Popular Culture Review 30.1
INTRODUCTION
Without Swift Action from the EEOC , Algorithmic Hiring is Poised to Undermine 50 Years of Title VII Protections
In the first episode of the series Futurama , Phillip J . Fry awakens in the future . After being subjected to a series of tests , a computer mechanically displays his permanent career assignment of delivery boy . This humorous moment may also prove to have been very prophetic in how technology may impact our daily lives . Hiring quality new employees is historically one of the most difficult problems in maintaining a business . Even if an employer only spends a couple seconds reviewing each resume , the labor quickly adds up . Employers do not want to spend months training new employees only for them to take positions with other companies . Often applicants look perfect on paper , but are not a great fit for the employer ’ s corporate culture . Modern technology has created a solution with algorithmic hiring . Harvest data from your top performing employees , and use it to hire more people like them .
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 makes it an unlawful employment practice for an employer to fail or refuse to hire because of such individual ’ s race , color , religion , sex , or national origin . 1 These legal protections are grounded in a foundation of if an employer is going to exclude an applicant due to one of these criteria , it must show it is due to a business necessity . 2 Aside from these codified categories , the layman might assume everything else is fair game . That everything else is where the dangers of algorithmic hiring begin to grow . Can an employer use distance from the workplace to disqualify workers ? 3 How about favoring applicants who visit websites that provide Japanese Manga ? 4 Facially these qualities may seem safe . The Supreme Court has held that not only is overt discrimination proscribed by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 , but practices that are fair in form but discriminatory
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