Law Commons^™

Given Equal Weight Under The Law: Expanding Title Vii Protections To Prohibit Weight Discrimination, Chelsea L. Yedinak

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

Approximately half of Americans have an overweight or obese body mass index (BMI), yet weight discrimination is legal in nearly every jurisdiction. This means employers can set BMI limits, maximum weights, waist sizes, and more with no legal consequences. This Note examines the history of anti-fat bias and weight discrimination and how that motivates weight discrimination in employment and in the law generally. It then discusses possible solutions. Currently, most scholars propose prohibiting weight discrimination on a state level through legislation similar to Michigan’s Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act or on a federal level by recognizing obesity as a disability protected …

Baby Steps: Why The Florida Supreme Court’S New Parental Leave Continuance Rule Reinvigorates The Fmla’S Underlying Gender Equity Goals Within The Legal Profession And Why More States Should Follow Suit, Katie B. Miesner

FIU Law Review

Although women are enrolling in law school and joining the legal profession in significant numbers, law firms are struggling to retain female lawyers. This poses a significant challenge to achieving gender equity at the highest levels of the legal profession, prompting several important questions: Why are women leaving the profession early; what policies or changes should be implemented to address this problem; and who is best suited to lead these efforts? One of the main reasons women leave the profession early is due to their disproportionate caregiving responsibilities. In response, both public and private measures have been introduced to address …

Pretext After Bostock—Disproving One Of The Employer’S Reasons Is Enough, Robert S. Mantell

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

When an employer gives a pretextual reason for an employee’s termination, that falsehood can help prove that the true reason was discrimination. The dishonesty constitutes “affirmative evidence of guilt.” The trier of fact may “infer the ultimate fact of discrimination from the falsity of the employer’s explanation.” However, when an employer provides multiple reasons for firing an employee, there has been a split of opinion whether the plaintiff must disprove one or all of those reasons.

The Supreme Court’s recent discussion of multiple motives in Bostock v. Clayton County provides the tools to resolve this split and compels rejection of …

Third-Party Retaliation Problems, Alex B. Long

Emory Law Journal

No abstract provided.

To Bar Or Not To Bar: Title I Of The Ada And After-Acquired Evidence Of A Plaintiff's Failure To Satisfy Job Prerequisites, Kathryn Johnson-Monfort

William & Mary Business Law Review

Through enactment of Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990, Congress unequivocally resolved to prohibit discrimination on the basis of disability in the workplace. However, distortions have since created loopholes through which disability-based employment discrimination may freely slip. An enforcement regulation promulgated by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) enables such circumvention of the ADA by creating an additional prima facie requirement: a plaintiff must not only be able to perform the essential functions of the position as required by the statute, but must also satisfy all job-related requirements of the position as demanded by the …

Working On The Other Side Of The Fence: Relief For Incarcerated Individuals After Employment Discrimination, Hannah C. Merrill

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

One of America’s largest workforces, comprised of 1.5 million incarcerated workers, remains unprotected by employment discrimination statutes and vulnerable to abuse from a system designed to exploit their labor. This Note highlights the effects of the lack of protection against employment discrimination for incarcerated workers. This Note will analyze the circuit split regarding the application of employment discrimination statutes to prisoners based on varying understandings of the term “employee” and explain why both approaches fail incarcerated workers. Although one approach bars suit from incarcerated employees altogether, the other only allows suit when the incarcerated individual is working in an “optional” …

Disaggregated Discrimination And The Rise Of Identity Politics, George Rutherglen

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Who Tells Your Story: The Legality Of And Shift In Racial Preferences Within Casting Practices, Nicole Ligon

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Analytical Nightmare: The Materially Adverse Action Requirement In Disparate Treatment Cases, Esperanza N. Sanchez

Catholic University Law Review

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 expressly prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of an individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Since its passage, however, federal courts have imported an adverse employment action requirement into Title VII jurisprudence despite its absence from the statutory language. Inconsistent determinations as to which employment actions qualify as sufficiently adverse under Title VII have resulted in an analytical confusion, yielding anemic anti-discrimination protections that, in effect, shelter invidious employment practices from liability. This Note argues that the anti-discrimination jurisprudence surrounding the adverse action requirement diametrically opposes both the letter …

Data-Driven Discrimination At Work, Pauline T. Kim

William & Mary Law Review

A data revolution is transforming the workplace. Employers are increasingly relying on algorithms to decide who gets interviewed, hired, or promoted. Although data algorithms can help to avoid biased human decision-making, they also risk introducing new sources of bias. Algorithms built on inaccurate, biased, or unrepresentative data can produce outcomes biased along lines of race, sex, or other protected characteristics. Data mining techniques may cause employment decisions to be based on correlations rather than causal relationships; they may obscure the basis on which employment decisions are made; and they may further exacerbate inequality because error detection is limited and feedback …

Balancing Employer And Employee Interests In Social Media Disputes, Tara R. Flomenhoft

Labor & Employment Law Forum

No abstract provided.

Employment Discrimination: Have The Federal Courts Reached A Consensus On How To Interpret Title Vii Claims Alleged By Plaintiffs Who Identify As Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Or Transgender?, Larkin Nicholas

Labor & Employment Law Forum

No abstract provided.

An Overture To Equality: Preventing Subconscious Sex And Gender Biases From Influencing Hiring Decisions, Christy Krawietz

Seattle University Law Review

In many industries, women are less likely than men to be hired, and research suggests that this is due to subconscious gender bias rather than meritorious difference. To combat this bias, some orchestras use gender-blind auditions to hire their musicians. Orchestral hopefuls sit behind a screen to play their pieces, and directors listen to determine whom they want to hire. Some orchestras require applicants to remove their shoes before walking onstage, as even the perceived sound of high heels can affect a director’s decision. Before instituting gender-blind auditions, the top five American orchestras had fewer than five percent women players. …

Why Title Vii's Participation Clause Needs To Be Broadly Interpreted To Protect Those Involved In Internal Investigations, May M. Mansour

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

This Note argues that this narrow interpretation of the statute is contrary to the intention and aim of Title VII and, in turn, should be interpreted more broadly. Part I of this Note gives a brief explanation of the meaning and purpose of Title VII's anti-retaliation provision. Part II focuses on some of the cases that have limited the application of the participation clause to employees who are involved in formal EEOC proceedings. In particular, it focuses on the most recent Second Circuit case, Townsend v. Benjamin Enterprises, Inc., to examine the dangers presented by such a limited …

Employment Discrimination Against Bisexuals: An Empirical Study, Ann E. Tweedy, Karen Yescavage

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

“Justice Is What Love Looks Like In Public”: How The Affordable Care Act Falls Short On Transgender Health Care Access, Rachel C. Kurzweil

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

The Use And Misuse Of Econometric Evidence In Employment Discrimination Cases, Joni Hersch, Blair Druhan Bullock

Washington and Lee Law Review

Statistical analyses play an important role in employment discrimination cases, as the Supreme Court has long recognized. Regression analysis can help a plaintiff establish a claim of discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by showing that, even when controlling for relevant characteristics, individuals of a certain class were treated differently than other employees or applicants. It can also help a defendant rebut such a claim by showing that differential treatment was due to characteristics other than being a member of a protected class. Yet, too often, opposing experts present invalid rebuttal evidence that the jury …

The Gay Accent, Gender, And Title Vii Employment Discrimination, Ryan Castle

Seattle University Law Review

While race, religion, ethnicity, and sex will always remain salient social issues in our nation, sexual orientation is currently at the forefront of our national debate and will likely not abate in the foreseeable future. Federal courts, for example, struggle in differentiating sex, gender, and sexuality when adjudicating Title VII employment discrimination claims. Because Title VII does not protect employees from sexual orientation-based discrimination, plaintiffs who are or are perceived to be of a sexual minority have difficulty proving a valid sex-based discrimination claim in federal court. This difficulty arises because one cannot perceive sex, gender, and sexuality without muddling …

The Dismantling Of Mcdonnell Douglas V. Green: The High Court Muddies The Evidentiary Waters In Circumstantial Discrimination Cases, Melissa A. Essary

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Disability Cause Lawyers, Michael E. Waterstone, Michael Ashley Stein, David B. Wilkins

William & Mary Law Review

There is a vast and growing cause lawyering literature demonstrating how attorneys and their relationship to social justice movements matter greatly for law’s ability to engender progress. But to date, there has been no examination of the work of ADA disability cause lawyers as cause lawyers. Similarly, despite an extensive literature focused on the ADA’s revolutionary civil rights aspects and the manner in which the Supreme Court’s interpretation of that statute has stymied potential transformation of American society, no academic accounts of disability law have focused on the lawyers who bring these cases. This Article responds to these scholarly voids. …

The New Danger Of Being Fired: Section 525(B)’S Disproportionate Effect On Older Workers And A Call To Amend, Jina Kim Yun

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

This Note explores an increasingly perverse effect of an anti-discriminatory provision of the Bankruptcy Code on numerous Americans who have declared personal bankruptcies after the recent economic recession of 2007. Under § 525(b) of the Bankruptcy Code, a private employer is not prohibited from barring a former debtor from prospective employment based on a past insolvency. This provision has had an immense impact on the large number of former debtors seeking the fresh start that bankruptcy law is meant to provide. With the dramatic increase in the number of personal bankruptcies, this Note argues that such an impact is overly …

Culture Matters: Cultural Differences In The Reporting Of Employment Discrimination Claims, Andrew Tae-Hyun Kim

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

Why don’t reasonable people complain about discrimination? Behavioral science evidence points to structural barriers, like the fear of retaliation and the lack of sociocultural power in the workplace, that discourage employees from reporting. By not reporting perceived discriminatory or harassing conduct, the employee not only underutilizes Title VII’s administrative scheme—which was created precisely to remedy and deter such conduct—but also incurs a heavy litigative cost in employer liability suits. This Article claims that for certain minority groups, namely Asian Americans, certain cultural differences significantly heighten those structural barriers and consequently leave them underprotected in the legal system. The Article locates …

Disparate Impact Realism, Amy L. Wax

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Curb Your Enthusiasm: A Note On Employment Discrimination Lawsuits In China, Jiefeng Lu

Richmond Journal of Global Law & Business

No abstract provided.

Extending The Vision: An Empowerment Identity Approach To Work-Family Regulation As Applied To School Involvement Leave Statuses, Kirsten K. Davis

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

Using school involvement leave legislation as the focus for analysis, this article proposes the “empowerment identity” approach to work-family legislation as an alternative or complement to the commonly used accommodation and antidiscrimination approaches. In many households, working parents struggle to meet routine demands of parenting, such as caring for a sick child or attending a child’s school activity. Interestingly, one of the most common forms of state-level legislation designed to address the routine demands of parenting is school involvement leave legislation. Although state school involvement leave statutes vary widely in how and for what reasons they permit time away from …

How The New Economics Can Improve Employment Discrimination Law, And How Economics Can Survive The Demise Of The "Rational Actor", Scott A. Moss, Peter H. Huang

William & Mary Law Review

Much employment discrimination law is premised on a purely money-focused "reasonable" employee, the sort who can be made whole with damages equal to lost wages, and who does not hesitate to challenge workplace discrimination. This type of "rational" actor populated older economic models but has been since modified by behavioral economics and research on happiness. Behavioral and traditional economists alike have analyzed broad employment policies, such as the wisdom of discrimination statutes, but the devil is in the details of employment law. On the critical damages-and liability issues the Supreme Court and litigators face regularly, the law essentially ignores the …

Diversity And Discrimination: A Look At Complex Bias, Minna J. Kotkin

William & Mary Law Review

Multiple claims have become a fixture of employment discrimination litigation. It is common, if not ubiquitous, for court opinions to begin with a version of the following litany: 'Plaintiff brings this action under Title VII and the ADEA for race, age, and gender discrimination. "Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) statistics show exponential growth in multiple claims in part because its intake procedures lead claimants to describe their multiple identities, at a time when they have little basis upon which to parse a specific category of bias. But increased diversity in workplace demographics suggests that frequently, disparate treatment may in fact …

Is Labor Really Cheap In China - Compliance With Labor And Employment Laws, Marisa Anne Pagnattaro

San Diego International Law Journal

This Article details China’s the growing body of labor and employment laws. Specifically, this research analyzes major labor and employment law developments in China, including the newly adopted Labor Contract Law, employment discrimination sexual harassment, wages, workplace health and safety, worker privacy, and dispute resolution. The ramifications of this developing legal landscape on U.S. companies doing business in China are also discussed.

The Failure Of Punitive Damages In Employment Discrimination Cases: A Call For Change, Joseph A. Seiner

William & Mary Law Review

Punitive damages were described by one early court as "an unsightly and an unhealthy excrescence." Although views toward punitive relief have changed over the years, the debate over the availability of exemplary damages in the judicial system has remained controversial. No place is that controversy more aptly demonstrated than in employment discrimination law, where punitive damages first became available in an amendment to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 after a bitter congressional debate. Almost a decade ago, in Kolstad v. American Dental Association, the Supreme Court provided guidance on how punitive damages should be applied in …

Contributory Disparate Impacts In Employment Discrimination Law, Peter Siegelman

William & Mary Law Review

An employer who adopts a facially neutral employment practice that disqualifies a larger proportion of protected-class applicants than others is liable under a disparate impact theory. Defendants can escape liability if they show that the practice is justified by business necessity. But demonstrating business necessity requires costly validation studies that themselves impose a significant burden on defendants-upwards of $100,000 according to some estimates. This Article argues that an employer should have a defense against disparate impact liability if it can show that protected-class applicants failed to make reasonable efforts to train or prepare for a job related test. That is, …