JUSTIFYING PREGNANCY-RELATED EMPLOYMENT DECISIONS UNDER THE PREGNANCY DISCRIMINATION ACT

This article provides an overview of recent court cases involving adverse employment actions that were influenced by an employee’s pregnant condition. It is intended to provide employers with a better understanding of how the courts adjudicate these types of cases so that they will be better able to make employment decisions that comply with the Pregnancy Discrimination Act. The information reported in this article was gleaned by reviewing all cases decided at the circuit court level and published from January 1999 to June 2004. The Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) prohibits pregnancy discrimination at the workplace. Enacted in 1978, the law states that “women affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions shall be treated the same for all employment related purposes . . . as other persons not so affected but similar in their ability or inability to work” [1, p. 1]. Because this law defines pregnancy discrimination in very general terms, it does not provide employers with a clear guide for implementing specific policies and practices. Such guidance is better provided by the case law. That is, an employer should refer to past court decisions when trying to determine the legality of an adverse employment action taken against a woman who is protected by the PDA.