Question

Betty has been working at her firm for 10 years. There are five employees in her department that do her same job. The other four employees are male. She recently learned that she was hired at a lower salary than her male counterparts, and that she is paid approximately 10% lower that all of her colleagues. If Betty decides to sue her employer for sex-based discrimination, what information would she have to show to support a cause of action?

. if the equal rights amendements ratification is successful, how would betty's legal situation be different?

Answer 1

Part A:

To successfully raise a claim under the Equal Pay Act, you must show that two employees, one male and one female:

• are working in the same place
• are doing equal work, and
• are receiving unequal pay.

You must also show that the employees in those jobs received unequal pay because of their genders.

You can file a lawsuit under the Equal Pay Act without first filing a complaint with the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission). Unlike Title VII, the Equal Pay Act does not require proof that the employer acted intentionally when discriminating. That can make an Equal Pay Act case much easier to win in court.

Part B: if the Equal Rights Amendments ratification goes through it will solidity betty's position if she wants to peruse this inequality below are few things about ERA.

• Without the ERA, the U.S. Constitution does not explicitly guarantee that the rights it protects are held equally by all citizens without regard to sex. The first — and still the only — right that the U.S. Constitution specifically affirms and applies equally to women and men is the right to vote.

• The equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment was first applied to sex discrimination only in 1971, and it has never been interpreted to grant equal rights on the basis of sex in the uniform and inclusive way that the ERA would.

• The ERA would provide a clearer judicial standard for deciding cases of sex discrimination. Not every state in the U.S. has ratified the Equal Rights Amendment, and therefore federal and state courts are inconsistent in their rulings regarding claims of sexual discrimination claims. The ERA would help clarify sex discrimination jurisprudence and conclusively invalidate the claim of late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia that the Constitution, specifically the 14th Amendment, does not protect against sex discrimination (reported in California Lawyer, January 2011).

• The ERA would provide a strong legal defense against a rollback of the significant advances in women's rights that have been achieved since the mid–20th century.

• Without the ERA women regularly — and occasionally men — have to fight long, expensive, and difficult legal battles in an effort to prove that their rights are equal to those of the other sex.

• The ERA would improve the United States' standing in the world community with respect to human rights. The governing documents of many other countries affirm legal gender equality, however imperfect the global implementation of that ideal may be.