Addison Morris at 3:33 PM ET
Monday, June 17, 2013
Texas governor vetoes bill intended to prevent pay discrimination
Texas governor vetoes bill intended to prevent pay discrimination
Addison Morris at 3:33 PM ET
[JURIST] Texas Governor Rick Perry [official website] on Friday vetoed [press release] a bill
[HB 950 text] intended to prevent payment discrimination and make it
easier for women to obtain equal pay. The bill was passed by the Texas House on April 25 in a 79-50 vote, and by the Senate
[official websites] on May 22 with a vote of 16-15. In a press release,
Perry explained that he vetoed the proposed bill because it "duplicates
federal law, which already allows employees who feel they have been
discriminated against through compensation to file a claim with the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission [official website]." Had the bill passed, it would have put Texas state laws in line with the federal Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act [S.181 materials]. Forty-two states have passed similar equal pay bills.
In January 2009 US President Barack Obama signed into law [JURIST
report] the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, extending the
deadline for employees to sue their employers for unequal pay
discrimination under a disparate treatment theory. The law's
"clarification" of equal pay protections effectively overturned the 2007
Supreme Court decision in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co [opinion, PDF; JURIST report],
which held that "a pay-setting decision is a discrete act that occurs
at a particular point in time" and that the statutory period for filing a
discrimination claim with the EEOC begins when that discrete act
occurs. The new law altered Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
[text] to clarify that the six-month statute of limitations controlling
racial, gender, or national origin employment discrimination suits is
applicable to each instance of a discriminatory practice, including the
receipt of each paycheck, not only to the initial discriminatory act.
The initial lawsuit was brought by Lilly Ledbetter, a Goodyear employee
for 19 years, who alleged that she received less pay than male
counterparts because of gender discrimination. The Supreme Court upheld
the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit's reversal [opinion, PDF] of a district court decision awarding Ledbetter $360,000 in damages.
Addison Morris at 3:33 PM ET
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment