In a unanimous decision on Wednesday, the Supreme Court ruled that churches and religious organizations are exempt from employee discrimination laws when hiring or firing their own employees and leaders. Many are heralding this decision as key in reinforcing the separation between church and state, while others worry that this will allow these organizations far too much power. The initial complaint that motivated Hosanna-Tabor Church v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission stemmed from a teacher at an elementary school who felt she was being fired for pursuing a disability claim. 

Bank of America, which now owns mortgage giant Countrywide Financial, will pay $335 million for Countrywide discriminating against minorities during the 2004-2008 housing boom. Countrywide brokers are accused of steering blacks and Latinos into more costly home loans than white borrowers with the same financial profile. An estimated 200,000 people were affected.

The country's "toughest sheriff" has had his gold star revoked. A scathing U.S. Justice Department report released Thursday found that Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's office carried out a blatant pattern of discrimination against Latinos and held a "systematic disregard" for the Constitution amid a series of immigration crackdowns that have turned the lawman into a prominent national political figure.

In response to the coverage of Egypt's elections, the Takeaway has heard a lot from listeners about our use of the term "Islamist" to describe the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood and other parties in Egypt. One Takeaway listener wrote on our Web site, "Is there Christianists and Jewists? It is about time that sensitivity was built in the media discourse."

In the 1980s and 1990s banks avoided lending in minority neighborhoods and Blacks and Latinos were denied mortgages at disproportionately higher rates than equally credit-worthy whites. Redlining and mortgage discrimination was the norm. It seemed those days came to an end in the 2000s, when mortgage lenders began lending eagerly to anyone they could, and instead of being accused of avoiding minority borrowers, faced accusations of predatory lending in minority communities. However, now the tide has turned once again.

We come back to an ongoing conversation as regards debt and unemployment in America. Last week we spoke with Takeaway and WDET listener Christine Tobin, from southeast Michigan. She told us she believes she was turned down for a job because her credit check came back with a prior bankruptcy.

Lenders typically ask to access someone's credit scores in order to see what kind of loans they have paid back in the past. Agreeing to a credit check has become an expected part of preparing to lease a car, buy a house or rent an apartment. But did you know a potential employer may also check your credit score before you get hired?

In 2009, workplace discrimination against Muslims rose 20 percent to a record 803 claims, according to federal data cited in the New York Times.

Sometimes a word is just a word. But other times, it’s an indicator of something more troubling on the part of the speaker. Take, for example, the word “boy.” When being used to refer to a small child, most of us don’t think twice. But when the word “boy” refers to an adult black man, and the speaker is his white supervisor who’s just passed him up for a promotion, it takes on a much different meaning.

It’s for this reason that John Hithon, an employee of the Tyson chicken processing plant in Gadsden, Alabama, sued his employers for workplace discrimination.

Tennessee became the first state to pass a law which allows businesses to require their employees to speak English at work. Tennessee is leading a trend seen by a number of cities throughout the country, which are implementing laws that allow English-only rules in one form or another.

Discount retailing giant Wal-Mart is facing the largest class action lawsuit in American history. Over one million women say that the corporation pays both salaried and hourly female workers less than their male counterparts.

For this week's work segment, we're asking, How do we know if we're getting paid what we're worth? Is it ever okay to ask our peers about their salaries for comparison's sake? And what can we do if our salary seems to fall below our worth?

Beth Kobliner, Takeaway work contributor and author of “Get a Financial Life,” guides us through the murky waters of determining our worth — and offers advice on what to do if we believe our value exceeds our paycheck.