Lessons from Princeton's $1M settlement of pay bias allegations

Princeton University recently agreed to pay nearly $1 million in cumulative back wages to 106 female professors the U.S. Department of Labor's (DOL) Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) found to be victims of gender-based pay discrimination.

Compensation discrimination law

The OFCCP enforces Executive Order 11246, which makes it unlawful for employers that are government contractors to engage in gender-based compensation discrimination. To assess compliance with the law, the agency regularly conducts aggressive, protracted reviews of contractors' pay practices. The reviews are called compliance evaluations. An employer that is found to pay female employees less than similarly situated male employees may be in violation of the law absent a legitimate nondiscriminatory explanation for the pay disparity, such as seniority.

The OFCCP can pursue legal remedies against the employers, including back pay and benefits, costly salary adjustments, and nonmonetary relief such as mandatory promotions or job placements, modifications of policies and practices, pay equity training, and, more harshly, the cancellation of current federal contracts and exclusion from future contracts.