What’s Behind the Broadening of Diversity Statements?

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Traditionally, diversity statements aimed to eliminate discrimination only on the basis of age, race, religion and gender — categories with legal protections. Lately, statements have broadened to include nonprotected groups, including, in a survey of law firms, “culture, communication style, perspective and personalities.” The upshot?

A more racially diverse workplace plus the addition of other formerly underrepresented people.

For every nonlegal class included in a law firm’s diversity statement, there was a significantly lower percentage of racial minorities employed.

Read on: An uncharitable explanation, researchers note, would be that firms broaden diversity statements to reach diversity goals not achieved by hiring racial minorities.

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You lend money to a friend and they later repay it. Does the fact they spent the money on a luxury good bother you?

It was repaid. None of my business how they spent it.

Actually, I’m angry — would have felt better, even though they repaid the loan, if it had gone to a necessity.

Read on: Lent money, according to research, is considered a “shared possession,” triggering emotions. Taxpayers had similar anger when federal bailout funds, later repaid, were used for luxury executive getaways.

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It’s well-documented that on so-called sharing platforms — think Uber or Airbnb — customers who are racial minorities are sometimes discriminated against. How about hosts on Airbnb?

Same deal. Hosts who are racial minorities get comparatively fewer guests and earn less profit.

There’s no difference between results for white and racial minority hosts, perhaps because renters focus more on the home itself.

Inexplicably, racial minority hosts outperform white hosts financially.

Read on: Racial minority hosts also drop out with higher frequency than their white counterparts.

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Companies often present consumers with a variety of choices that offer trade-offs between service and price. And it’s also not uncommon in a choice menu to include one “decoy,” an inferior option whose sole purpose is to coax consumers to pick the alternative that is most lucrative for the company. Customers recognizing this practice:

Admire the company’s cleverness and are more inclined to do business with it.

Aren’t affected in their purchasing decision by the practice.

Are more inclined to distrust the company and thus not do business with it.

Read on: Oddly, in research, all it took to mostly alleviate those feelings of distrust was a claim that the company employing the decoy was rated highly for trustworthiness.

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We know that growing up in poverty impedes educational outcomes and subsequent lifelong earnings. Among equally poor people, what’s the impact of growing up in a segregated neighborhood?

Black people and white people both suffer from racial isolation, though Black people to a greater degree.

Black people suffer, but white people gain.

Segregation doesn’t impact either group.

Read on: Beyond income, researchers found that Black boys growing up in extreme poverty and who live in an area with above-average segregation have a 29% greater probability of being incarcerated. For white boys growing up in poverty and extreme segregation, their probability of incarceration rises by 22%.