The Equal Pay Act amended the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) to add protection for gender based differences in pay. The main point of the law is that all employees should receive the same wage for same or similar work. In order for an employer to be liable under the EPA, the employee must show:
- different wages are paid to employees of the opposite sex;
- the employees perform substantially equal work on jobs requiring equal skill, effort and responsibility; and
- the jobs are performed under similar working conditions.
I try to avoid political talk in my blog posts, and just focus on the law, but it is important to address a few political points when discussing the EPA. President Obama’s Administration has made equal pay for women a high priority, and there is a equal pay task force that is investigating and enforcing the EPA. One of the main reasons for the task force is that 2013 marks 50 years since the passage of the EPA, and the government wants to take stock on where gender based pay discrimination is in this country.
Because of the increase in investigation, it is very important for a company owner to review the pay for the company’s employees to make sure everything is in compliance with the EPA and FLSA. As I mentioned in my FLSA blog (click here), part of my Bottorff Business Review is to review the jobs and pay of the employees to help analyze any liability the company may have.
Luke D. Bottorff
Nashville Business Lawyer
McNulty & Associates, PLLC
211 Printers Alley, Suite 400
Nashville, TN 37201
615-829-8250 x3
[email protected]
