Supreme Court to Decide if Employers Must Help Pregnant Employees

The U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether the Pregnancy Discrimination Act requires employers to accommodate pregnant employees, it announced July 1.

The court agreed to review Young v. United Parcel Service, Inc., a case from last year in which the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a corporate policy that does not include pregnancy among the conditions making an employee eligible for light duty is a “neutral and legitimate business practice.”

In Young, the 4th Circuit held that UPS did not violate PDA by limiting light-duty accommodations to employees: (1) injured on the job; (2) disabled as defined by the Americans with Disabilities Act; or (3) legally unable to work as truck drivers due to a loss of their U.S. Department of Transportation certification.

In appealing to the Supreme Court, Peggy Young alleged that the 4th Circuit disregarded PDA’s statutory text. The law states that “women affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions shall be treated the same for all employment-related purposes, including receipt of benefits under fringe benefit programs, as other persons not so affected but similar in their ability or inability to work.” (42 U.S.C. §2000e(k)) Although the 4th Circuit noted that the three categories of workers UPS accommodates are different from pregnant workers in other respects, they are similar in the only respect the statutory text makes relevant: their “ability or inability to work,” Young’s petition argues.

Both UPS and the federal government recommended that the Court decline to hear the case, arguing that review of the case is unnecessary. While pregnancy itself is not a disability per se, the amended ADA may lead courts to rule that employers must accommodate pregnant women who are substantially limited in a major life activity as a result of a pregnancy-related impairment, the government said. If that is eventually the case, a pregnant woman’s right to an accommodation would not depend on her employer’s offering a similar accommodation to non-pregnant employees with similar impairments, it added.

Furthermore, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is considering the adoption of new enforcement guidance on pregnancy discrimination that would address a range of issues related to pregnancy under the PDA and the ADA. If published, the guidance will clarify the commission’s interpretation of those statutes with respect to policies like the one at issue in this case, thus diminishing the need for this court’s review of the question presented, the government said.

UPS concurred with the government’s position. “While pregnancy per se is not an ADA-covered disability, temporary physical limitations imposed because of pregnancy may be within the ADA’s reach,” it said, noting, however, that only the pre-amendments ADA applies to Young’s case. “It is entirely possible, however, that the question presented in this petition will not recur: If courts construe the ADA (as amended) to cover pregnant workers subject to lifting restrictions like petitioner’s, that statute, unlike the PDA, would expressly require accommodation,” UPS said.

For more information, see Pay Careful Attention to Pregnancy Accommodation Requests as EEOC Plans New Enforcement Guidance.