...just for being older, that is.
The Supreme Court issued
a recent ruling that may have a dramatic effect on workforce management issues, as it places on employers the burden of proving that a layoff or other action that hurts older workers more than others was based not on age but on some other “reasonable factor.”
What is such a reasonable factor? If you've got some workforce reductions in your future, you'd better start quantifying them, and quickly:
The laid-off Knolls Atomic workers won their case before a jury, but the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit overturned the verdict on the ground that the employees had not refuted the reasonableness of the laboratory’s selection process.
In his majority opinion overturning the appeals court’s decision, Justice David H. Souter said the structure of the statute made it clear that the defense was “entirely the responsibility of the party raising it.” He said that by using the phrase “otherwise prohibited,” Congress meant to offer employers “an excuse or justification for behavior that, standing alone, violates the statute’s prohibition,” but only if they could prove their entitlement to the defense.
“There is no denying that putting employers to the work of persuading fact-finders that their choices are reasonable makes it harder and costlier to defend,” Justice Souter said. But that is a complaint to make to Congress, he added.
Justice Antonin Scalia wrote a concurring opinion to say that the court was properly adopting the position of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Ironically, the Times story points out that "the only dissenter was Justice Clarence Thomas, who once headed that commission."
As stated, the decision was nearly unanimous, with the justices breaking 7-1 for the majority. *Interestingly,* the right of habeas corpus, enshrined in Western legal tradition since the Magna Carta, was only
barely upheld by this same court in a a 5-4 decision.
Don't Fire Your Older Workers
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