storewanderer wrote: ↑December 11th, 2023, 8:48 pm
Here in Nevada over the years I have seen multiple examples of what may be considered age discrimination at businesses.
For instance a pizza parlor near a high school with a policy of nobody under 18 without an adult before 3 PM or something.
A casino (including motel rooms detached, bar in casino, restaurant in casino) with a policy that they do not allow anyone under 21 to enter the facility containing the bar/casino/slot machines for any reason. Typically minors can walk through a casino to get to a restaurant. This restaurant refuses to serve minors (even if they are with their parents) due to being part of the casino.
Have heard of food places doing as you say with the pizza place. Oftentimes, the school has asked them to do so, in order to prevent students from leaving the school/campus for lunch (and then perhaps not returning for classes afterward).
They should have an addendum that it only applies on school days (not during vacation, summer etc.)
Not sure why the restaurant does that, as you say normally they don't. Unless there is no easy way to access it (many times the casinos will have a walkway somewhat blocked from the machines that gets people to these facilities, thus you may technically be walking through the casino, but not really being able to access it except at designated doorways that can be easily monitored for who goes into them).
ClownLoach wrote: ↑December 11th, 2023, 3:36 pm
I no longer have access to my university databases now that I have graduated. The discrimination piece comes from exclusionary tactics where there is no reasonable threat to safety, moral corruption, or other such pressing public need. You're a bar? You have to discriminate and ban those under 21 because otherwise it is easy for underage individuals to get alcohol. But if you're Target and sell household goods and toys then how can you say it is inappropriate for minors to visit the store? That is where the issue was but unfortunately I no longer have access to those databases but I found it very interesting that there were legal challenges to those policies.
I can't find any evidence of a successful legal challenge. There may have been challenges, and while this may seem discriminatory, at the end of the day, there is no law against it. Title II Of The Civil Rights Act, which covers businesses, prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, and national origin, but does not mention age or gender.
Unfortunately I don't have access anymore. There was a case cited in a lecture in a Diversity and Inclusion course I took. It was a California case (surprise, surprise). It could have been overturned since I took the class about three years ago.
And more importantly, the last five years or so I have seen a drastic and dramatic shift in the boardroom and executive meetings when it comes to any matter that is age related or could even be extrapolated to it. So even if there isn't enough definitive casework there clearly is litigation that occurs enough to for example cause the Legal Dept. at my last company to fear potential claims of discrimination by elderly customers if we stopped accepting paper checks. I was incredulous over it since major companies like Walmart no longer do paper checks but instead switched to EFT, but because apparently our demographics indicated a higher percentage of older customers who paid with paper checks it was a specific shoot-down by the legal department at the time. All of operations wanted to make the change.
Remember that there is the law as written, law as found by the courts, the court of public opinion, and the "legal climate." Just because case law hasn't changed yet does not mean that you want your company to be the name cited on Customer V. Retailer in the Supreme Court. There is significant concern in the legal community around anything regarding age right now, thus the legal climate issue. If the lawyers that make annually many times more than what you and I will make in our lifetimes fear that there is a future court case to be lost, then it will be as if the case has already been tried and resolved.
One of my best friends is VP Director of HR at a large company and he mirrors your observations!
I can't find any evidence of a successful legal challenge. There may have been challenges, and while this may seem discriminatory, at the end of the day, there is no law against it. Title II Of The Civil Rights Act, which covers businesses, prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, and national origin, but does not mention age or gender.
Unfortunately I don't have access anymore. There was a case cited in a lecture in a Diversity and Inclusion course I took. It was a California case (surprise, surprise). It could have been overturned since I took the class about three years ago.
And more importantly, the last five years or so I have seen a drastic and dramatic shift in the boardroom and executive meetings when it comes to any matter that is age related or could even be extrapolated to it. So even if there isn't enough definitive casework there clearly is litigation that occurs enough to for example cause the Legal Dept. at my last company to fear potential claims of discrimination by elderly customers if we stopped accepting paper checks. I was incredulous over it since major companies like Walmart no longer do paper checks but instead switched to EFT, but because apparently our demographics indicated a higher percentage of older customers who paid with paper checks it was a specific shoot-down by the legal department at the time. All of operations wanted to make the change.
Remember that there is the law as written, law as found by the courts, the court of public opinion, and the "legal climate." Just because case law hasn't changed yet does not mean that you want your company to be the name cited on Customer V. Retailer in the Supreme Court. There is significant concern in the legal community around anything regarding age right now, thus the legal climate issue. If the lawyers that make annually many times more than what you and I will make in our lifetimes fear that there is a future court case to be lost, then it will be as if the case has already been tried and resolved.
One of my best friends is VP Director of HR at a large company and he mirrors your observations!
The simple matter is that the makeup of the courts and other recent decisions are easily analyzed and reviewed by lawyers who can then predict exactly what cases would come next and what their outcomes would be. Again the age case I learned about was over three years ago and must not have withstood appeals but so what? If it was tried again today it would likely win and establish new case law. The legal system becomes it's own self generating industry these days as new decisions turn into new opportunities for litigation.
So ultimately the legal departments at these big corporations know that if they make certain decisions that could wind up in court - they're going to be forced to spend incredible amounts of money to defend themselves in what will be a fruitless exercise as they lose the case and as I said become the name repeated forever in the lawsuit name. It's not worth it.
The law as written is only a fraction of the legal climate.
