Orange County gender discrimination lawyer

Gender Discrimination Rampant at Pinterest, Former Exec Alleges in Lawsuit

September 10, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

Pinterest, a $21 billion company that markets mostly to women on its virtual pinboards, is accused by its former chief operating officer of rampant sexism, harassment, retaliation and wrongful termination. She alleges she was fired for speaking out about disparate treatment between female and male top executives.

As The New York Times reports, the former COO says in her San Francisco Superior Court lawsuit that she was excluded out of key meetings, given professional feedback that was highly gendered and she was paid less than her male peers when she was first brought on. She learned the pay disparity after the company filed to go public last year. She talked about how decisions were often made in informal discussions among male colleagues; the “meeting after the meeting.” Despite being the No. 2 executive, she said she endured a culture of constant exclusion. When she ultimately spoke up about it, she said, she was dismissed (the dispute compared to a domestic squabble), maligned (told she wasn’t working collaboratively enough) and ultimately fired.

As our Orange County gender discrimination lawyers can explain, this type of discriminatory action in the upper echelons of corporate America may look slightly different than at other levels, particularly as it can be more subtle. But one thing our employment lawyers have noted no matter the pay grade is that workers who speak out about unfair treatment may find themselves may find themselves a target of demotion, loss of benefits or firing. This in itself is an illegal act called retaliation. Continue Reading ›

Wave of Wal-Mart Gender Discrimination Lawsuits in California to Follow Flood of Florida Claims

March 1, 2019 | by Nassiri Law

Gender discrimination lawsuits are piling up once more against retail giant Wal-Mart, with nearly 100 unfair wage and hour claims filed in Florida and more expected in both California and Ohio later this year. Orange County gender discrimination lawyers are quite familiar with a long history of allegations against Wal-Mart by female workers alleging they were discrimination against for years – in some cases decades.

Perhaps most notable was the 2011 case of Wal-Mart v. Dukes, in which late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the 5-4 majority, reversed the certification of a national class of female employees of Wal-Mart, finding it inconsistent with Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(a), which requires those seeking class certification to prove the the whole class of plaintiffs has either common questions of law or fact. Despite basically being too expansive, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s dissent described the company’s corporate culture as being “suffused” with gender bias.

Since then, the namesake plaintiff of the Dukes case has died. But many of the women who were originally part of that class she filed originally in 2001 are now in this action. When Dukes case was dismissed, the remaining claims were left under the consideration of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Late last year, the EEOC granted them permission to sue for gender discrimination, citing violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That federal law prohibits employers from discriminating against workers on the basis of (among other things) their gender. Disparate treatment in the workplace resulting in systemic adverse treatment of a protected class is considered grounds for a Title VII claim.

New Hampshire Joins in States Fighting Gender Identity Discrimination

June 13, 2018 | by Nassiri Law

New Hampshire has joined California in protecting residents from gender identity discrimination with the passing of House Bill 1319, which was signed into law by Gov. Chris Sununu. The bill added gender discrimination to the state’s current civil rights statute, which already includes age, sex, religious creed, race, color, national origin, physical or mental disability, familial status, and sexual orientation. By doing so, the updated law would prohibit discrimination based on gender identity in regards to housing, employment, and public accommodations.

According to a report from New Hampshire Union Leader, the bill received support not only from the governor and state legislature, but also the American Civil Liberties Union, the Human Rights Commission, several health establishments, and a New Hampshire police chief association.

Gender identity primarily involves giving people the freedom to express their gender however they see fit, regardless of the sex they were assigned at birth. Transgender people, for example, would benefit from such protections. In recent years some have argued that gender identity discrimination falls under sex discrimination, including the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and former Attorney General Eric Holder. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, however, has attempted to end this line of thinking. He released a memo last fall that expressly excluded gender identity from sex discrimination protections under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. A spokesperson from the Justice Department claimed any attempts to extend those protections was an exaggeration of the laws Congress put in place. This has turned gender into a partisan issue with transgender citizens in the crosshairs. Continue Reading ›

New Employment Law Bolsters Equal Pay for Equal Work, Targets Gender Discrimination

March 24, 2018 | by Nassiri Law

Gender equality in the workplace has been a long and hard-fought struggle, and it’s not over yet. Recently, a pay equity bill passed in Washington state that will make it more clear what constitutes wage and gender discrimination, ultimately fortifying employee rights.

HB 1506 updates a 75-year-old wage law making it a misdemeanor to discriminate based on gender, according to a report from KING 5 News. This measure will not only make it illegal to discriminate based on gender, but levelthe playing field for all employees. This is achieved in two substantial ways.

First, the measure defines what it means for “similarly employed” workers to receive equal compensation. As our employment attorneys can explain, many companies skirt the issue of “equal pay for equal work” by giving employees different titles, even though the tasks and work load are similar. In the past, employers could argue that because the jobs technically weren’t the same, wage comparisons were not relevant. By moving the goalpost to include “similarly employed” workers as deserving equal pay, Washington has removed this loophole and made sure that those with similar responsibilities and skills remain on a level playing field. Continue Reading ›

Women Face Employment Consequences for Reproductive Health Choices

February 5, 2017 | by Nassiri Law

During a recent Senate confirmation hearing to the post of Health and Human Services Secretary, Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), stated he did not believe companies were allowed to terminate women from their jobs for their reproductive choices. Specifically, he indicated that the right to use birth control was not something that affected women’s employment status.

In fact, as our gender discrimination attorneys know, this is far from true.

Price is a conservative politician, and as such, he has been vocal and active in his anti-abortion stance. And in 2015, he voted for a resolution that would have eliminated protections for women in the District of Columbia from being fired due to their reproductive health choices. That resolution indicated at the top that it opposed the vote by the D.C. Council in favor of the Reproductive Health Non-Discrimination Act, the purpose of which is to shield women from discrimination at work on the basis of the decisions they make in favor of their reproductive health. However, a the recent confirmation hearing, he insisted that the measure he voted for in D.C. would not have meant that employers could discriminate against workers based on their reproductive choices. In a back-and-forth with Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), Price stated he did not think employers ought to be able to or are currently allowed to discriminate against someone based on their health status or the medications (including birth control) that they use. Continue Reading ›

Pao California Gender Discrimination Lawsuit Against Venture Capital Firm Goes to Trial

February 23, 2015 | by Nassiri Law

A high-profile gender discrimination and retaliation lawsuit is underway in Silicon Valley, with one of the area’s oldest venture capital firms in the center of the storm.

In her complaint, Ellen Pao claims she was subjected to five years of retaliation after she refused sexual advances from several of the senior partners at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. As a former partner of the firm, she stated she and other female workers were discriminated against when it came to matters of pay and promotions. She also said she was pressured into having an affair with a senior executive, and after she ended it, the discrimination began – and continued for the better part of five years. She is seeking $16 million in compensation for back pay, future wage losses and other damages as a result of the alleged discriminatory conduct.

The case is being closely watched as it has underscored longstanding issues of sexual inequality in the field of technology. As a result, many technological firms have started releasing diversity data regarding their workforces, and have vowed to make improvements with regard to racial and gender balances.