Resolved: The Americans with Disabilities Act has done more harm than good.

Great Debates
41

This is sort-of correct, in the same sense that everyone playing a roulette wheel has the same chances. However, just as in roulette, ADA produces winners and losers. If your individual business is burdened with an unusual number of allegedly disabled workers, or you get a big verdict against you, then you will be at a disadvantage.

Furthermore, businesses located in an area with more liberal court interpretations of ADA or more aggressive lawyers will be at a general disadvantage.

That reminds me: There was a case a few months ago involving a hotel in California with a minor structural infraction relating to the entry of disabled people. A disabled person sued for damages, although he had never complained or asked the owners to rectify the problem. In other words, there’s a legal way to game the system, whereby a lawyer and a disabled person can get money from businesses they have never patronized. However, I do not recall whether that suit was under ADA or whether it took advantage of some other law involving the disabled.

42

As I mentioned above, there was a partially deaf woman and a legally blind man in my workplace in San Francisco in 1973.

43

well, I guess we didn’t need the ADA after all.

re: your former point, please again to read the actual facts regarding ADA - that the average accomodation was in the neighborhood of 200- 500$, that many didn’t cost anything, that any accomodation had to be ‘reasonable’ (ie that it couldn’t bankrupt the company), that in any event, there were a number of programs and ways of paying for the accomodation, and some potential tax benefits for the company.

add all that up and your Chicken Little scenario doesn’t seem at all likely, especially when weighed against the absolute benefit of allowing people who wish to work, the opportunity to do so.

You’ve failed to substantiate the case you made in the OP.

44

wring, perhaps you need to pay more attention to what is actually being discussed next time.
PP: —All of their competitors have similar costs, therefore they can safely pass it along to their consumers without fear of being put at a competitive disadvantage.—

Consumers of certain goods should likewise not be singled out. Again: if there is a reponsibility, it should fall on everyone equally.

—How is this law economically different than any other? If I can’t dump my toxic waste into the river, then I simply charge my customers more.—

True, but the river is almost always a public good: a store is someone’s private property. Corps have to pay more if they want to use public resources, and hence make their good cost more. But store owners and employers are not necessarily using public goods like air or rivers. They are already paying for everything.

—As long as the law applies to everyone, then nobody is at a disadvantage.—

The law doesn’t apply to everyone: it only applies to store owners/employers. It puts a responsibility on them and no one else.

—Which pretty clearly means that he believes stores should be as meanspirited as they want.—

I believe that they CAN be as meanspirited as they want, and pay any of the normal consequences that comes with that.

—Although, he gave no indication that he would use or even think such an epithet, he apparently has no problems with store owners acting on such prejudices.—

I have lots of problems with it: I don’t think that it’s just that they be forced by law to do things with their property that they don’t want to.

----I think it is appropriate of me to point out that tolerance of such behavior is complicity in such behavior.—

Now you are just getting dishonest. The fact is, the person you were arguing with didn’t express the idea you claimed you were arguing against, and neither did I. You could make the same arguement that because I think Nazis have a right to free speech, that I am complicit in supporting Nazism. But you know full well that few people here would respect that argument very far.

What I said was that IF we argue that disabled (or any group) has a right to be sold, say, a sandwich, then the responsibility for servicing that right cannot sensibly be placed only on sandwich makers. I, a humble temp worker, am just as guilty of not supplying sandwiches to the disabled as anyone else is.

The only reason I can think of why people think that sandwich makers should be specially burdened is retalitory meanspiritedness, or some sort of class hatred. Neither are justified as the basis for law, IMHO.

45

Hmmm. Burdended. Interesting choice of words.

/me thinks back to Rhum Runner’s previous chiding.

You know, contrary to popular belief, verdicts are usually fairly good indicators of culpability. Sure, some fractional percentage of verdicts are just wrong, but, all in all, the system works. I don’t have much sympathy for a company that was deserving of a big verdict.
BTW, Take a look at this recent Fortune article http://www.fortune.com/indexw.jhtml?channel=artcol.jhtml&doc_id=207665

46

Apos???? 'scuse me? You posted that as far as you were concerned that it shouldn’t be just the businesses cost to bear, and I had already posted info that it wasn’t. Now, perhaps I ‘misunderstood’ your point that the businesses shouldn’t have to pay all of the costs all by themselves (of course since in many of the cases, the cost was zip, so that’s a moot point in those cases), so that data suggesting that it didn’t happen wasnt’ relevent to the ‘topic at hand’, but golly, it sure seemed to be.

47

Apos: replied to PencilPusher: *—Which pretty clearly means that he believes stores should be as meanspirited as they want.—

I believe that they CAN be as meanspirited as they want, and pay any of the normal consequences that comes with that.

—Although, he gave no indication that he would use or even think such an epithet, he apparently has no problems with store owners acting on such prejudices.—

I have lots of problems with it: I don’t think that it’s just that they be forced by law to do things with their property that they don’t want to. *

Why on earth not? Everybody’s forced by law to do some things with their property that they don’t want to, including complying with building and fire safety codes, paying taxes, and obeying trash disposal and sanitation ordinances. A business is not some completely private imperium that owes nothing to anybody: its prosperity is created partly by the various communities and governments that maintain its streets and utilities, educate its workforce, guard its property, subsidize the media that carry its advertising, and so forth.

To imagine that a business is in no way dependent on “public resources” just because it’s not dumping waste into a river is IMHO simply silly. That’s a totally artificial, absolutist notion of “private” enterprise, and there’s nothing in the working of actual real-life business to justify it. In real life, everybody and everything gets some benefit from public resources, and in return the public is entitled to a certain limited amount and type of control over its/their activities.

48

Well, I had a very comple response to Apos, which got eaten up by the Internet. Teaches me for not Copying my post before hitting the “submit reply” button.

Anyway, I first explained that being open to the public is not a God-given right. Frequenly, being open to public means an increased crime rate for the surrounding area and a host of other problems, including a disproportional drain on public resources. Requiring businesses who want to be open to the public (and reap the associated benefits of being open to the public) to be open to the entire public is not unreasonable.

I also went into some detail about why the free market doesn’t always work and is frequently broken due to ignorance, inefficiencies and externalizations. The law must attempt to correct such problems.

Additionally, I took umbrage at being called dishonest. I explained that there was a huge difference between the notion of freedom of speech (which, potentially, covers many many diverse causes) and a narrow law that covers accessibility to the disabled. Claiming that someone who supports freedom of speech is supporting one specific cause is dishonest.

However, if you oppose a narrow law that has a narrow effect, even if you oppose it on some misguided free market principle, has the effect of supporting businesess who discriminate.

I actually took some time picking apart Apos’s post. I simply don’t have the energy to repeat the effort.

49

—Apos??? 'scuse me? You posted that as far as you were concerned that it shouldn’t be just the businesses cost to bear, and I had already posted info that it wasn’t.—

Whether it is or isn’t is hardly relevant to the issue of whether it is just in principle, which is what I’ve been here discussing. I haven’t been arguing with you: I don’t even remember addressing myself to you.

50

/me glances up a half dozen posts.

Um, Apos, read the first line of your 11:48 GMT post. 3 1/2 hours is not that long a time.

51

David, you just provided me the context to more fully appreciate this line from the 1965 song by Tom Lehrer about George Murphy: “Should Americans pick crops? George says ‘No’. / 'Cause noone but a Mexican should stoop so low. After all, even in Egypt, the pharoahs / Had to import Hebrew braseros”!

Who says the SDMB ain’t educational!?!

Tom Lehrer isn’t the only humorist around these parts! This line was good for a few laughs from this Fortune 500 company employee!

By the way, anyone who wants to follow the money trail for Cato and other such organizations, an interesting article appeared in a recent Sierra Magazine: http://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/200207/thinktank.asp

52

Guys, your attack on that Cato report amounts to nothing but an ad-hominem rebuttal. You don’t have to trust Cato - they footnote everything. Every one of those statistics mentioned is cited. Follow them up, and see if Cato is cooking the story.

53

Actually, Kimstu made some pretty good points. If you really want, I can tear it apart even more.

First, who cares? How is any of this relevant after the law was passed? Second, I reject the attempt to classify the disabled as only those people who “the public and many policymakers usually think of.”

I must have missed something. How, exactly does one follow the other?

Impressive number. 15,000. Wow, that’s a lot. Isn’t it? Oh yeah, there are 280 million people in the US. That means that 0.005% of the population filed ADA-based complaints. Doesn’t seem too high any more, does it?

First, 50.7% + 26.2% doesn’t add up to 90%. I wonder what they left out.

Second, if 50.7% of the people were fired, then are they really still in the workforce?

Third, who cares? I’m satisfied knowing the ADA helped out people who were already in the workforce. I see nothing wrong with protecting them from discrimination.

I’m trying to find a point, but I just don’t see one. Note the Cato institute just reports the facts and doesn’t make any conclusion. That’s probably because it “sounds” like something is wrong, but really there is no inconsistency.

Whoa. Cite? How about because the company knew that they screwed up and corrected the situation as fast as possible.

I’m sure there is more, but, really, what’s the use?

54

—Um, Apos, read the first line of your 4:48 GMT post. 3 1/2 hours is not that long a time.—

Hello? That post was AFTER you posted you bit about the cites, and in that post I point out preceisely one thing: that I wasn’t arguing with you or addressing your points. Same as expanded upon in my next post.

You’re being a little ridiculous here.

55

—Anyway, I first explained that being open to the public is not a God-given right.—

Who said we were having a theological discussion? I am having a discussion on justice.

—I also went into some detail about why the free market doesn’t always work and is frequently broken due to ignorance, inefficiencies and externalizations.—

I am the first to point that out, especially since it’s what I specialize in. But that fact doesn’t justify a blanket grant of “do anything to rectify anything we see as a problem with people’s behavior.”

—The law must attempt to correct such problems.—

The law must attempt to correct certain SORTS of problems. Precisely what we are debating is WHAT sorts of problems certain measures should and should not be used on.

—However, if you oppose a narrow law that has a narrow effect, even if you oppose it on some misguided free market principle, has the effect of supporting businesess who discriminate.—\

I’m sorry, but I don’t think people should be forced to say certain things or sell to certain people just because others deem that they should. I see those principles as being very similar.
I don’t support bussiness that discriminate, and I again object to being called someone who does (and again point out that your original unjustified comment was to another person who was likewise innocent of this charge).

Bussiness that discriminate impose huge costs upon themselves. Segregation, for instance, imposed incredible economic costs (mostly in lost opportunity) on, ironically enough, white stockholders. And turning away a disabled person because one refuses to make a minor change to their store seems not just meanspirited, but stupid.

However, I think it is unjust to force people to sell their property to certain people, simply because we don’t happen to like their views. That, in my mind, is not only itself unjust, but is also exactly the wrong way to go about changing people’s bad behavior (assuming that it is even our job).

It is, IMHO, ridiculous that if I spend my money to lavishly bathe myself in chocolate every night, I have no obligation to take efforts to sell chocolate to disabled people: but if I put an “open for sale” sign on my building, I do.

56

Do you also find business licensing requirements, fire and health codes and city zoning laws “ridiculous”? The ADA requirements are consistent with these other regulatory concerns. Bathing yourself in chocolate is a private activity; selling chocolate puts you into a business community environment which is necessarily subject to governmental regulation of commerce, and members of which are obligated to adhere to business standards.

NOTE that simply selling your chocolate doesn’t necessarily place your facility under ADA consideration (or indeed under AA). You’re free to sell to an exclusive set of customers, discriminating however you wish to do so. Only when you open your facility to the general public as a retail establishment, or advertise in public media as an employer, are you obligated to provide access to the disabled (or make “reasonable accomodation” for employees).

57

The ADA not only tells you what you must do, it tells you how you must do it.

There have been racists who didn’t want to do business with African-Americans. That’s not the case with chocolatiers and the disabled. Storekeepers want to sell their wares.

Left to his own devices, a storekeeper might choose to serve disabled people in various alternative methods, say by some sort of personalized service. The ADA gives the decision-making hammer to some federal bureaucrat. The bureaucrat may choose a poor option, since
– he isn’t directly involved,
– he has no skin in the game,
– may lack expertise in that particular store,
– he will look for uniform regulations, that may be inappropriate in a specific case.
– his chosen regulation may be affected by personal political calculations
– he may be incompetent
– he may be corrupt

58

The ADA specifically allows storekeepers to do this, i.e. if it is not feasible to put in a ramp/elevator the storekeeper can be in compliance with the ADA by offering to take things outside. My problems with the ADA lie more with its employment requirements than with the requirement to modify/serve disabled in a retail setting.

59

Only if the business owner refuses to become compliant. (See Rhum Runner’s excellent response above.)

december, why argue from ignorance? The ADA Homepage has a wonderful set of FAQ’s designed specifically to answer misconceptions such as yours. Take advantage.

Particularly, peruse the ADA Guide for Small Businesses, which contains this paragraph: “When it is not readily achievable to provide an accessible entrance, the goods and services must be provided in some other way, if doing so is readily achievable. For example, if a restaurant has several steps at the entrance and no accessible entry is possible, providing home delivery or some alternative service may be required. In other cases, it may be possible to receive an order by telephone and to have a clerk bring the order to the customer outside the store or business. If alternative service is provided, it is important that it be publicized so a customer knows how the goods and services are offered.”

60

Thank for the cite, **xenophon41 **. I appreciate it.

Note that your cite in no way contradicts what I posted. It’s the bureaucrat rather than the store-owner who decides whether it is “not readily achievable to provide an accessible entrance.”

Still, I’m happy to see that the rules do contemplate this possibility.