EEOC holds hearing on artificial intelligence

On January 31, 2023, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) held a hearing on the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in employment, entitled “Navigating Employment Discrimination in AI and Automated Systems: A New Civil Rights Frontier.” The hearing was part of the agency’s Artificial Intelligence and Algorithmic Fairness Initiative launched in 2021 “to ensure that the use of software, including artificial intelligence (AI) . . . and other emerging technologies used in hiring and other employment decisions comply with the federal civil rights laws.” Although it’s impossible to predict the exact results of the hearing, future guidance on the application of the uniform guidelines of employee selection procedures (UGESP) to AI seems likely in the near future.

Missing viewpoints
During the hearing, the EEOC heard from a dozen experts, including professors of law and data science, representatives from the ACLU and the Chamber of Commerce, and two practicing attorneys. One telling aspect of the hearing was that only two of the 12 guests represented the interests of employers and not a single representative from an AI vendor testified.
This led Republican-appointed commissioners Andres Lucas and Keith Sonderling to express frustration with the imbalance. Given the lack of viewpoint diversity at the January 31 hearing, further hearings on this topic with more professionally and ideologically diverse panelists seem warranted.