{"id":1049,"date":"2011-11-17T07:55:38","date_gmt":"2011-11-17T12:55:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www3.law.harvard.edu\/journals\/hlpr\/?p=1049"},"modified":"2015-10-02T15:25:46","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T15:25:46","slug":"pay-secrecy-and-the-eeoc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/2011\/11\/17\/pay-secrecy-and-the-eeoc\/","title":{"rendered":"Pay Secrecy and the EEOC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anne King\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

A recent decision in an EEOC case against retail chain Sterling Jewelers highlights the issue of pay secrecy in the workplace \u2013 in particular the common employer practice of prohibiting employees from discussing wages with one another.\u00a0 Pay secrecy may stem from a formal employer policy, informal practices or customs, or norms of workplace culture.\u00a0 The threat of disciplinary action or retaliation is a powerful deterrent, and will keep many employees from talking about their pay with co-workers.\u00a0 But this makes it all the more difficult for employees to become aware of pay discrimination or wage and hour violations.<\/p>\n

The phenomenon of pay secrecy has come up in some of the Supreme Court\u2019s most significant recent employment cases.\u00a0\u00a0Lilly Ledbetter\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0found out that Goodyear Tire was paying her less than male coworkers only after she received an anonymous note.\u00a0 And the\u00a0Wal-Mart\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0plaintiffs uncovered evidence of a company policy prohibiting employees from talking about their wages.<\/span><\/p>\n

In\u00a0EEOC v. Sterling Jewelers, Inc.<\/a><\/em>, a magistrate judge recommended enforcement of an administrative subpoena that sought documents relating to Sterling\u2019s policy of prohibiting pay discussions among employees.\u00a0 (The case is one of several lawsuits against Sterling, all alleging widespread sex discrimination at the company.)\u00a0 The EEOC based the subpoena on a document it received from a former employee, which stated that Sterling disciplined her for discussing pay with co-workers, in violation of the company\u2019s \u201ccode of conduct.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sterling Jewelers<\/em>\u00a0takes an interesting approach to the problem of pay secrecy. Sterling argued that it shouldn\u2019t have to comply with the subpoena because it doesn\u2019t, in fact, maintain a policy prohibiting employee discussions of pay.\u00a0 But the court didn\u2019t find this convincing at all \u2013 and reasoned that Sterling\u2019s position actually contradicted its protestation that the subpoena imposed a significant burden.\u00a0 Notably, the court emphasized that the EEOC generally has the authority, in investigating a charge of discrimination, to determine whether an employer maintains a pay secrecy policy. That\u2019s the case, the court said, even when there is no other evidence of such a policy.<\/p>\n

This has to be the right answer.\u00a0 Because in a legal system where employees will find it extremely difficult to bring class actions against their employers, the EEOC\u2019s investigation and enforcement capacity is especially crucial.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Anne King\u00a0 A recent decision in an EEOC case against retail chain Sterling Jewelers highlights the issue of pay secrecy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peZQka-gV","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1049\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}