Fla. Workers May Be Impacted By Walmart Decision
MIAMI (CBSMiami.com) – The United States Supreme Court protected Walmart to a degree in a unanimous ruling separating a class action lawsuit into separate suits.
Walmart, which has 176 Supercenters, 30 stores, 44 Sam's Clubs, and employs over 92,000 workers in the Sunshine State, was sued by a group of women who were claiming sexual discrimination by the retail giant. The women were seeking class-action status which could have involved up to 1.6 million women.
The Supreme Court ruled 8-0 against allowing the lawsuit against Walmart to continue as a class-action suit. Instead, the women who claimed to have been discriminated against must file individual lawsuits against the company.
But, with far less than the potentially billions of dollars in a possible class-action suit, Walmart will be under much less pressure to settle any pending lawsuit, according to the Associated Press.
There was another part of the ruling that will make it much tougher to try and sue a company in a class-action discrimination lawsuit.
The second part of the decision, which was a 5-4 decision in favor of the conservative majority, said there has to be common elements tying together all of the employment decisions.
Walmart reported spending $17 billion in Florida for merchandise and services. The company said it paid $753.1 million in sales taxes.
The case was Walmart vs. Dukes, et al.
For more on the case from CBSNews, click here.
