By Stephanie Armour, USA TODAY
The number of women claiming they've been discriminated against on the job because they're pregnant is soaring even as the birth rate declines.
Mailyn Pickler, 23, was fired from an auto dealership a week after she revealed her pregnancy.
Pregnancy discrimination complaints filed with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) jumped 39% from fiscal year 1992 to 2003, according to a recent analysis of government data by the Washington-based National Partnership for Women & Families. During that same time, the nation's birthrate dropped 9%.
The surge in pregnancy complaints makes it one of the fastest-growing types of employment discrimination charges filed with the EEOC — outpacing the rise in sexual harassment and sex discrimination claims.
The charges are coming from a range of women, from those in entry-level jobs as well as those in executive suites. Well-known employers that have faced pregnancy-discrimination lawsuits include Wal-Mart, Hooters and Cincinnati Bell.
Rob Schumacher, for USA TODAY
Marilyn Pickler says she was fired after telling supervisors about her pregnancy.
Employment lawyers say that, in many cases, employers are simply making honest mistakes as they try to understand a variety of federal and state laws governing issues such as pregnancy discrimination and family leave. And they say it's easy to overlook the very real costs of pregnancy to small employers, who may see productivity suffer significantly when women take time off after having a baby.
But pregnant women claim they've been unfairly fired, denied promotions and in some cases urged to terminate pregnancies in order to keep their jobs.
Mailyn Pickler, 23, of Mesa, Ariz., says she was working for auto dealership Berge Ford when she told a manager about her pregnancy. About a week later, she says, supervisors told her she was being fired. They told her they were concerned that it would not be safe for her to drive, which was part of her job, while she was pregnant, according to the lawsuit.
Berge Ford did not return calls seeking comment.
"I burst into tears," Pickler says. "They thought I was not going to be able to do my job. They thought I would throw up or have a cramp. But pregnant women work every day. It just wasn't fair."
The EEOC filed a lawsuit on Pickler's behalf, and the case was settled out of court for $70,000. Her son, Jesse, is 3, and Pickler, who is now a stay-at-home mom, is pregnant again.
The rise in pregnancy discrimination cases is important now because more women of child-bearing age are in the labor force: Women make up about 47% of the total labor force, and they're projected to account for more than half of the increase in total labor force growth from 2002 until 2012, according to the Department of Labor.
And more working women are having children at a later age, when careers are better established and more is financially at stake. In 2000, the average American woman having her first child was almost 25 years old. In 1970, the average age was 21.4 years for a first birth, according to a 2002 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Pregnancy discrimination cases also are costing companies more money. In fiscal year 2003, theEEOC and state and local agencies collected $12.4 million from charges of pregnancy discrimination (that amount excludes any awards obtained through lawsuits), vs. $3.7 million collected in 1992. Money may also come from other sources, such as conciliation agreements with employers and benefits obtained through mediation.
The length of time it takes a case to come to trial or settle can vary. Some cases are resolved within a year; some may drag on in the courts for a number of years.
"We've seen an explosion, a huge increase in cases," says Mary Jo O'Neill, a regional lawyer with the EEOC. "The kind of cases we're seeing are very blatant, cases where managers say, 'We don't want pregnant women working here.' "
Several factors may be behind the trend:
•More pregnant women are staying in the workplace rather than going on early leave. More women are working while pregnant, and they're working further into their pregnancies. In the decade before the 1978 passage of the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, more than half of employed women quit their jobs when they became pregnant, according to the National Partnership for Women & Families analysis of government data. The non-profit education and advocacy group also found that, by the early 1990s, that number dropped to 27% of pregnant women.
"The discrimination is more prevalent because there are so many more women who are working pregnant," says Debra Ness, president of the National Partnership for Women & Families. "People think pregnancy discrimination is a thing of the past, that it doesn't happen anymore. But it does."
•Productivity pressures and the economy. The sluggish economy in recent years has pushed employers to lay off workers and stress productivity, leaving fewer employees doing more work. Employers may see pregnant workers — with pending maternity leave and their possible need for more flexible work arrangements in the future — as a liability.
"Pregnancy is expensive for employers," says Veronica Duffy, an employment lawyer in Rapid City, S.D., who has represented pregnant women filing discrimination claims. "And as health insurance costs rise, costs become more of an issue. Employers are driven to discriminate."
•Stereotypes about pregnant women persist. Mounting research shows that women who become pregnant are viewed as less competent in the workplace — a view that is held by both male and female co-workers.
In one study published in 1993 in the Journal of Organizational Behavior, pregnant and non-pregnant women performed tasks that were rated by college students drafted for the research. While both subjects performed the same, those who were pregnant consistently received lower performance ratings. They were viewed as overly emotional, often irrational, physically limited and less than committed to their jobs, according to the report.
In another study, pregnant women were interviewed about their own experiences on the job. About half said their supervisors' reactions to their pregnancies were negative, according to the report published in 1997 in the Journal of Business and Psychology.
They also reported intrusive comments from co-workers, including such comments as, "Why are you eating so much?" and, "Do you have stretch marks yet?" About half of pregnant women managers said subordinates became upset or hostile.
"When women become pregnant, they're seen as putting personal life ahead of work," says Jane Halpert, an associate professor of industrial and organizational psychology at DePaul University who worked on the studies. "There's a whole set of separate attitudes that show up at work when you get pregnant."
Roberta Carlton says she's seen it firsthand. When she was working as a manager at a software company, she says she wanted to hire a woman who had just had a baby. She says her boss said the job applicant was a new parent and wouldn't be able to put in the hours. What the boss didn't know was that Carlton was three months pregnant at the time.
"You wonder how many women deal with this," says Carlton, 39, who went on maternity leave and was later laid off. She now is a vice president at a public relations firm in Lexington, Mass. "I thought pregnancy was something people were educated about. I hadn't realized anything that blatant happened anymore."
Employers have concerns
But employment lawyers also point out that there are some valid concerns for companies. Small employers can be especially hard hit if they have a large number of women who go out on maternity leave: Productivity can suffer, and there can be extra work for co-workers who are forced to pick up the slack.
Employers can also wind up in a bind if they hire a woman who goes on maternity leave during a critical time, such as a tax-preparation firm that loses a woman to leave during April, when demand is at its peak.
"It can create an enormous challenge for a small organization," says Michael Lotito, a San Francisco-based employment lawyer. He says employers can also feel unable to take disciplinary action against a pregnant employee who isn't performing because they fear it will be seen as discriminatory.
And Lotito says part of the increase in discrimination claims could be coming simply because employers are making honest mistakes or are confused by conflicting laws. Many states have protections for pregnant women that go beyond the federal law. For example, they may mandate that pregnant women be allowed to get some paid time off through employee payroll taxes.
Federal law allows for 12 weeks of unpaid leave.
Generally, under current federal law, an employer shouldn't ask job applicants if they are pregnant; a job seeker also is not required to inform an employer of her pregnancy, legal experts say.
An employer also can't force a pregnant woman to take time off during her pregnancy or force her to quit because of fears the work may be hazardous to her or her fetus. Employees who go on maternity leave must generally get the same treatment as other employees with disabilities or time off.
Susan Kenna, 38, says her employer didn't make accommodations for her when she became pregnant with triplets. She says managers cut her pay after she needed to go on bed rest, and she says she was cut out of meetings before being put on bed rest and generally pressured to quit. She was on bed rest for one week.
Kenna, who worked as a director at Gitto/Global Corp., went into early labor on Sept. 28, 2001, and her triplets died shortly after birth. She says in a lawsuit filed last year against her employer that stress over discrimination played a role in triggering the early births.
Gitto/Global, a manufacturer of specialty compounds, filed for bankruptcy protection in September 2004 and sold its assets to S & E Specialty Polymers. Gitto/Global has been embroiled in scandal following accusations top officials created bogus customers and bilked lenders out of millions of dollars.
A spokeswoman declined to comment, saying the lawsuit originated before the sale. The case was filed in August 2004 and is still pending. A trial date has not yet been set.
"I believe the stress caused my pre-term labor, and I filed a lawsuit because I didn't want my children to die in vain," says Kenna, of Sterling, Mass., who is now the mother of 2-year-old twin girls and a son who is just over 2 months old. "A lot of people at companies are getting away with this, and they have to be called on their bad behavior."
