In United States labor law, a hostile work environment exists when one's behavior within a workplace creates an environment that is difficult or uncomfortable for another person to work in, due to illegal discrimination. Common complaints in sexual harassment lawsuits include fondling, suggestive remarks, sexually-suggestive photos displayed in the workplace, use of sexual language, or off-color jokes. Small matters, annoyances, and isolated incidents are usually not considered to be statutory violations of the discrimination laws. For a violation to impose liability, the conduct must create a work environment that would be intimidating, hostile, or offensive to a reasonable person. An employer can be held liable for failing to prevent these workplace conditions, unless it can prove that it attempted to prevent the harassment and that the employee failed to take advantage of existing harassment counter-measures or tools provided by the employer.
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is a federal agency that was established via the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to administer and enforce civil rights laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints based on an individual's race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information, and retaliation for reporting, participating in, and/or opposing a discriminatory practice.
The Civil Rights Act of 1991 is a United States labor law, passed in response to United States Supreme Court decisions that limited the rights of employees who had sued their employers for discrimination. The Act represented the first effort since the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to modify some of the basic procedural and substantive rights provided by federal law in employment discrimination cases. It provided the right to trial by jury on discrimination claims and introduced the possibility of emotional distress damages and limited the amount that a jury could award. It added provisions to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protections expanding the rights of women to sue and collect compensatory and punitive damages for sexual discrimination or harassment.
Griggs v. Duke Power Co., 401 U.S. 424 (1971), was a court case argued before the Supreme Court of the United States on December 14, 1970. It concerned employment discrimination and the disparate impact theory, and was decided on March 8, 1971. It is generally considered the first case of its type.
Disparate impact in United States labor law refers to practices in employment, housing, and other areas that adversely affect one group of people of a protected characteristic more than another, even though rules applied by employers or landlords are formally neutral. Although the protected classes vary by statute, most federal civil rights laws protect based on race, color, religion, national origin, and sex as protected traits, and some laws include disability status and other traits as well.
Equal employment opportunity is equal opportunity to attain or maintain employment in a company, organization, or other institution. Examples of legislation to foster it or to protect it from eroding include the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which was established by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to assist in the protection of United States employees from discrimination. The law was the first federal law designed to protect most US employees from employment discrimination based upon that employee's race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
Burlington Northern & Santa Fe (BNSF) Railway Co. v. White, 548 U.S. 53 (2006), is a US labor law case of the United States Supreme Court on sexual harassment and retaliatory discrimination. It was a landmark case for retaliation claims. It set a precedent for claims which could be considered retaliatory under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In this case the standard for retaliation against a sexual harassment complainant was revised to include any adverse employment decision or treatment that would be likely to dissuade a "reasonable worker" from making or supporting a charge of discrimination.
Employment discrimination law in the United States derives from the common law, and is codified in numerous state, federal, and local laws. These laws prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics or "protected categories." The United States Constitution also prohibits discrimination by federal and state governments against their public employees. Discrimination in the private sector is not directly constrained by the Constitution, but has become subject to a growing body of federal and state law, including the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Federal law prohibits discrimination in a number of areas, including recruiting, hiring, job evaluations, promotion policies, training, compensation and disciplinary action. State laws often extend protection to additional categories or employers.
The California Fair Employment and Housing Act of 1959, codified as Government Code §§12900 - 12996, is a California statute used to fight sexual harassment and other forms of unlawful discrimination in employment and housing, which was passed on September 18, 1959.
In employment law, a bona fide occupational qualification (BFOQ) (US) or bona fide occupational requirement (BFOR) (Canada) or genuine occupational qualification (GOQ) (UK) is a quality or an attribute that employers are allowed to consider when making decisions on the hiring and retention of employees—a quality that when considered in other contexts would constitute discrimination in violation of civil rights employment law. Such qualifications must be listed in the employment offering.
McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973), is a US employment law case by the United States Supreme Court regarding the burdens and nature of proof in proving a Title VII case and the order in which plaintiffs and defendants present proof. It was the seminal case in the McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting framework.
Crawford v. Nashville, 555 U.S. 271 (2009), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court unanimously ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects an employee who opposes unlawful sexual harassment, but does not report the harassment him or herself.
AT&T Corporation v. Hulteen, 556 U.S. 701 (2009), is a US labor law case of the United States Supreme Court, holding that maternity leave taken before the passage of the 1978 Pregnancy Discrimination Act needed not to be considered in calculating employee pension benefits.
Employment discrimination against persons with criminal records in the United Stateshas been illegal since passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The law, however, still allows an employer to lawfully consider an applicant's or employee's criminal conviction(s) for employment purposes e.g., hiring, retention, promotion, benefits, and delegated duties.
LGBT employment discrimination in the United States is illegal under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity is encompassed by the law's prohibition of employment discrimination on the basis of sex. Prior to the landmark cases Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia and R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes Inc. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (2020), employment protections for LGBT people were patchwork; several states and localities explicitly prohibit harassment and bias in employment decisions on the basis of sexual orientation and/or gender identity, although some only cover public employees. Prior to the Bostock decision, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) interpreted Title VII to cover LGBT employees; the EEOC determined that transgender employees were protected under Title VII in 2012, and extended the protection to encompass sexual orientation in 2015.
County of Washington v. Gunther, 452 U.S. 161 (1981), is a US labor law case concerning discrimination and the lower standards of protection for gender pay because of the Bennett Amendment in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, §703(h).
Altitude Express, Inc. v. Zarda, 590 U.S. ___ (2020), was a landmark United States Supreme Court civil rights case which ruled that under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 employees could not be discriminated against on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes Inc. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 590 U.S. ___ (2020), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case which ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects transgender people from employment discrimination.
Corporation of Presiding Bishop v. Amos, 483 U.S. 327 (1986), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the court decided that the exemption of religious organizations from the prohibition of religious discrimination in employment in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act is constitutional. Appellee Arthur Frank Mayson worked for 16 years in an organization operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was terminated from employment when he "failed to qualify for a temple recommend, that is, a certificate that he is a member of the Church and eligible to attend its temples." He filed suit in district court, arguing that his firing violated discrimination on the basis of religion in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The district court agreed. The case was appealed directly to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that Title VII's exemption of religious organizations from the prohibition on religious discrimination, even in secular activities, did not violate the First Amendment.
Bostock v. Clayton County, 590 U.S. ___ (2020), was a landmark United States Supreme Court civil rights case in which the Court held that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects employees against discrimination because they are gay or transgender.
