system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
CMV: It should be illegal to ask job / school / housing applicants for race

Race is a protected class. It is illegal to discriminate on hiring, school, and housing based on race. So I don't understand why the race question is legally allowed on these types of applications. They certainly don't ask for religion. Having a race question on the application officially unblinds the process. Receivers of the applications might be be able to figure out the race anyway based on the name, but at a minimum, it increases the cost of doing of doing so. We should not make it easier for institutions to be racist.

Posting from the USA.

EDIT - my OP is about making it illegal to put on all applications, not specifically about job applications.

EDIT - adding my personal experience. I was recently asked to put down my race for a mortgage application. Since it was covid and done over the phone, the banker (apologetically) read the disclaimer that if I choose not to answer, a selection would be picked for me based on other information on my application, or physical apperance. This was at Citibank. I was shocked.
gpt
The hiring manager doesn't get to see race gender or ethnicity info.

It's used by HR to see who the applicants are so they know if they're hiring process eliminate non white candidates or if they're only getting white candidates.