{"id":193,"date":"2014-08-23T21:56:41","date_gmt":"2014-08-24T01:56:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/?p=193"},"modified":"2022-05-19T14:31:09","modified_gmt":"2022-05-19T18:31:09","slug":"house-votes-to-bar-credit-history-in-hiring-process","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/2014\/08\/23\/house-votes-to-bar-credit-history-in-hiring-process\/","title":{"rendered":"House Votes to Bar Credit History in Hiring Process"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Garry Rayno, State House Bureau<\/em><\/p>\n

Published in the Union Leader on April 17, 2014<\/a><\/p>\n

CONCORD – The House Tuesday voted 192-142 to approve Senate Bill 295, which bars using a person’s credit history in employment decisions.<\/p>\n

Supporters said a person’s credit history does not predict job performance nor does it change a person’s intelligence or skills.<\/p>\n

Given the recent recession and long-term unemployment experienced by some workers, credit reports are a growing barrier to employment for many, they said.<\/p>\n

“A negative credit history is a growing barrier to employment for very good people,” said Rep. Andrew White. “Credit history in no way is a predictor of job performance. Private information should be private whenever possible.”<\/em><\/p>\n

But opponents said government should not deny employers the tools they have now to judge a job applicant.<\/p>\n

And they said many high security jobs require a credit check for an applicant and the change could convince companies not to come to the state.<\/p>\n

Rep. J.R. Hoell,<\/strong> R-Dunbarton, said a person’s credit history is a good indicator of who will be a responsible employee with good judgment.<\/p>\n

“Why is it necessary for the state to intervene with companies to tell them they cannot use a viable vetting (mechanism) to determine if someone will be a good employee,”<\/em> Hoell said.<\/p>\n

He noted defense firms and other employers that require security clearance for employees have to check the credit history of the people they hire.<\/p>\n

“It would not benefit New Hampshire to have this law,” Hoell said. “There are a lot of defense contractors and employers here who would be affected by this law.”<\/em><\/p>\n

But Rep. Sally Kelly, D-Chichester, said there are exemptions in the bill for such things as federal contracts and financial institutions.<\/p>\n

“If someone has a bad credit history but excellent job history, chances are he or she will not be hired,” Kelly said. “This removes a huge barrier to New Hampshire workers to being employed.”<\/em><\/p>\n

She noted the recent recession has resulted in long-term unemployment for many workers who are faced with tough decisions about which bills to pay.<\/p>\n

“Their credit report looks very different than it did four years ago,” Kelly said. “What didn’t change is their intelligence, their job skills, their work ethics: all those things that affect their job.”<\/em><\/p>\n

The House changed the bill to reflect the language it passed earlier this session in a House bill.<\/p>\n

House and Senate negotiators are likely to have to reconcile the two versions of the bill in a conference committee later this session.<\/p>\n

Last session, a similar bill died when a conference committee could not agree on a compromise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Garry Rayno, State House Bureau Published in the Union Leader on April 17, 2014 CONCORD – The House Tuesday voted 192-142 to approve Senate Bill 295, which bars using a person’s credit history in employment decisions. Supporters said a person’s credit history does not predict job performance nor does it change a person’s intelligence […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issues","category-updates"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":612,"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193\/revisions\/612"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jrhoell.com\/jr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}