Workplace policies that support gay and lesbian workers are likely to produce positive business outcomes, according to a new study from the UCLA Law School’s Williams Institute.
The report, titled “The Business Impact of LGBT-Supportive Workplace Policies,” analyzes 33 research studies and concludes that policies supporting lesbian and gay workers tend to generate positive business impacts as well as greater job commitment, increased job satisfaction and improved health outcomes among LGBT employees.
Moreover, those employees are less likely to face discrimination in workplaces that have accommodating policies.
“We now have a strong body of evidence that LGBT-supportive policies have a variety of benefits for companies that extend beyond the employees those policies impact directly,” said Lee Badgett, an economics professor at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and a co-author of the study. “As our nation’s workplaces become more diverse, business that respond to that trend will benefit.”
Anders Jacobsen, co-founder of LGBT Capital, a corporate investment management firm, called the Williams Institute study “a potentially catalytic step in the efforts to present robust arguments and statisticial underpinnings for the business case for LGBT diversity in employment.”
“This research will carry weight with both corporate and public-sector decision makers in the U.S. and abroad,” Jacobsen said.
The Williams Institute is a think tank based at the UCLA School of Law. The study can be viewed at http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/category/research.
