Suit Charges Wal-Mart With Bias
Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s largest retailer, was charged with discriminating against women in promotions, pay and job assignments in a far-reaching lawsuit filed Tuesday in federal court.
The suit filed in San Francisco by six current and former employees seeks class-action status and could represent as many as 500,000 women who work or have worked in the company’s stores within the last two years.
A Wal-Mart spokesman said the company condemns discrimination and denies any systematic pattern of bias.
Although women make up more than 72% of the Wal-Mart work force, they hold only 10% of the store director jobs and fewer than a third of all store management jobs, according to the suit. That puts Wal-Mart out of step with its top 20 competitors, where 56% of the overall store management jobs are held by women, the suit says, citing statistics from the Labor Department. The suit alleges that other retailers had higher percentages of women in management in 1975 than Wal-Mart does now.
“It’s as if the last 25 years of progress for women never happened at Wal-Mart,” said Brad Seligman, the lead lawyer for the plaintiffs and the executive director of the Impact Fund, a nonprofit civil rights advocacy organization based in Berkeley. The suit also charges that women who have complained about unfair treatment have been subjected to retaliation, so much so that some workers refer to the company’s grievance hotline as “1-800-you’re-fired,” Seligman said.
If the court declares the case a class action, it could be the largest such discrimination suit ever filed against a U.S. employer.
The lawsuit was put together by a nationwide consortium of lawyers and public-interest law firms after a year of investigation. The group set up a Web site and toll-free telephone number to solicit additional grievances and evidence. The suit seeks unspecified damages, including wages lost because of alleged discrimination.
Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart is the nation’s largest private employer, with a U.S. work force of more than 960,000 at 3,100 Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club stores. The company reported sales last year of more than $191 billion.
A spokesman said the company condemns any kind of discrimination and has a record of taking disciplinary action, up to firing, against employees who violate that prohibition.
“We feel very confident about this lawsuit,” spokesman Bill Wertz said. “I would not argue to you that we are a perfect company. There have been instances of discrimination in Wal-Mart. We are as unhappy about that as anybody else. But we do not do it systematically.”
A Wal-Mart statement said women hold 37% of the company’s 55,000 management positions, and warned that comparisons to competitors might be unfair because Wal-Mart does not include department managers among its salaried ranks.
Wertz said that in general the company fights lawsuits it believes are without merit and does not settle “to make a case go away.”
Three of the plaintiffs spoke at a news conference in San Francisco on Tuesday announcing the lawsuit. The suit alleges a nationwide pattern of sex discrimination and an atmosphere where female employees are demeaned and told that women don’t make good managers.
The lead plaintiff, Betty Dukes, is in her eighth year at the Pittsburg, Calif., Wal-Mart store. She said she has been passed over for promotions, and 18 months ago was wrongly demoted from customer service manager to cashier.
When she started, Dukes said she was optimistic about opportunities for advancement. When she inquired about promotions, she was told she had to wait until her 90-day probationary period was up. But Dukes said she has seen men get promoted in as little as 45 days. She also said 99% of the advancement opportunities that are not posted go to men.
“It seems like there is a great divide between the women and the men at Wal-Mart,” Dukes said. “I’ve suffered. I’ve been angry. We have mumbled under our breath. But today I’m speaking out.”
Micki Earwood said she worked as a personnel manager in an Ohio store for 12 years until she was fired after she attempted to inform supervisors of discriminatory practices she witnessed.
Stephanie Odle said she began working for Wal-Mart seven years ago at 19. She cried when she described how she had viewed the late Sam Walton, Wal-Mart’s founder, as a hero. The Texas woman said she was transferred 11 times before she was fired and replaced by a man.
“I was terminated to make room for yet another member of the good ol’ boys’ club,” Odle said. It “left me, a single mom with a 2-year-old daughter, with no job, no benefits.”
Wal-Mart shares rose 34 cents to close at $48.86 on the New York Stock Exchange.
