We'll All Be Crazy Soon
Walter Olson blogs at Cato that the revised DSM-5, the American Psych Association's "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders," with its expanded categories of disorder, is likely to allow all sorts of legal fun in the workplace:
Introducing a new category of Mild Neurocognitive Disorder, for example, could entitle workers to begin claiming job-related accommodation for cognitive deficits often associated with advancing age -- perhaps especially significant since federal law has made it unlawful for most private employers to set policies of automatic retirement at any particular age. As Foley notes, the task force is also planning to reduce the diagnostic threshold for two disabilities that generate many ADA claims already: Attention Deficit Disorder and Generalized Anxiety Disorder.Employers already face serious legal risks under existing law if they decline to accommodate employees with mental and behavioral deficits (which may include substance abuse, at least if the worker has entered rehab). As I noted the other day at Overlawyered, a hotel chain has agreed to pay $132,500 for dismissing an autistic front desk clerk rather than working with a state-paid "job coach" to remedy his deficiencies. The EEOC sued an insurance company that rescinded a job offer as an agent to an applicant after he tested positive for methadone. An Iowa jury awarded $1.1 million against a university for failing to accommodate an employee's request for a lighter work load and other changes after she was diagnosed with depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety. And HR lawyers have warned employers that administering personality tests to new workers could violate the law by improperly revealing protected conditions such as "paranoid personality disorder."
Meanwhile, one repugnant activist group is trying to get pedophilia phased out of the DSM. They want to reclassify it, at least for starters, so that only people who feel bad about these godawful feelings will be considered to have a problem.
mpetrie98 at December 6, 2011 1:24 AM
Interesting that the federal government has outlawed retirement at a certain age...and yet many federal agencies have mandatory retirement at a certain age! Niiiiiiiice.
choika at December 6, 2011 8:01 AM
The APA also knows that by expanding and modifying the DSM they can extend the insurance compensation available to Psychiatrists, Psychologists, and Counselors.
jelly at December 6, 2011 10:01 AM
02/07/11 - Stefan Karlsson
Education Level, Degrees, and Unemployment [edited]
=== ===
Unemployment for High school drop outs 13.9%, HS diploma 9.5%, Some college 7.8%, BS degree or higher 4.3%.
The employment rate suggests that there is much "hidden unemployment" for people with little education.
High school drop outs 39.2%, HS diploma 54.6%, Some college 64.1%, BS degree or higher 73.6%.
=== ===
I infer that "loss of demand" is not a big factor in current unemployment. People with greater education have been able to find work that is in demand, while the less educated have been more affected.
I don't think that it is schooling itself which makes people more productive, but education is acquired by more productive people.
There is increasing business regulation, employment costs (healthcare), a higher minimum wage, and uncertainties about future profits. Businesses are reluctant to hire people of lesser productivity. Businesses continue to employ people who are comfortably productive and likely to be profitable even with higher future costs.
Put simply, bad regulation and government interference hits hardest on the poor and less productive. Businesses are willing to hire and train the less productive, but only if there is a reasonable and predictable payoff for that extra work.
Employers will be less interested in employing anyone with a disability or a personality disorder. They will lose the desire to try out a person for a job, because they may be stuck with him, legal bills, and settlements.
The advancement of soft disabilities and the power of the ADA acts like a forced lottery. Low productivity and disabled people will face higher obstacles to employment, while a few will hit the legal jackpot.
Andrew_M_Garland at December 6, 2011 5:07 PM
by improperly revealing protected conditions such as "paranoid personality disorder."
What are you accusing me of? You talking to me? You must be talking to me, there's no one else here...
Ltw at December 7, 2011 12:09 AM
Whether your 'condition' exists or not, I'm sure someone makes a pill for it (and if you can't afford it, maybe Astra-Zenica-Glaxo-Bayer can help).
And Ltw, just because you've been diagnosed with 'paranoid personality disorder' doesn't mean that they're not out to get you.
DrCos at December 7, 2011 2:12 AM
Wait, having General Anxiety Order makes me a Protected Class? Can I sue me for not accommodating me at my workplace?
Fuck that. It's easier to take a pill every morning to make my brain behave.
brian at December 7, 2011 5:23 AM
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