and women. Proceeding from these assumptions, the researchers further assumed that employment policies based upon performance or potential performance would result in an integrated workforce in which a firm would acquire and retain only the most efficient workers. In the everyday world, however, such assumptions are seldom valid. Thus, employers are tempted to continue practices that have the effect of defeating affirmative action goals.
In actual practice, for whatever reasons (the lingering effects of past discrimination, societal imposed roles, the presence of discrimination in contemporary society, the distribution of abilities and motivations to learn, or other factors), knowledge bases, and skill levels are not comparable between all racial and ethnic groups, or between men and women within the context of the work force. Thus, when government regulators assume that discrimination is present within a firm when gender, racial, and ethnic groups are not represented in the firm in the same proportions in which they are represented in the general population, the application of non discriminatory employment policies by a firm will not insure that the firm's work force will be composed of the most productive individuals available. These distortions are exacerbated, when employment discrimination regulations are intended to rectify the effects of past discrimination affirmative action goal compliance. When rectification is the intent of employment discrimination regulations, government regulators and courts often direct firms
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