During an interview for the position of an administrative assistant,you will be conducting the interview of five (5)applicants:

Applicant 1is a 65 year old female who has a 30 year history of working as a secretary and/or administrative assistance for other companies. She shared that she has a gap in her employment history of 15 years while she was a stay at home mother for her 3 children. She also 5 year gap in her employment history while she was caring for her husband while he was undergoing cancer treatments. She is currently raising her 2 grandchildren while her daughter is in rehab for substance abuse

Applicant 2 is a 40 year old female who is recently divorced and has 2 minor children (under 18 years of age). She has not worked outside of the home before, but took several business classes in high school, has a high school degree, and took some more business and computer classes in junior college as well, though she never graduated from junior college. She is willing to take additional college courses as needed to operate any computer programs that she is not familiar with.

Applicant 3 is a 23 year old male who is a current college student. He shared with you that he takes classes in the evening and online, so that he is available to work full time during the hours that are required. He also shared that he is needed a job to help him cover expenses during the next 2 years while he finishes school. He is getting a degree in health care management and his career goal is to get a job in HR at a hospital. He is not married, but is dating.

Applicant 4 is a 60 year old female who was a stay at home mom until 10 years ago when her children had all graduated from high school. At that time she went to a techschool an earned an associates degree as aparalegal. She worked for a local law firm for 3 years, until the law firm was dissolved. Since then, and for the past 5 years, she has not been employed full time, but has held various temporary jobs. This coincided with her husband's retirement from his full time job 5 years ago. Since that time she and her husband have spent two months each winter "snow birding" in Florida.

Applicant 5 is a 60 year old male who took early retirement from his prior full time job of 30 years. He has a bachelor's degree and an MBA. He is overqualified for the position in terms of both education and experience. He tells you that he is looking for a less stressful job that will allow him to earn enough money so that he does not have to dip into his retirement savings.

Consider each applicant and state which employee you would be likely to hire and explain why?

As to each applicant, are there any issues that could subject you to a lawsuit based on discriminatory hiring decisions? If so what are those issues and how can you justify that the decision you made was based on the essential functions of the job?