A new piece
of legislation that has recently been introduced aims to modify a Supreme Court
decision that made it very difficult for older workers to prove that they were
discriminated against based on their age.
The bill is
called the Protecting Older Workers against Discrimination Act, and has been
sponsored by Senator’s, Tom Harkin, Democrat-Iowa, Chuck Grassley
Republican-Iowa and Patrick Leahy Democrat-Vermont. The bill is designed to
modify a critical Supreme Court decision that came in 2009 in Gross vs. FBL
Financial Services Inc.
Prior to
that Supreme Court decision, if a worker could show that there was at least one
other motivating factor in a discrimination-related action in the workplace,
then the employer had to prove that he would have taken the very same action
even in the absence of the discrimination. However, after the Supreme Court
2009 decision, employees are now required to prove that the employer would not
have taken the adverse action had it not been for the employee’s age. That means a
significantly higher burden of proof on the employee to prove age discrimination.
This makes
it harder for older workers to be able to make their case when they want to sue
their employer. The number of lawsuits being filed by older workers is only
likely to increase as the senior workforce in the country increases.
The
incidence of workplace-related age bias is especially high in California’s Silicon
Valley, where employees in their 40s are judged to be aged,
and therefore behind the times. According to some estimates, by 2016, as many
as one- third of the American workforce will be above the age of 50.
1 comment:
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