Not withstanding the anti-discrimination laws in this country, and all the cases you read about, we often hear of women who as Hillary Clinton says “have not cracked the glass ceiling” and find out that they are being paid less in terms of actual compensation and benefits than their male colleagues. The question is, does that person have a claim? To determine this, we ask a number of questions. The first question is whether or not the jobs that those colleagues have are actually the same job the female employee has. If they are not, then we really can’t make a determination of discrimination on the basis of gender. If we can however as certain that the jobs are indeed the same jobs, and that those employees have the same skills and background, then a female employee may be able to commence a lawsuit for the difference in pay. Some people have heard about the ‘Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act’ which was turned into law by President Obama in the last number of years. This was an employee of a government agency who found out after many years that she and other women had been routinely paid less than other employees. The act that President Obama signed into law basically gave employees the right to go back over a number of years and collect that pay.
This informational blog post was provided by Jane Gould, an experienced New York Attorney for Employees.
