June 5, 2002 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - College-educated
women are more likely to work past retirement age than those
with only a high school education are, new research
shows.
According to Penn State University labor economist,
Elizabeth Hill,
32% of female college graduates work beyond the age
of 70,
compared to 13% of women with only a high school
education.
Hill says she expected to find less educated women
working later in life because they needed the money, the
Christian Science Monitor reports. Instead, she discovered
that flexibility on the job, not money, was the primary
factor in determining whether women remained in the
workforce.
Ca. Court Ruling Boosts Employers' Sex Harassment
Defenses
April 18, 2001 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - California
courts' practice of holding employers strictly liable for
supervisor sexual harassment has been called into question by
a recent 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling.
The court ruled last week that a woman whose sexual
harassment claim was thrown out under federal law —
because she did not use her company’s policies to deal with
harassment claims before she sued — cannot pursue her
claims under state law for the same reason.
The ruling “is going to do away with strict liability in
California. And that is clearly a major defeat for
employees,” said plaintiff’s attorney Mark Rudy.
In upholding a federal district court decision to throw
out the woman’s state claims, 9th Circuit Judge Arthur
Alarcon said that employers are allowed the same defense
against harassment suits under California’s Fair Employment
and Housing Act as they receive under federal Title VII of
the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
In so doing, Alarcon ruled that previous California
Court of Appeal opinions holding employers “strictly
liable” for supervisor harassment did not preclude the
defense established by the U.S. Supreme Court in two 1998
decisions.
The Supreme Court ruled in those cases that employers
can avoid liability by showing that they exercised “all
reasonable care” to prevent and correct the harassment, and
that the employee did not take advantage of preventive or
corrective company policies.
Faced with predicting how the California Supreme Court
would decide the issue, Alarcon explained:
That California courts have consistently looked to
Title VII for guidance in interpreting FEHA.
That the two statutes had the same legislative
intent.
FEHA’s requirement that employers “take all
reasonable steps to prevent harassment” is similar to the
first test of an affirmative defense.
Attorney Richard Rahm, who represents management in
employment disputes, said the 9th Circuit was looking at
public policy. The judges “want to encourage employers to
have a strong anti-sexual harassment policy, ” Rahm
said.