What does "disparate treatment" refer to in employment discrimination?

Disparate treatment in employment discrimination specifically refers to the practice of treating one employee or job applicant less favorably than another based on protected characteristics, such as race, gender, age, religion, or disability. This concept is rooted in the notion that individuals should not be discriminated against due to inherent attributes that are unrelated to their qualifications or performance.

The essence of disparate treatment lies in the differential treatment aspect, which illustrates how decisions regarding hiring, promotions, pay, or other employment conditions are made in a biased manner, thus violating anti-discrimination laws. For example, if an employer consistently promotes less qualified candidates from one demographic while overlooking equally or more qualified candidates from another demographic, this constitutes disparate treatment.

Recognizing that other choices may relate to workplace fairness and policies, they do not encapsulate the legal definition of disparate treatment. Uneven workload distribution pertains more to operational issues rather than discrimination per se, changes in job roles due to company policy focus on organizational structure rather than employee-specific bias, and compensation differences among similar jobs can involve a broader examination of pay equity but do not specifically highlight the issue of biased treatment based on characteristic distinctions. Therefore, the focus on differential treatment based on protected characteristics identifies exactly what disparate treatment addresses within the realm of employment discrimination