Employers required to report equal employment opportunity data can begin submitting their reports for 2019 and 2020 on April 26, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has announced. The deadline for submitting the reports is July 19.
Employers with 100 or more employees and federal contractors with 50 or more employees and a contract with the federal government worth at least $50,000 are required to comply with the annual EEO-1 data collection, which collects race/ethnicity, gender, and job category data on employers’ workforces. Information from the reports helps the EEOC gauge compliance with federal equal opportunity laws.
The EEOC delayed collection of the 2019 data last year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, so this year’s collection will gather data for both 2019 and 2020.
The EEOC’s announcement says the collection period has been extended this year from 10 weeks to 12 weeks to provide employers still dealing with the impact of the pandemic additional time to file.
Nita Beecher, an attorney with FortneyScott in Washington, D.C., says the extra time should help employers meet the deadline. Employers also have been on notice for a year that the information would have to be submitted, but the pandemic may still present some complications.
“I think the real issue will be where employees who have been working from home will be reporting for the EEO-1 data for 2020,” Beecher says. “Some employers may have data issues because of employees being laid off in 2020 because of the pandemic and being confused as to where to report them.”
The EEOC’s announcement says EEO filers can visit www.EEOCdata.org for information on updates on the data collection. When the collection opens, the website also will provide resources to assist filers with their submissions.
Status of Component 2
During the Obama administration, the EEOC added a Component 2 data collection, which was a compilation of information to help the EEOC and the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) identify pay disparities across industries and occupations.
The Trump administration claimed the Component 2 requirements were too burdensome on employers and issued a stay on the the collection. Later a federal judge ordered the stay lifted, and the Component 2 data was collected for fiscal years 2017 and 2018.
Then in July 2020, the EEOC launched a statistical study with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Committee on National Statistics to assess the quality and utility of the Component 2 data that had been collected, Beecher says. That project is expected to be completed by December 31, 2021.
Beecher says the EEOC asked the Office of Management and Budget in the fall of 2019 to approve the EEO-1 Component 1 report but did not ask for an extension of Component 2.
“So, since the EEOC did not request renewal of Component 2, Component 2 is effectively dead right now,” Beecher says. “It is important to note that the EEOC currently has a majority of Republicans although the chair and the vice chair are Democrats. As long as the Republicans have the majority and the Commission has to approve requesting that it reestablish Component 2, Component 2 will remain dead.”
Tammy Binford writes and edits news alerts and newsletter articles on labor and employment law topics for BLR web and print publications.