Word: allstateã
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Employment discrimination cases are notoriously difficult to defend, and even meritless cases can be expensive to litigate and damaging to a company’s reputation—Allstate CEO Edward M. Liddy has called them “a plague on corporate America.” But Allstate??s strategy of “fire first, sign waivers later” seems new—and if it succeeds, it could undermine basic protections for American workers...
...honest, I have no idea whether age discrimination was a factor in Allstate??s layoffs. The circumstantial evidence doesn’t look good: the agreement the employees signed specifically waived “any claim for age or other types of discrimination prohibited by the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967.” So let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that Allstate did have a discriminatory intent when it fired the 6,400 workers. Or, better yet, suppose that it had chosen to discriminate by firing a group...
What can be done to prevent Allstate??s strategy from becoming a shield for future discrimination? If the class-action plaintiffs lose, not much. Under longstanding principles of contract law, courts will occasionally refuse to enforce non-negotiated or “adhesion” contracts whose terms are “unconscionable;” courts will also sometimes void contracts that are viewed as contrary to public policy. Yet the legal system is extremely hesitant to overturn agreements signed by both parties, and workers shouldn’t have to rely on the unpredictable intervention...
| 1 |