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Tuesday, March 29, 2011

First two stories this morning on NPR dealt with courts

The first is the typical type of court story in the news media, a follow-up from an earlier story about a notable crime and arrest, the brutal murder of a news reporter in San Francisco, CA.

Now the suspect is going to trial, so the news media are talking about it again.

The second is a fascinating story about the massive class action lawsuit filed by more than one million women against Wal Mart. They allege gender discrimination, claiming that only one-third of managerial positions in the company are held by women and that women in similar positions as men make $1.16 less per hour.

Wal Mart responds by claiming they explicitly forbid discrimination and that these numbers are due to only a portion of stores. And they also claim they are "too big" to be sued.

The U.S. Supreme Court will decide the issue of whether Wal Mart can be sued.

http://www.npr.org/2011/03/29/134866747/can-a-business-be-too-big-for-a-class-action-suit?sc=fb&cc=fp

1 comment:

  1. I think this is especially interesting, but maybe that's because I happen to be female. Well, that's not the only reason; as this is progressing, some interesting bits are coming out from the Supreme Court. Today and yesterday the part I heard was the three women seem sympathetic to the issue (surprise!) while two of the male justices seemed to almost dismiss the issue by pointing out that this case is no different from the situation in the rest of the country. And that obviously makes it okay, right? Because telling one of the nation's biggest employers to shape up wouldn't cause a ripple effect, making others shape up out of either fear or (less likely) realization.

    Is this making it big on the mainstream news? (sorry, I still don't follow it) If so it is a rare example of the legislative process in action. Plus it illustrates how differently things work with diversity (albeit minimal diversity) thrown in the mix. If the Supreme Court was still only "Rich, Old White Men" I doubt there would be much debate here.

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