Here are three of the top financial news stories of the week, gathered from around the web:
AI fails job interview
Robot investigators produce robot candidates, Zahira Jaser said in Harvard business review. A growing number of employers are using automated video interviews, in which candidates “check in on an interview platform, answering questions under time pressure.” The video is then evaluated based on visual, verbal and/or vocal cues. Our research suggests that job seekers’ experience with these AI-powered interviews was poor. Most applicants didn’t understand the technology and “felt they had to behave like robots” to pass the interview. The AI experience was particularly difficult for young job seekers from less privileged backgrounds, but for all types of candidates, trying to use a computerized interviewing system was draining “both emotionally and cognitively”.
Get rid of unfair fees
Feds aim to end ‘junk fees,’ Stacy Cowley says in The New York Times. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued a request for public comment last week on the use of “added expenses that collectively add billions to what Americans pay for goods and services.” These fees include late payment fees, hotel resort fees, and service fees collected by concert ticket providers. The banks have come under fire since “the agency released a report in December on the $15 billion a year they collect in overdraft and insufficient funds fees.” Several banks, including Bank of America and Capital One, have since announced that they are reducing or eliminating overdraft fees.
Prosecute workers who try to quit
A judge has dismissed efforts by a Wisconsin healthcare provider to block former employees from joining a competitor, Karla Miller says in The Washington Post. Non-profit healthcare organization ThedaCare had sued rival Ascension “for poaching seven workers” and seeking an injunction, arguing that the employees’ departure would “impede its ability to provide 24-hour critical care”. US law generally gives companies a great deal of freedom to terminate employees; now, with a very tight labor market, companies see the other side of the “employment at will” coin. ThedaCare workers “were employees at will with no contractual restrictions on changing employment,” and Wisconsin Judge Mark McGinnis ruled that the hospital system should fill its staffing gaps in ways other than d trying to sue their employees to stay in their jobs.
This article first appeared in the latest issue of The week magazine. If you want to know more, you can try six risk-free issues of the magazine here.
