| Possible inequities in hiring and admissions procedures have caused concern. The purpose of this report was to investigate hundreds of hypothetical selection cases defined by numerical parameters describing a majority applicant pool and a minority applicant pool. The parameters included relative group sizes, within-group joint distributions of test and criterion, within-group validity coefficients, and the selection ratio. The outcomes of selection included the minority representation in the work force (minority hires divided by total hires, or MH), and a threshold utility measure of the productivity of hires. Most of the analyses assume that the majority applicant group has the higher average criterion score.;Because of social consciousness or legal pressure, the employer may select more minority applicants than is optimal in terms of utility. The loss in utility is examined in cases where MH is 10% above the value obtained by equal marginal risk hiring. Regions in the parameter space are located where the loss in utility is small and where it is large. When the minority applicants are less qualified than the majority applicants, the loss decreases as validity rises; when the difference is reversed, no such general statement holds. The major finding is that in most realistic cases the loss in utility is slight.;Federal legislation, guidelines, professional standards, and U.S. Supreme Court decisions concerned with fair selection procedures are discussed. Among suggestions for future research is a call for a model that reaches beyond selection to consider job tenure and promotion.;Relations among the parameters are presented under several statistical definitions of fair selection. Under equal marginal risk, quality adjusted quota, and representative work force hiring policies, the relations between utility in two groups and validity and selection ratio are similar to those found in a single group of applicants. Under equal marginal risk hiring and with other parameters held constant, a test of greater validity results in greater MH; also, MH increases with the selection ratio. Under quality adjusted quota hiring, tests of greater validity result in less minority hiring. Some of these relations differ when the minority applicant group is better qualified than the majority applicant group. Cases where the validity in one group is different from the validity in the other group produce complex relationships. |
