A better workplace for LGBTQIA+ workers means a better world for
all workers
By Stephen Colón, senior manager of Integrated Services, and Fernando López, executive director of San Diego Pride.
A local transgender 18-year-old with unsupportive parents could not wait to move out and finally be who she knew herself to be. But she needed a job.
She enrolled in a program at the San Diego Workforce Partnership and was quickly offered interviews with our partner employers. Most jobs open to her were in customer service, but the feedback we got from her interviewers did not match the outgoing, courteous and detail-oriented person our staff knew — we were told she was too bashful and inattentive for a customer service job. Employers couldn’t get her to talk much in interviews. Turns out, she was spending her interviews distracted: instead of focusing on the knowledge, skills and abilities she could bring to the workplace, her focus was on policing her language and mannerisms to avoid discrimination. And who could blame her?
Stories like this aren’t unique. For as long as the Center for American Progress has tracked this data, LGBTQIA+ people have experienced unemployment at rates that outpace the general population. Earlier last year, the same workers were disproportionately impacted by COVID-19-related layoffs. While employment discrimination against LGBTQIA+ employees has been broadly illegal in California for some time, inequities remain, and as people who care about both LGBTQIA+ workers and the health of San Diego’s workforce broadly, we know it’s worth exploring the reasons why.
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