Labor Dept. Said to Soften Plans on Pay Bias Guidance

Labor Department leaders are slightly backtracking on an effort to develop a more business-friendly approach to probing federal contractors for pay discrimination, two sources familiar with the deliberations told Bloomberg Law.

The department still plans to give federal contractors some power to determine which workers are doing the same job for pay comparison purposes. But the DOL is softening the move by also allowing government investigators leeway to declare those groupings invalid. It also wants to ensure that new investigative guidance doesn’t undercut ongoing litigation.

The agency’s leadership huddled and decided to moderate their draft of a new field memo ...