Regardless of how they are structured, anti-discrimination labor laws have serious harmful effects upon the operation of the market and in many cases are detrimental to the very persons that they are designed to protect. Why then are such laws and regulations so widely accepted?

People assume that anti-discrimination laws will benefit members of class C exactly as intended; moreover, they overlook the unexpected yet entirely predictable negative side-effects arising from the conflicts between such legislation and human value scales.
The efficiency considerations that guide business decisions are highly technical and tend to be ignored and discounted by the uninformed. To an outside observer, consequently, legitimate employment and compensation practices that promote efficient business operation may appear to constitute unfounded, irrational, and unjust discrimination.