Judging Job Bias by Comparing Workers: Circuit Court Rules Vary

Many courts require workers alleging job discrimination to compare themselves to similarly situated colleagues who didn’t face bias. A federal appeals court in Atlanta recently suggested it did those workers a favor by relaxing its definition for those comparable coworkers.

But in the same decision, the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit also gave employers a boost. The court said judges should thoroughly assess such comparator evidence when workers make their initial showing of discrimination, before employers have to give their reason for taking an allegedly biased action.

The Eleventh Circuit majority said that initial “prima ...