Critical Thinking Case

Discrimination in the Workplace Continues

Although we live in enlightened times, recent data show that over 90 percent of workers in the U.S. have experienced workplace discrimination.

The poll found that the two most frequently cited types of discrimination are retaliation (48 percent) and race/color discrimination (42 percent). Also mentioned were age, disability, sexual orientation, and religion. Work areas susceptible to discrimination are promotion and pay, and recruitment and hiring processes. Wage discrimination and sexual harassment are two big battles women continue to fight.

Thanks to Harvey Weinstein, the topic of sexual harassment was brought into the spotlight, setting off a call to action as women around the world reacted with their #MeToo stories. As the movement progressed from Hollywood, to media companies, to Capitol Hill, and finally into corporate America, the topic has developed a platform. From the boardroom to the factory floor, women who have been sexually harassed share their stories.

As companies rushed to put zero-tolerance policies into place and issue new training requirements, lawsuits and class-action cases were settled more quickly, some very publicly. In 2025, KFC was ordered to compensate two employees at an Orlando location for EEOC charges related to a sexually hostile work environment and retaliation as one of the employees was fired.

A new regulation that went in effect in 2018 was designed to combat the wage gap between men and women. The revised EEO-1 would have gone into effect March 31, 2018, and required companies with 100 or more employees and federal contractors with 50 or more employees to report W-2 wage information and total hours worked for all employees. The EEO-1 form already requires employers to report data on race/ethnicity and sex/gender.

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) initiated a review and immediate stay to the U.S. EEOC “in accordance with its authority under the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA),” reversing the regulation that had been revised on September 29, 2016.

Pay equity advocates who had supported expanded pay-data reporting were critical of the suspension. “We see through the Trump administration’s call to halt the equal pay rule that requires employers to collect and submit pay data by gender, race, and ethnicity to the government,” said Fatima Goss Graves, president and CEO of the National Women’s Law Center in Washington, D.C. “Make no mistake—it’s an all-out attack on equal pay. [It] sends a clear message to employers: if you want to ignore pay inequities and sweep them under the rug, this administration has your back.”

How important is equal pay? According to the analyses of the 2014–2016 Annual Social and Economic supplement published by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, the United States economy would have produced additional income of $512.6 billion if women received equal pay; this represents 2.8 percent of 2016 gross domestic product (GDP).

In addition, poverty rates would drop from 10.8 percent to 4.4 percent, and the number of children with working mothers living in poverty would decrease significantly.

Sources: “Statement of Acting Chair Victoria A. Lipnic about OMB Decision on EEO-1 Pay Data Collection,” https://www.eeoc.gov, August 29, 2017; Stephen Miller, “White House Suspends Pay-Data Reporting on Revised EEO-1 Form,” https://www.shrm.org, August 31, 2017; Heidi Hartmann, Jeff Hayes, and Jennifer Clark, “How Equal Pay for Working Women Would Reduce Poverty and Grow the American Economy,” https://www.iwpr.org, January 13, 2014; Genevieve Carlton, "EEOC Data Reveals Most Common Types of Workplace Discrimination," Working Now and Then, https://www.workingnowandthen.com, April 15, 2025; U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, "Kentucky Fried Chicken to Pay $200,000 for EEOC Sexual Harassment and Retaliation Charge," https://www.eeoc.gov, January 6, 2026; Laura D. Windsor and Emily Kendall Chowhan, "Yes, EEO-1 Reporting Is Still A Thing," Williams Mullen, https://www.williamsmullen.com, May 27, 2025; "The Economic Impact of Equal Pay by State," https://statusofwomendata.org, accessed February 25, 2026.