An employee complained to Mr. Zirk, the president of Marathon Printing, a small Portland, Ore., printer, that a co-worker propositioned him, made threats, vulgar remarks and obscene gestures. After that, we watched them carefully for the next year. We never saw anything happen. Nevertheless, a year later, the employee charged Marathon Printing with sexual harassment.
Companies dumping toxic stuff know that environmental conflicts come with the turf.
Construction companies constantly face worker-safety issues. And child-care companies have liability matters. But employment-related complaints are universal, and these days a lot of employees complain. According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in Washington, there were 80,680 charges of discrimination last year. While those numbers haven't changed much in the past several years, their types have changed.