case analysis

Introduction

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA) is the primary federal statute that prohibits discrimination in employment on the basis of age; and applies to individuals who are at least 40 years old. Under the ADEA, it is unlawful for an employer to discriminate against any individual because of his/her age involving any conditions, terms, or privilege of employment including hiring, firing, promotion, training, benefits, etc. It is also illegal to limit, or segregate the employees in any way which would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment opportunities or allow employee status to be unfavorably affected because of the individual’s age. The act applies to employment by public or private employers, even by overseas enterprises with no less than 20 employees based in the United States. The particular age class being protected was only from 40 to 65 when ADEA went into effect in 1967. Later it removed the 65 year limit completely; there is no upper age limit up to now. The ADEA and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) both are enforced by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commison. Compared to Title VII, ADEA protected class is different, and it has protection from reverse discrimination. Additionally, ADEA is more merciful because it allows employers to regard reasonable factors other than age. Nowadays, age discrimination in the workplace still exists and trends have increased because of the prolonged economic downturn. Complaints based on age increased from 7.5% to 25.8% between 1999 and 2008 (Bennett-Alexander & Hartman, 2012). People usually treat senior employees with stereotyping such as; not being hard workers, not technology person, or having poor performance. However, the ADEA law stands for the proposals that treating older workers fairly willing could contribute to a better country. The case of Morgan against New York Life Insurance Co.will be brought into this essay to analysis age discrimination.

Issue

Whether the New York Life Insurance company discriminated against employee Tommy G. Mogran based on his age.

Ruling

The district court ruled in favor of employee Mogran, and the jury awarded him $6,000,000 in compensatory damages plus punitive damages.

Facts

Morgan was a 45-year-old employee of New York Life. In 2000, as managing partner in Nothern Ohio, Morgan was the senior executive in charge of the Cleveland office. The company used an index that it calls Growth Profitably and Accountability (GPA) which ranged from 0 to 4.0+ as one means of measuring and evaluating a manager’s performance. Based on the manual of New York Life, once the GPA drops down lower than 1.5, a written Performance Improvement Program would be established. This internal system includes: performance alert, written performance warning, final notice and termination which can be given to managing partners following the step-by-step warnings. According to Tommy G. Morgan v New York Life Insurance Co, Morgan was terminated from his job when he was turning 50 years old in September, 2005. The reason given by New York Life was because he failed to meet the manpower requirements as provided in New York Life’s written manual. On the contrary, Morgan’s performance was substantially acceptable. In June 2004, New York Life originally graded him as GPA 1.5, and then modified it to 1.71 after Moran questioned this. New York Life also did not follow its usual practice of first giving a “performance alert,” and instead placed Morgan on “performance warning,” and subsequently a “final warning.” Although Morgan met five of the six goals, New York Life still fired him because he failed to grow the office manpower numbers sufficiently. Meanwhile, New York Life treated younger employees favorably in similarly situations. Randy Cox (age 39) was a managing partner in the same area as Morgan and had poor performance with a GPA of 1.22 at same time in June 2004. However he was promoted upon the zone president’s recommendation. Some age-related statements had also been stated by the decision makers of New York Life regarding hiring sales employees. Morgan sued New York Life on December 13, 2005.

Analysis

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 prohibits discrimination in employment on the basis of age. The plaintiff Morgan may rely on direct or circumstantial evidence of age discrimination to prove judgment. He must establish a prima facie case of disparate treatment by establishing the following four elements to persuade the court that it related to age discrimination: (1) The employee is in the protected class; (2) He suffered an adverse employment action (was terminated); (3) The employee was doing his job well enough to meet his employer’s legitimate expectations; (4) Others not in the protected class were treated more favorably (Bennett-Alexander & Hartman, 2012). If the plaintiff makes a prima facie case, the defendant New York Life must offer evidence of a business justification for the discharge as their response. The plaintiff can then rebut the defendant’s justification by showing it was the pretext for age discrimination.

The plaintiff claimed age discrimination against the defendant based on starting with circumstantial evidence. Morgan started his career in New York Life as a managing partner when he was 45 years old in 2000, thus a member of the protected class. The fact he was terminated by the defendant New York Life in September 2005 is obviously an adverse employment action. Element 3 whether the employee had qualified performance in his job position, was the most intense point argued by both the plaintiff and defendant. Morgan presented direct evidence that among statistical evaluation GPA, New York Life most relied upon the GPA score to evaluate managers. Based on Morgan’s performance, 1.71 should be his the GPA score he deserved, but somehow it was dropped to 1.5. Additionally, the defendant skipped the “performance alert” and placed “performance warning”. Plaintiff persisted that it was intentionally made up by the defendant. Meanwhile, Vice-President of the South Central Zone Wilson testified that the GPA played only a small part in Morgan’s performance warning. So GPA score was not counted as a direct or major reason he was fired. And defendant admits that Plaintiff’s actual GPA never dipped below 1.71. Wilson continually testified Morgan was discharged because he failed to meet the manpower requirements for a total of six category requirements. But other testimony suggests that Morgan was good at recruiting and most of his coworkers could not believe that New York Life would terminate a long-time successful employee. At the same time, the trend of manpower was falling down in the whole northern office zone, and he was ranked 3 among all managing partners. In contrast to the defendant’s pretext, the plaintiff’s performance was totally acceptable for his position. Basically, treating others not in the protected class more favorably existed when 39 years old manager Randy got promotion with lower GPA, and 50 years old plaintiff Morgan was fired with higher GPA. Additionally, Vice-Presidents state they need a balance between young and aggressive individuals when it pertains to recruiting. In this case, the defendant required older managing partners to meet higher performance standards. The court accepted all of the direct or circumstantial evidences plaintiff presented above and denied New York Life’s motion for a new trial.

Conclusion

The court’s refusal to give New York Life’s proposed jury instruction does not constitute reversible error. Because there was sufficient evidence supporting the verdict in favor of Morgan on his age discrimination claim. ADEA provide law standard to protect older workers in employment against with adverse action. Age discrimination only applies to those 40 and older. No state is permitted to extend the protection to someone younger than40. For the foregoing reasons, New York Life treated younger employee less than 40 years old more favorably, it was not fair at all for Morgan. Not meeting the manpower requirement was obviously not related to Morgan’s performance, and he did very outstanding work in other 6 categories requirement. Therefore, the employer New York Life simply base employment decisions on age-related stereotypes. Moreover, the court’s refusal to give New York Life’s proposed jury instruction does not constitute reversible error. The judgment will be affirmed as to the $6,000,000 compensatory damages award.

References

Bennett-Alexander, D.D. & Hartman L.P. (2012). Employment law for businesss (7th ed.). New York. NY: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc

Tommy G. Morgan v New York Life Insurance Co., 507 F. Supp. 2d 808 (N.D. Ohio 2007)