to land the job, what logical reason would they have for not seeing that as a sign of self-serving dishonesty

Based on what I know of US labor laws, the applicant does not have to reveal this and cannot be asked if they are pregnant. This pretty much applies to most medical conditions. Is it right or wrong, who am I to say, but from a legal angle the woman does not have to reveal. This part will vary a bit based on locale I would suspect.

Case in point: If as a hiring manager, I have an opening to do to work that needs to be done in the next few months, the new hires availability over those said months to do the job is a legitimate factor in the hiring decision.

At no point am I saying discriminate, but you are allowed as an employer to hire someone who meets the job requirements (be available to work when necessary).

Answer 2

You would hire a pregnant woman if she is the best candidate for the job. ETA: For a position requiring consistent attendance, ask "The job requires good attendance over x period, can you meet these requirements?" Not "Will you be able to come to work if you're pregnant?" If the answer is no, then they aren't the best candidate and you move on. Better on both ends - you avoid a lawsuit, and good candidates might reapply to other positions later on when their situation changes.

You would want to avoid discriminating against pregnant women during the hiring process because it is illegal (US: Pregnancy Discrimination Act - "employers may not discriminate against employees or job applicants on the basis of pregnancy or a pregnancy-related condition").

Women often do not disclose pregnancy during the hiring process to avoid discrimination, and because it often has no bearing on their ability to perform the job long term. It's not about being dishonest. It's about playing it safe when some hiring managers share your views.

More info on Pregnancy Discrimination Act: https://www.aauw.org/what-we-do/legal-resources/know-your-rights-at-work/pregnancy-discrimination-act/

Answer 3

Legalities aside? Yeah, it's a bad idea. You would be better to hire someone else.

Which is why we have laws. It's a classic example of how individuals optimising for their best interest don't maximise things for the collective. Most developed have correctly concluded that while your business is benefiting from the incredible advantages that society and the state are granting you, you should suck up a little bit for the benefit of the collective.

Society is better off when women don't suffer from having children. Partly because this way we don't squander the abilities half of the best and most capable people in society and partly because it's unfair to put all the cost of two people having a child on one of those people.

Taking the pregnant woman is your business being the co-operator and not the cheater/parasite in the relationship. Laws exist to force you to do it, and punish your competitors if they break the deal and don't behave as well as you have.

Answer 4

All else being equal what logical reason would a business have to hire a pregnant lady instead of discriminate against her being hired based on her pregnancy.

I think this really gets back to what the purpose of a business is. It is definitely not to make money at all costs. It is to advance the interests of its stakeholders (owner, stockholders, whatever). Those interests are not just in making as much money as possible but also in making the world better for themselves and everyone else. This is a logical interest for people to have.

You can certainly imagine situations where one might obtain a personal benefit from discriminating. And sometimes it might not be obvious why that's still a terrible thing to do. Perhaps a hypothetical situation might help: You're the owner of a hardware store. Many of your customers are racist. If you hire a black worker, some of your racist customers might shop at your store less frequently. So why not implement a whites only employee policy if you can get away with it?

I would hope that you can see why this does not really advance the interests of the human beings who own the business. I would hope they don't want to live in a world where racists are catered to. It's logically worth the cost of losing some business from some racists to make the world a fairer place in a tangible way.

If she hid her pregnancy to land the job, what logical reason would they have for not seeing that as a sign of self-serving dishonesty.

The law specifically says that she is not required to disclose that. It is not dishonest to refrain from disclosing something that there is clearly, under the law, no obligation to disclose and an affirmative right to refrain from disclosing.

I'm kind of stunned by the implied hypocrisy of this question. You're asking why not to illegally discriminate against someone to save some money and you're also asking why you can't consider it dishonest for someone else to withhold information to gain a job where that is specifically legal for them to do! I can't see how you can even ask both questions.

How can it be problematic dishonesty not to disclose pregnancy (which the law specifically allows, so there's no obligation to) but perfectly logical to discriminate against a pregnant woman (which the law specifically prohibits)?!

Answer 5

In the United States, paid maternity leave is not required under the law. Unpaid maternity leave is required but only if the employee has worked for you for at least twelve months and has worked 1,250 hours or more over the past 12 months (i.e. needs to be more than half time). So the idea that a brand new employee gets mandatory paid maternity leave within her probation period is fiction.

That being said, a business still has the option to offer paid maternity leave at any time. And some business do so, because the option to take leave is part of their overall benefits package. The reasons for offering it are the same for offering any form of compensation: to attract and retain the best possible employees.

Answer 6

Legalities aside there are very few reasons not to discriminate negatively if you have other candidates that are otherwise equivalent. The following are examples.

There is an incentive to hire like a subsidy of some sort as some countries have for disabled people.

There is an employment quota to be met of a certain group which this lady is part of but not other candidates.

It's your baby.

Answer 7

Legalities aside, I think the essence of your question has nothing to do with pregnancy. As a business you can state upfront that employees are eligible for paid leave after working for a certain period of time. Someone trying to take paid leave that they're not eligible for would certainly be grounds for termination.

But that has nothing to do with someone being pregnant or not; a pregnant applicant could fully intend on continuing to work full time after giving birth. That's her decision. So the logical reason to hire her (or anyone with any medical condition) is that you've come to an agreement upfront about what the job requires and what they're eligible for. So why discriminate?

Answer 8

The same reason that you don't close your business down and reopen in the same place with the same name to escape warranty claims. Lots of companies do that and it is perfectly legal. But it is benefiting from doing something morally wrong. Most people don't wish to act that way.

Answer 9

The logic behind it is that you have a position to fill, and a pregnant woman is absent only a few months per child, and the average is 2.4 children per family (and typically, but not always, worklife). In the U.S., the average was less than 1.9 children in 2016.

One reasoning that may follow from this is that if some company hires cleaning ladies on a regular basis and want to build a good reputation as an employer, they should be able to incorporate this low ratio of absence in their business plan, if they want to be a success.

If instead the assumption is that workers are robots and not people, you have a problem with your axiom, and unfortunately, no valid conclusion can follow from valid logic based on an incorrect axiom.

(The following is a side note, since you asked to disregard the legalities.)

Economies typically allow unlimited economic growth for individual companies. During periods of low GDP growth, the low job market can then be played through whatever loopholes not yet addressed by law to prevent abuse. If large companies deem their reputation during or after this period as worth less than the economical gain, they can logically risk abuse of the remaining loopholes in this way.