Initially, a 2007 study commissioned by the Department of Labor[29] cautioned against overzealous application of the EPA without closer examination of possible reasons for pay discrepancies. An official website of the United States government. ], (5) any employee employed in the catching, taking, propagating, harvesting, cultivating, or farming of any kind of fish, shellfish, crustacea, sponges, seaweeds, or other aquatic forms of animal and vegetable life, or in the first processing, canning or packing such marine products at sea as an incident to, or in conjunction with, such fishing operations, including the going to and returning from work and loading and unloading when performed by any such employee; or, (6) any employee employed in agriculture (A) if such employee is employed by an employer who did not, during any calendar quarter during the preceding calendar year, use more than five hundred man-days of agricultural labor, (B) if such employee is the parent, spouse, child, or other member of his employer's immediate family, (C) if such employee (i) is employed as a hand harvest laborer and is paid on a piece rate basis in an operation which has been, and is customarily and generally recognized as having been, paid on a piece rate basis in the region of employment, (ii) commutes daily from his permanent residence to the farm on which he is so employed, and (iii) has been employed in agriculture less than thirteen weeks during the preceding calendar year, (D) if such employee (other than an employee described in clause (C) of this subsection) (i) is sixteen years of age or under and is employed as a hand harvest laborer, is paid on a piece rate basis in an operation which has been, and is customarily and generally recognized as having been, paid on a piece rate basis in the region of employment, (ii) is employed on the same farm as his parent or person standing in the place of his parent, and (iii) is paid at the same piece rate as employees over age sixteen are paid on the same farm, or (E) if such employee is principally engaged in the range production of livestock; or, (7) any employee to the extent that such employee is exempted by regulations, order, or certificate of the Secretary issued under section 214 [section 14] of this title; or, (8) any employee employed in connection with the publication of any weekly, semiweekly, or daily newspaper with a circulation of less than four thousand the major part of which circulation is within the county where published or counties contiguous thereto; or, [Note: Section 13(a)(9) (relating to motion picture theater employees) was repealed by section 23 of the Fair Labor Standards Amendments of 1974.
Once a plaintiff meets her or his heavy burden and establishes a prima facie case of gender discrimination under the EPA, then the defendant may avoid liability only by proving the existence of one of four statutory affirmative defenses. In other words, it is highly probable that the passage of [the EPA] would result in less employment for women."
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