©2025 Seyfarth Shaw LLP Developments in Equal Pay Litigation 2025 | 19 Another example of benefits that courts have found can constitute a pay disparity under the EPA is differential parental leave policies. In Sparrow v. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority,88 a bus operator alleged his employer violated the EPA by allowing female employees to use accrued sick leave for up to six months when caring for newborns, while limiting male employees to just two days of sick leave for the same purpose. The court first rejected the defendant’s argument that the EPA does not cover benefits.89 Although the plaintiff could not identify a specific female comparator who received this benefit, the court held that evidence of the collective bargaining agreement's potentially discriminatory provisions could be sufficient to establish a prima facie EPA claim. The court thus denied summary judgment, finding a genuine dispute of material fact as to whether WMATA permitted women to use sick leave beyond recovery from childbirth for childcare purposes—a benefit allegedly denied to men in similar circumstances.90 When a disparity in benefits forms the basis of a gender discrimination claim, it is obviously critical that a plaintiff establish their right to those benefits.91 This issue is poised to become especially important for employers and employees in the wake of the Supreme Court’s seminal decision, Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia,92 which held that Title VII prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity as forms of sex discrimination. That decision has rendered many workplace issues newly relevant, including the question of who qualifies for spousal benefits. For example, in Doe v. Catholic Relief Services,93 a data analyst for a religiously aligned organization alleged he was underpaid because certain health benefits were denied to his spouse even though they were provided to others in the same position. The plaintiff was a man married to a man. He claimed it was a violation of the EPA, among other laws, to provide health benefits to women employees that covered their male spouses while denying those benefits to males spouses of male employees.94 The religious organization employer argued that it retained its religious character by, among other things, maintaining a code of conduct and administering its employee benefits program consistent with its religious values. Those values prevented it from providing spousal benefits to employees’ same-sex spouses.95 Citing the Bostock decision, the court held: “When an employer discriminates against an employee based on sexual orientation, ‘it necessarily and intentionally discriminates against that individual in part because of sex. And that is all Title VII has ever demanded to establish liability.’”96 The court denied the employer’s several attempts to remove itself from the purview of Title VII and the EPA due to its religious affiliation. With respect to Title VII’s exception for employees of religious entities, the court held that the relevant provision, § 702(a), was meant to allow religious organizations to hire only individuals of the same religion; it did not provide blanket protection for religious organizations to discriminate against those who do not share particular beliefs or standards of conduct tied to its religious identity. “A plain reading of § 702(a) reveals Congress's intent to protect religious organizations seeking to employ co-religionists, but the reading urged by [employer] would cause a relatively narrowly written exception to swallow all of Title VII, effectively exempting religious organizations wholesale.”97 The court was justified by a reason other than gender, the court concludes that the allegations are sufficient to withstand the defendant’s motion to dismiss”). 88 Sparrow v. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, No. 22-2216 (JDB), 2024 WL 3551962 (D.D.C July 26, 2024). 89 Id. (“[T]he EPA has long been interpreted to cover benefits).” 90 Id. at *8. 91 See, e.g., Barney v. Zimmer Biomet Holdings, Inc., No. 3:17-cv-616 JD, 2021 WL 3212383, at *10 (N.D. Ind. July 29, 2021) (holding that the denial of severance benefits to a female Senior Vice President was enough to establish a prima facie case, but that ultimately plaintiff had failed to establish that the denial was due to her gender because, under the company’s policies, she was not entitled to severance: “[employer] has put forth evidence that the difference in severance benefits was based on a factor other than sex; specifically, the difference was based on how the employees left their employment with [employer]. [Plaintiff] has not put forth evidence to place the facts surrounding that rationale in dispute”). 92 Bostock v. Clayton Cnty., Ga., 590 U.S. 644 (2020). 93 Doe v. Catholic Relief Servs., 618 F. Supp. 3d 244 (D. Md. 2022). 94 Id. at 250. 95 Id. at 249. 96 Id. at 252 (quoting Bostock, 590 U.S. at 665). 97 Id. at 253.
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