Question

Employers are forbidden from hiring, promoting or firing workers for reasons based on race and gender. Also, they cannot discriminate against people who are at the age 40 or with a disability.

However, there are still many grounds where employers may discriminate against employees. For example they can discriminate based on height, weight or on their appearance. Eventhough, employers can legally discriminate on such an idea, do you think it is ethical for them to do that? Why or why not? Include examples.

Answer 1

Ethics refer to moral principles that govern the behaviour of a person. Appearance based discrimination is prevalent.Organizations have legal duty and ethical duty to hire the most qualified candidate irrespective of appearance , height or weight and civil rights legislation is enacted keeping this in consideration.However protection against physical appearance discrimination is less.Eg Michigan is the only state that prohibits such discrimination based on physical appearance.Another example is that Washington DC in its human rights act  prohibits discrimination based on height, weight , appearance. Defenders of the right to hire based on physical appearance say that good looking employees attract more clients and thus bring for income for the company as compared to ugly looking employees.No Federal legislation as such bans employers from discriminating based on appearance, height or weight.But such discrimination is unethical as it compromises the principles of individual dignity and equal opportunity.They are unethical because such traits  does not reflect that the employee is less industrious , less efficient or less social.