Compliance March 24, 2003

EEOC Launches New Mediation Pilot Program

March 24, 2003 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - The US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has implemented a new voluntary mediation pilot program providing private sector employees another avenue to pursue discrimination charges filed with the EEOC.
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>The new “referral back” mediation pilot, which will be carried out at the district office level, gives an individual who has filed a discrimination charge against a participating employer the option to have their charge referred back to the employer’s internal dispute resolution department, according to a news release.

>Should the employee choose such a route, the charge will be suspended for not more than 60 days to provide the charging party and the employer an opportunity to resolve the dispute using the employer’s dispute program.   If the dispute is resolved, the charge will be closed pursuant to the EEOC’s procedures governing withdrawal and settlement of charges. Otherwise, EEOC proceedings on the original charge will recommence.

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Stipulations

>However, the mediation program is not without its caveats.   The provisions of the new pilot dictate that the EEOC will refer charges back to those employer-provided internal dispute resolution programs that meet the following criteria:

  • employee participation is voluntary
  • the program has clearly written procedures
  • the employer program is free to the employee
  • the program addresses all claims and relief under EEOC-enforced statutes
  • settlements obtained must be in writing and enforceable in court.

Cari Dominguez, chair of the EEOC, stressed the selection of an employer to participate in the pilot program does not constitute an endorsement or approval by the EEOC of an employer’s internal dispute resolution program. Instead, the EEOC is acknowledging that the employer’s internal program is the type of program that the EEOC is interested in evaluating for the pilot, Dominguez said.

Dominguez added: “We are interested in exploring whether existing employer-provided dispute resolutions programs that operate fairly and voluntarily, afford employees appropriate and meaningful remedies, and do not seek to interfere with the commission’s enforcement authority, can serve as an effective means of resolving employment discrimination charges filed with the EEOC.”

Benefits March 21, 2003

Study: White Males Still Top Earnings Ladder

March 21, 2003 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - White, college-educated men had paychecks in 2001 worth about $65,000 - more than anyone else.
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A US Census Bureau report said white, colleged-educated women made about 40% less than white male college grads, while similarly educated black and Hispanic males earned 30% below the white males, according to the Associated Press. The Census Bureau’s education study showed income gaps have narrowed slightly since 1991 at the high school level but grown a bit at the college level.

Differences in income were slightly lower on educational levels other than undergrad college between white men and minorities. Black men who are high school graduates earned about 25% less than comparably educated whites, and black men who held master’s degrees earned 20% less than their white counterparts. Almost half of Asian residents 25 and older have graduated from college, nearly twice the rate of whites. Still, Asians earned about 8% less than whites.

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Income disparities across educational levels were far lower among white women and other minorities. In fact, Asian women with bachelor’s and master’s degrees earned more money than similarly educated white women.

Schooling Differences

The government recorded high educational levels for nearly every group and for the nation overall. Nationally, 84% of US residents 25 and older are high school graduates, the Census Bureau found. Some 83.8% of men and 84.4% of women at least graduated from high school while slightly more than a quarter of the population has a college degree – 29% of men and 25% of women.

The schooling gap between the genders has been narrowing since the 1970s, because of younger, more educated women steadily replacing older, less-educated women in the workforce, Census Bureau analyst Jennifer Day told the Associated Press. For example, among 25- to 29-year-olds, nearly 32% of women have college diplomas, compared with 27% of males.

Among the races, whites remain more likely to be better educated than blacks and Hispanics regardless of gender. More than 29% of whites are college graduates, compared with 17% of blacks and about 11% of Hispanics – all record highs, according to Census data.

For blacks, disparities in high school graduation have narrowed dramatically with whites over the past 30 years while the college-education racial gap has narrowed slightly between 1997 and 2002, but generally has increased since the 1970s.

Meanwhile, among Hispanics, the high school education gap with whites has remained level since 1970. Despite the record high, the college education gap between whites and Hispanics has grown during the 1990s in large part because of an increase in the number of less-educated Hispanic immigrants, the Census Bureau said.

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