Not all discrimination is illegalSimilarly, not all workplace discrimination is illegal. California’s whistleblower law prohibits an employer from retaliating against an employee because the employee disclosed information about employer activity the employee reasonably believed was unlawful. But categorical discrimination sometimes is appropriate, such as discrimination favoring education, experience, or the ability to speak more than one language. Bloom has concluded that remote workers are victims of, and on-site workers the beneficiaries of, “proximity bias,” the bias that comes from being physically close to upper management. But it probably isn’t illegal discrimination, even leaving aside that remote workers are not uniformly more productive than their on-site colleagues.
