Is it legal for interviewers to ask about family planning or kids?
Employers sometimes cross legal lines by probing about marriage, children, or future pregnancy intentions to gauge employee retention. These invasive questions force applicants to choose between revealing personal life details or withdrawing from consideration out of discomfort.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
- 1Reporting the interviewer to the EEOC or a state civil rights agency
- 2Withdrawing from consideration for the job
- 3Leaving a factual review on platforms like Glassdoor or Indeed
- 4Notifying organizational leadership, the Executive Director, or the Board of Directors
- 5Refusing to answer and setting boundaries
- 6Cutting the interview short
- 7Dropping or declining the client
In their words
Unedited, most upvoted first, each linked to the thread it came from.
“During the interview, the interviewer went on and on about how they've had to keep hiring to fill this specific role because one of their previous employees left after a few years, and then another went on maternity leave and ended up not returning. They then went on to say, "You're not planning to get pregnant and leave, right? We reward people who stick around for the long haul."”source ↗
“To state the obvious, this made me feel super icky and I took myself out of consideration for the role. This is the first (and hopefully only) time something like this has ever happened to me (mid 20s woman) in the workplace, but it feels kind of illegal to ask that, right?”source ↗
“I had a freelance interview where the interviewer asked if I was married.”source ↗
“I got a call yesterday from an HR representative. He asked if I was married, and I said yes. Then he asked if I had any kids.”source ↗
“I had someone ask my age….so annoying.”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
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