One of the greatest achievements in recent times was the recognition of woman's pay. It just didn't make sense why a woman who did the same job as a man (often just as good if not better), got paid less money by her employer. How can or could anyone justify such a ludicrous setup? In the UK, there's still a bit of legal wrangling going on over this but it's pretty much sorted out now.

There have always been major issues with ageism too. To some degree I can understand this, as man in his 50's or 60's say, is just not going to be as fast or as strong to carry out heavy manual labor as a buck stud in his late teens. But with other types of work you would think experience would play a part, but there still seems to be a major problem regarding equal opportunity employment for the over 40's. Some of this is due to the technological revolution where employers of these young dynamic companies fear that the older guys are too set in their ways to adapt to the ever changing technology.

Of course, no employers would admit to these prejudices otherwise they would find themselves in hot legal water, but to get around many of them, they simply employ who they want. Ageism, in particular, has major problems in today's society, with not only employment, but in health care and at a consumer level too.

Equal opportunity employment comes in many guises, and by law there should be equal rights for age, creed, colour, sex, disabilities (where those disabled are perfectly capable of the job in question), size, and weight, ad infinitum.

I bet most folks at some point or another have experienced or seen a breech of equal opportunity employment. Having said that, things are one heck of a lot better than they ever used to be, and the equal opportunity employment laws have worked in favor of perhaps millions of individuals in then Western world.

Changes in society regarding people are often slow and it usually takes some publicized case to get media attention before new laws and rights are introduced for the good of the people. At least in modern times we have civil and legal caretakers whose chief role is to protect our rights to justice in the work place, and to make sure we get reasonable chances and fair treatment.

Although equal opportunity employment laws exist, sometimes there is blatant exploitation and discrimination against certain individuals or groups, and quite often they are not always obvious and go unreported. If you feel you are not being protected by equal opportunity employment, and have no one to talk to, hop online and get educated on your rights and where to take your complaint. Equal opportunity employment laws are there to protect both employers and employees and it is only when both parties cooperate that everyone is happy. Happy workers are good workers and tend to be sick less often than disgruntled staff members, so equal opportunity employment is there for us all.