Kia Franklin
Fair Warning… On DMI Blog
Check out Antoine Morris’ post on DMI Blog:
Last week, Republicans blocked a fair pay bill that would effectively overturn a flawed ruling by the Supreme Court in a wage discrimination case, Lilly Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co. The measure was designed to bring the law in line with Congressional intent of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the Court’s own precedents, and restore fairness to the workplace.For nearly 20 years, Lilly Ledbetter was paid less than men with less seniority than her as a supervisor at a Goodyear plant in Alabama for doing the same job. But as soon as she received an anonymous note that made her aware of the discrimination, Ms. Ledbetter filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. A federal court agreed Ms. Ledbetter was being discriminated against and a jury awarded her more than $3 million in damages and back pay before the judge reduced the amount to $360,000 due to a damages cap prescribed by the law. But the Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision ruled that Lilly Ledbetter filed her claim too late and was not entitled to compensation.
The 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits workplace discrimination on the basis of race, sex, creed, disability, age, but also requires that a plaintiff file a complaint within the 180 days “after the alleged unlawful employment practice occurred.” For decades, the Supreme Court and other courts understood this provision to mean that employees could sue within 180 of receiving from their last - not just their first - discriminatory paycheck, since each check represented a related yet distinct instance of discrimination.
Justice Samuel Alito, however, disagreed with that interpretation. Writing for the majority, Justice Alito argued that Ms. Ledbetter should have filed her suit with the EEOC within 180 days of the original decision to pay her differently. “Current effects alone cannot breathe life into prior, uncharged discrimination,” declared the Justice. Apparently, it did not make much of an impression on the conservative bloc on the Supreme Court that pay discrimination often occurs in small increments across time and the secrecy surrounding salary pay in the workplace makes it nearly impossible to sue as soon as a worker receives her first discriminatory pay check as Justice Ruth Ginsburg noted in her dissent.
The Ledbetter Fair Pay Act sponsored by Senator Ted Kennedy would have simply restored anti-discrimination law back to its pre-Ledbetter status. But even the status quo was too radical for certain pro-business hardliners in the Senate. {Keep Reading}
Posted at 9:48 AM, Apr 28, 2008 in Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)
Comments
"The Ledbetter Fair Pay Act sponsored by Senator Ted Kennedy would have simply restored anti-discrimination law back to its pre-Ledbetter status."
That's a remarkable lie. Please cite the Supreme Court case that held an employee could sue over a decision a long-dead employer made thirty years ago.
Posted by: Ted | April 28, 2008 10:49 AM
"Lilly Ledbetter was paid less than men with less seniority than her as a supervisor at a Goodyear plant in Alabama for doing the same job."
This sentence has gotten kicked around a lot. And it's true. But it doesn't tell the whole story.
First, the pay in question was not based on seniority, but on each employee's evaluation. Thus, mentioning seniority is nothing more than slieght of hand.
Second, while Ledbetter was getting paid less than some men "for the same job," men were being paid less than other men "for the same job." In other words, everyone was being paid different amounts. It was a varying pay scale based on evaluation. In fact, the difference between the lowest and highest paid man was more than twice the difference between the lowest paid man and Ledbetter.
In short, the undisputed pay statistics prove nothing more than: (i) there was a varying pay scale; and (ii) the lowest paid person was female.
Of course, there may have been discriminatory intent behind the evaluations leading to Ledbetter's lower pay. And such was found by the jury. But it isn't proven by the pay statistics as the constant calls-to-arms lead one to believe.
Posted by: Lawyer | April 28, 2008 06:04 PM