Religious Discrimination and Racial Harassment in the United States Workplace

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The diversity of the domestic and global workforce is increasing daily in the United States (U.S.). The growing number of immigrants and the expansion of globalization in the workforce forces organizations to make necessary adjustments to meet the needs of all their employees. People in organizations have different cultural and religious backgrounds that can be quite different in beliefs and practices (Johnson, 2012). The workforce is more diverse in ethnicity, culture, language, and religion (Borstorff & Arlington, 2011). The inflow of immigrants has augmented the number of religious denominations represented in the U.S. and as a result religious diversity is emerging as a significant issue.
Organizations often discriminate employees due to the lack of understanding of employee’s religious beliefs and needs. They understand their own religion practices but are ignorant about other religious practices. As a result, they often fail to make accommodations to meet the religious needs of the groups within the organization. The claims for religious discrimination in the U.S. increased from 1811 in 1999 to 3386 in 2009; an increase of $3.1 million to $7.6 million (Borstorff & Arlington, 2011). There are approximately 4.3 million Muslims in the U.S. and they feel the most vulnerable to religious discrimination (Alexis, 2011).
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) enforces federal laws prohibiting employment discrimination. These laws protect people against employment discrimination when it involves the following conditions (Johnson, 2012):
• Unfair treatment because of race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, age (40 or older), disability or genetic information.
• Denial of a reasonable wor...

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