Supreme Court Rules Against Retirees in Pregnancy Discrimination Case

On May 18, 2009, the Supreme Court issued its decision in AT&T Corp. v. Hulteen.  In a 7-2 ruling, the Court dealt a blow to the countless women workers who continue to suffer financial losses because of past pregnancy discrimination. 

Hulteen concerned the pension benefits awarded by AT&T to four women employees who took pregnancy leaves in the 1960s and 1970s, before the federal Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) was passed in 1978.  At that time, women at AT&T who took temporary leaves to have children did not accrue as much pension credit as their co-workers who took leaves for other reasons.  As a result, when the four women retired in the 1990s, their pension benefits were lower than their co-workers’. 

The Court ruled in favor of AT&T.  In an opinion by Justice David Souter, the Court held that because the PDA was not yet on the books when AT&T denied the four women seniority credit, AT&T’s prior policy was not discriminatory – and that as a result, any pension calculations based on that policy is not discriminatory, either.  However, in an impassioned dissent that Justice Stephen Breyer joined, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg argued that because AT&T’s prior policy expressly excluded pregnancy from the seniority credit system, and because the PDA expressly outlawed that exclusion, the policy was discriminatory.  For that reason, AT&T’s present-day decision to continue using the flawed seniority credit system – resulting in lower pension payments to women than to their co-workers – is discriminatory, too. 

“Allowing AT&T to ignore current law in paying pension benefits to today’s women  retirees means that these women will suffer discrimination all over again,” says Irasema Garza, President of Legal Momentum.  “Women already face significant financial hurdles as compared to men in the form of lower retirement savings and Social Security benefits due to discrimination, workforce segregation, and time off for children, so it is crucial that they receive every penny to which they are entitled.”

Visit Legal Momentum's Commentaries to read the full opinion, as well as reviews of this and other cases before the Court this term that are of importance to women's rights.