Dive Brief:
- A Los Angeles state judge on Monday granted final approval of a $43.25 million settlement in a class-action lawsuit alleging that The Walt Disney Co. underpaid women workers, according to court documents.
- The lawsuit alleged that Disney paid “women workers tens of thousands of dollars less than their male counterparts” (Rasmussen, et al. v. The Walt Disney Co.), skipped over women for promotions and assigned them extra work without pay. Disney maintained that its “employment policies and practices are lawful and appropriate,” court documents said. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
- In addition to monetary relief, Disney agreed to have an outside labor economist conduct a pay equity analysis of certain positions for the next three years.
Dive Insight:
The lawsuit was filed just shy of six years ago and alleged violations of the California Equal Pay Act.
Judge Elihu Berle granted preliminary approval of the settlement May 20 and gave final approval Monday during a hearing in California Superior Court, Los Angeles.
The nonmonetary terms of the settlement “will benefit current and future employees,” the plaintiffs’ lawyers said.
In court documents laying out their case for approval, the plaintiffs' lawyers said the settlement's nonmonetary terms would help Disney sort through job classification and benchmarking issues and would provide "forward-looking relief" to promote pay equity at the company.
The settlement comes among increased awareness and legislation regarding pay equity and pay transparency. However, many companies say their compensation processes aren’t yet ready for the heightened scrutiny.
Globally, 19% of organizations said they’re ready for mandated pay transparency, and another 58% saying they’re “getting ready” for new laws, according to a July report from Aon plc. In North America, meanwhile, 25% said they’re ready, while 59% said they’re preparing.
In the U.S., less than 1 in 5 companies have a pay transparency strategy in place, a Mercer report from January found.
