Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., 550 U.S. 618 (2007).

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618 OCTOBER TERM, 2006

Syllabus

LEDBETTER v. GOODYEAR TIRE & RUBBER CO., INC.

certiorari to the united states court of appeals for

the eleventh circuit

No. 05–1074. Argued November 27, 2006—Decided May 29, 2007

During most of the time that petitioner Ledbetter was employed by re-

spondent Goodyear, salaried employees at the plant where she worked

were given or denied raises based on performance evaluations.

Ledbetter submitted a questionnaire to the Equal Employment Oppor-

tunity Commission (EEOC) in March 1998 and a formal EEOC charge

in July 1998. After her November 1998 retirement, she ﬁled suit, as-

serting, among other things, a sex discrimination claim under Title VII

of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The District Court allowed her Title

VII pay discrimination claim to proceed to trial. There, Ledbetter al-

leged that several supervisors had in the past given her poor evaluations

because of her sex; that as a result, her pay had not increased as much

as it would have if she had been evaluated fairly; that those past pay

decisions affected the amount of her pay throughout her employment;

and that by the end of her employment, she was earning signiﬁcantly

less than her male colleagues. Goodyear maintained that the evalua-

tions had been nondiscriminatory, but the jury found for Ledbetter,

awarding backpay and damages. On appeal, Goodyear contended that

the pay discrimination claim was time barred with regard to all pay

decisions made before September 26, 1997—180 days before Ledbetter

ﬁled her EEOC questionnaire—and that no discriminatory act relating

to her pay occurred after that date. The Eleventh Circuit reversed,

holding that a Title VII pay discrimination claim cannot be based on

allegedly discriminatory events that occurred before the last pay deci-

sion that affected the employee’s pay during the EEOC charging period,

and concluding that there was insufﬁcient evidence to prove that Good-

year had acted with discriminatory intent in making the only two pay

decisions during that period, denials of raises in 1997 and 1998.

Held: Because the later effects of past discrimination do not restart

the clock for ﬁling an EEOC charge, Ledbetter’s claim is untimely.

Pp. 623–643.

(a) An individual wishing to bring a Title VII lawsuit must ﬁrst ﬁle

an EEOC charge within, as relevant here, 180 days “after the alleged

unlawful employment practice occurred.” 42 U. S. C. § 2000e–5(e)(1).

In addressing the issue of an EEOC charge’s timeliness, this Court has

stressed the need to identify with care the speciﬁc employment practice

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Syllabus

at issue. Ledbetter’s arguments—that the paychecks that she received

during the charging period and the 1998 raise denial each violated Title

VII and triggered a new EEOC charging period—fail because they

would require the Court in effect to jettison the deﬁning element of the

disparate-treatment claim on which her Title VII recovery was based,

discriminatory intent. United Air Lines, Inc. v. Evans, 431 U. S. 553,

Delaware State College v. Ricks, 449 U. S. 250, Lorance v. AT&T Tech-

nologies, Inc., 490 U. S. 900, and National Railroad Passenger Corpora-

tion v. Morgan, 536 U. S. 101, clearly instruct that the EEOC charging

period is triggered when a discrete unlawful practice takes place. A

new violation does not occur, and a new charging period does not com-

mence, upon the occurrence of subsequent nondiscriminatory acts that

entail adverse effects resulting from the past discrimination. But if

an employer engages in a series of separately actionable intentionally

discriminatory acts, then a fresh violation takes place when each act is

committed. Ledbetter makes no claim that intentionally discrimina-

tory conduct occurred during the charging period or that discriminatory

decisions occurring before that period were not communicated to her.

She argues simply that Goodyear’s nondiscriminatory conduct during

the charging period gave present effect to discriminatory conduct out-

side of that period. But current effects alone cannot breathe life into

prior, uncharged discrimination. Ledbetter should have ﬁled an EEOC

charge within 180 days after each allegedly discriminatory employment

decision was made and communicated to her. Her attempt to shift for-

ward the intent associated with prior discriminatory acts to the 1998

pay decision is unsound, for it would shift intent away from the act that

consummated the discriminatory employment practice to a later act not

performed with bias or discriminatory motive, imposing liability in the

absence of the requisite intent. Her argument would also distort Title

VII’s “integrated, multistep enforcement procedure.” Occidental Life

Ins. Co.ofCal. v. EEOC, 432 U. S. 355, 359. The short EEOC ﬁling

deadline reﬂects Congress’ strong preference for the prompt resolution

of employment discrimination allegations through voluntary concilia-

tion and cooperation. Id., at 367–368. Nothing in Title VII supports

treating the intent element of Ledbetter’s disparate-treatment claim

any differently from the employment practice element of the claim.

Pp. 623–632.

(b) Bazemore v. Friday, 478 U. S. 385 (per curiam), which concerned

a disparate-treatment pay claim, is entirely consistent with Evans,

Ricks, Lorance, and Morgan. Bazemore’s rule is that an employer vio-

lates Title VII and triggers a new EEOC charging period whenever the

employer issues paychecks using a discriminatory pay structure. It is

not, as Ledbetter contends, a “paycheck accrual rule” under which each

paycheck, even if not accompanied by discriminatory intent, triggers a

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Opinion of the Court

Justice Alito delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case calls upon us to apply established precedent in a

slightly different context. We have previously held that the

time for ﬁling a charge of employment discrimination with

the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)

begins when the discriminatory act occurs. We have ex-

plained that this rule applies to any “[d]iscrete ac[t]” of dis-

crimination, including discrimination in “termination, failure

to promote, denial of transfer, [and] refusal to hire.” Na-

tional Railroad Passenger Corporatio n v. Morgan, 536 U. S.

101, 114 (2002). Because a pay-setting decision is a “discrete

act,” it follows that the period for ﬁling an EEOC charge

begins when the act occurs. Petitioner, having abandoned

her claim under the Equal Pay Act, asks us to deviate from

our prior decisions in order to permit her to assert her claim

under Title VII. Petitioner also contends that discrimina-

tion in pay is different from other types of employment dis-

crimination and thus should be governed by a different rule.

But because a pay-setting decision is a discrete act that oc-

curs at a particular point in time, these arguments must be

rejected. We therefore afﬁrm the judgment of the Court

of Appeals.

Petitioner Lilly Ledbetter (Ledbetter) worked for re-

spondent Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company (Goodyear) at

its Gadsden, Alabama, plant from 1979 until 1998. During

much of this time, salaried employees at the plant were given

or denied raises based on their supervisors’ evaluation of

their performance. In March 1998, Ledbetter submitted a

questionnaire to the EEOC alleging certain acts of sex dis-

crimination, and in July of that year she ﬁled a formal EEOC

charge. After taking early retirement in November 1998,

son H. Sullivan, Robin S. Conrad, Shane Brennan, and Karen R. Harned;

and for the Equal Employment Advisory Council et al. by Ann Elizabeth

Reesman and Laura A. Giantris.

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Opinion of the Court

charging period. 421 F. 3d 1169, 1182–1183 (2005). The

Court of Appeals then concluded that there was insufﬁcient

evidence to prove that Goodyear had acted with discrimina-

tory intent in making the only two pay decisions that oc-

curred within that time span, namely, a decision made in 1997

to deny Ledbetter a raise and a similar decision made in

1998. Id., at 1186–1187.

Ledbetter ﬁled a petition for a writ of certiorari but did

not seek review of the Court of Appeals’ holdings regarding

the sufﬁciency of the evidence in relation to the 1997 and

1998 pay decisions. Rather, she sought review of the follow-

ing question:

“Whether and under what circumstances a plaintiff may

bring an action under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act

of 1964 alleging illegal pay discrimination when the dis-

parate pay is received during the statutory limitations

period, but is the result of intentionally discriminatory

pay decisions that occurred outside the limitations pe-

riod.” Pet. for Cert. i.

In light of disagreement among the Courts of Appeals as to

the proper application of the limitations period in Title VII

disparate-treatment pay cases, compare 421 F. 3d 1169 with

Forsyth v. Federation Employment & Guidance Serv., 409

F. 3d 565 (CA2 2005); Shea v. Rice, 409 F. 3d 448 (CADC

2005), we granted certiorari, 548 U. S. 903 (2006).

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 makes it an “un-

lawful employment practice” to discriminate “against any in-

dividual with respect to his compensation... because of

such individual’s . . . sex.” 42 U. S. C. § 2000e–2(a)(1). An

individual wishing to challenge an employment practice

under this provision must ﬁrst ﬁle a charge with the EEOC.

§ 2000e–5(e)(1). Such a charge must be ﬁled within a speci-

ﬁed period (either 180 or 300 days, depending on the State)

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1998 decision was unlawful because it “carried forward” the

effects of prior, uncharged discrimination decisions. Reply

Brief for Petitioner 20. In essence, she suggests that it is

sufﬁcient that discriminatory acts that occurred prior to the

charging period had continuing effects during that period.

Brief for Petitioner 13 (“[E]ach paycheck that offers a

woman less pay than a similarly situated man because of her

sex is a separate violation of Title VII with its own limita-

tions period, regardless of whether the paycheck simply im-

plements a prior discriminatory decision made outside the

limitations period”); see also Reply Brief for Petitioner 20.

This argument is squarely foreclosed by our precedents.

In United Air Lines, Inc. v. Evans, 431 U. S. 553 (1977),

we rejected an argument that is basically the same as

Ledbetter’s. Evans was forced to resign because the airline

refused to employ married ﬂight attendants, but she did not

ﬁle an EEOC charge regarding her termination. Some

years later, the airline rehired her but treated her as a new

employee for seniority purposes. Id., at 554–555. Evans

then sued, arguing that, while any suit based on the original

discrimination was time barred, the airline’s refusal to give

her credit for her prior service gave “present effect to [its]

past illegal act and therefore perpetuate[d] the consequences

of forbidden discrimination.” Id., at 557.

We agreed with Evans that the airline’s “seniority system

[did] indeed have a continuing impact on her pay and fringe

beneﬁts,” id., at 558, but we noted that “the critical question

[was] whether any present v iolation exist[ed],” ibi d. (empha-

sis in original). We concluded that the continuing effects

of the precharging period discrimination did not make out

a present violation. As Justice Stevens wrote for the

Court:

“United was entitled to treat [Evans’ termination] as

lawful after respondent failed to ﬁle a charge of discrimi-

nation within the 90 days then allowed by § 706(d). A

discriminatory act which is not made the basis for a

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Opinion of the Court

stantial plant seniority began to move into the traditionally

male tester positions. Id., at 902–903.

We held that the plaintiffs’ EEOC charge was not timely

because it was not ﬁled within the speciﬁed period after the

adoption in 1979 of the new seniority rule. We noted that

the plaintiffs had not alleged that the new seniority rule

treated men and women differently or that the rule had been

applied in a discriminatory manner. Rather, their complaint

was that the rule was adopted originally with discriminatory

intent. Id., at 905. And as in Evans and Ricks, we held

that the EEOC charging period ran from the time when the

discrete act of alleged intentional discrimination occurred,

not from the date when the effects of this practice were felt.

490 U. S., at 907–908. We stated:

“Because the claimed invalidity of the facially nondis-

criminatory and neutrally applied tester seniority sys-

tem is wholly dependent on the alleged illegality of sign-

ing the underlying agreement, it is the date of that

signing which governs the limitations period.” Id., at

911.

After Lorance, Congress amended Title VII to cover the speciﬁc situa-

tion involved in that case. See 42 U. S. C. § 2000e–5(e)(2) (allowing for

Title VII liability arising from an intentionally discriminatory seniority

system both at the time of its adoption and at the time of its application).

The dissent attaches great signiﬁcance to this amendment, suggesting that

it shows that Lorance was wrongly reasoned as an initial matter. Post,

at 652–654 (opinion of Ginsburg, J.). However, the very legislative his-

tory cited by the dissent explains that this amendment and the other 1991

Title VII amendments “ ‘expand[ed] the scope of relevant civil rights stat-

utes in order to provide adequate protection to victims of discrimination.’ ”

Post, at 653 (emphasis added). For present purposes, what is most impor-

tant about the amendment in question is that it applied only to the adop-

tion of a discriminatory seniority system, not to other types of employ-

ment discrimination. Evans and Ricks, upon which Lorance relied, 490

U. S., at 906–908, and which employed identical reasoning, were left in

place, and these decisions are more than sufﬁcient to support our holding

today.

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Opinion of the Court

and the paychecks that were issued to her during the 180

days prior to the ﬁling of her EEOC charge do not provide

a basis for overcoming that prior failure.

In an effort to circumvent the need to prove discrimina-

tory intent during the charging period, Ledbetter relies on

the intent associated with other decisions made by other per-

sons at other times. Reply Brief for Petitioner 6 (“Inten-

tional discrimination . . . occurs when . . . differential treat-

ment takes place, even if the intent to engage in that conduct

for a discriminatory purpose was made previously”).

Ledbetter’s attempt to take the intent associated with the

prior pay decisions and shift it to the 1998 pay decision is

unsound. It would shift intent from one act (the act that

consummates the discriminatory employment practice) to a

later act that was not performed with bias or discriminatory

motive. The effect of this shift would be to impose liability

in the absence of the requisite intent.

Our cases recognize this point. In Evans, for example,

we did not take the airline’s discriminatory intent in 1968,

when it discharged the plaintiff because of her sex, and at-

tach that intent to its later act of neutrally applying its

seniority rules. Similarly, in Ricks, we did not take the

discriminatory intent that the college allegedly possessed

when it denied Ricks tenure and attach that intent to its

subsequent act of terminating his employment when his non-

renewable contract ran out. On the contrary, we held that

“the only alleged discrimination occurred—and the ﬁling lim-

itations periods therefore commenced—at the time the ten-

ure decision was made and communicated to Ricks.” 449

U. S., at 258.

Not only would Ledbetter’s argument effectively eliminate

the deﬁning element of her disparate-treatment claim, but it

would distort Title VII’s “integrated, multistep enforcement

procedure.” Occidental Life Ins. Co. of Ca l. v. EEOC, 432

U. S. 355, 359 (1977). We have previously noted the legisla-

tive compromises that preceded the enactment of Title VII,

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tions through voluntary conciliation and cooperation. Occi-

dental Life Ins., supra, at 367–368; Al exander, supra, at 44.

A disparate-treatment claim comprises two elements: an

employment practice, and discriminatory intent. Nothing in

Title VII supports treating the intent element of Ledbetter’s

claim any differently from the employment practice element.

If anything, concerns regarding stale claims weigh more

heavily with respect to proof of the intent associated with

employment practices than with the practices themselves.

For example, in a case such as this in which the plaintiff ’s

claim concerns the denial of raises, the employer’s challenged

acts (the decisions not to increase the employee’s pay at the

times in question) will almost always be documented and will

typically not even be in dispute. By contrast, the employ-

er’s intent is almost always disputed, and evidence relating

to intent may fade quickly with time. In most disparate-

treatment cases, much if not all of the evidence of intent is

circumstantial. Thus, the critical issue in a case involving a

long-past performance evaluation will often be whether the

evaluation was so far off the mark that a sufﬁcient inference

of discriminatory intent can be drawn. See Watson, 487

U. S., at 1004 (Blackmun, J., joined by Brennan and Marshall,

JJ., concurring in part and concurring in judgment) (noting

that in a disparate-treatment claim, the McDonnell Douglas

Corp. v. Green, 411 U. S. 792 (1973), factors establish discrim-

ination by inference). See also, e. g., Zhuang v. Datacard

Of course, there may be instances where the elements forming a cause

of action span more than 180 days. Say, for instance, an employer forms

an illegal discriminatory intent toward an employee but does not act on it

until 181 days later. The charging period would not begin to run until

the employment practice was executed on day 181 because until that point

the employee had no cause of action. The act and intent had not yet been

joined. Here, by contrast, Ledbetter’s cause of action was fully formed

and present at the time that the discriminatory employment actions were

taken against her, at which point she could have, and should have, sued.

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Opinion of the Court

III

In advancing her two theories Ledbetter does not seri-

ously contest the logic of Evans, Ricks, Lorance, and Mor-

gan as set out above, but rather argues that our decision in

Bazemore v. Friday, 478 U. S. 385 (1986) (per curiam), re-

quires different treatment of her claim because it relates to

pay. Ledbetter focuses speciﬁcally on our statement that

“[e]ach week’s paycheck that delivers less to a black than to

a similarly situated white is a wrong actionable under Title

VII.” Id., at 395. She argues that in Bazemore we adopted

a “paycheck accrual rule” under which each paycheck, even

if not accompanied by discriminatory intent, triggers a new

EEOC charging period during which the complainant may

properly challenge any prior discriminatory conduct that im-

pacted the amount of that paycheck, no matter how long ago

the discrimination occurred. On this reading, Bazemore dis-

pensed with the need to prove actual discriminatory intent

in pay cases and, without giving any hint that it was doing

so, repudiated the very different approach taken previously

in Evans and Ricks. Ledbetter’s interpretation is unsound.

Bazemo re concerned a disparate-treatment pay claim

brought against the North Carolina Agricultural Exten-

sion Service (Service). 478 U. S., at 389–390. Service em-

ployees were originally segregated into “a white branch” and

“a ‘Negro branch,’ ” with the latter receiving less pay, but

in 1965 the two branches were merged. Id., at 390–391.

After Title VII was extended to public employees in 1972,

black employees brought suit claiming that pay disparities

attributable to the old dual pay scale persisted. Id., at 391.

The Court of Appeals rejected this claim, which it inter-

preted to be that the “ ‘discriminatory difference in salaries

should have been afﬁrmatively eliminated.’ ” Id., at 395.

This Court reversed in a per curiam opinion, id., at 386–

388, but all of the Members of the Court joined Justice Bren-

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plaintiffs were alleging that the defendants “ha[d] not from

the date of the Act forward made all their employment deci-

sions in a wholly nondiscriminatory way,” 478 U. S., at 396–

397, n. 6 (emphasis in original; internal quotation marks and

brackets omitted)—which is to say that they had engaged

in fresh discrimination. Justice Brennan added that the

Court’s “holding in no sense g[ave] legal effect to the pre-

1972 actions, but, consistent with Evans . . . focuse[d] on

the present salary structure, which is illegal if it is a mere

continuation of the pre-1965 discriminatory pay structure.”

Id.,

at 397, n. 6 (emphasis added).

The sentence in Justice Brennan’s opinion on which Led-

better chieﬂy relies comes directly after the passage quoted

above, and makes a similarly obvious point:

“Each week’s paycheck that delivers less to a black than

to a similarly situated white is a wrong actionable under

Title VII, regardless of the fact that this pattern was

begun prior to the effective date of Title VII.” Id., at

395–396.

That the focus in Bazemore was on a current violation, not the carrying

forward of a past act of discrimination, was made clearly by the side opin-

ion in the Court of Appeals:

“[T]he majority holds, in effect, that because the pattern of discriminatory

salaries here challenged originated before applicable provisions of the

Civil Rights Act made their payment illegal, any ‘lingering effects’ of that

earlier pattern cannot (presumably on an indeﬁnitely maintained basis)

be considered in assessing a challenge to post-act continuation of that

pattern.

“Hazelwood [School Dist. v. United States, 433 U. S. 299 (1977),] and

Evans indeed made it clear that an employer cannot be found liable, or

sanctioned with remedy, for employment decisions made before they were

declared illegal or as to which the claimant has lost any right of action by

lapse of time. For this reason it is generally true that, as the catch-phrase

has it, Title VII imposed ‘no obligation to catch-up,’ i. e., afﬁrmatively to

remedy present effects of pre-Act discrimination, whether in composing a

work force or otherwise. But those cases cannot be thought to insulate

employment decisions that presently are illegal on the basis that at one

time comparable decisions were legal when made by the particular em-

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as an example, the employee there was unlawfully termi-

nated; this caused her to lose seniority; and the loss of senior-

ity affected her wages, among other things. 431 U. S., at

555, n. 5 (“[S]eniority determine[s] a ﬂight attendant’s wages;

the duration and timing of vacations; rights to retention in

the event of layoffs and rights to re-employment thereafter;

and rights to preferential selection of ﬂight assignments”).

The relationship between past discrimination and adverse

present effects was the same in Evans as it is here. Thus,

the argument that Ledbetter urges us to accept here would

necessarily have commanded a different outcome in Evans.

Bazemore stands for the proposition that an employer vio-

lates Title VII and triggers a new EEOC charging period

whenever the employer issues paychecks using a discrimina-

tory pay structure. But a new Title VII violation does not

occur and a new charging period is not triggered when an

employer issues paychecks pursuant to a system that is “fa-

cially nondiscriminatory and neutrally applied.” Lorance,

490 U. S., at 911. The fact that precharging period discrimi-

nation adversely affects the calculation of a neutral factor

(like seniority) that is used in determining future pay does

not mean that each new paycheck constitutes a new violation

and restarts the EEOC charging period.

Because Ledbetter has not adduced evidence that Good-

year initially adopted its performance-based pay system in

order to discriminate on the basis of sex or that it later ap-

plied this system to her within the charging period with any

discriminatory animus, Bazemore is of no help to her.

Rather, all Ledbetter has alleged is that Goodyear’s agents

discriminated against her individually in the past and that

this discrimination reduced the amount of later paychecks.

Because Ledbetter did not ﬁle timely EEOC charges relating

to her employer’s discriminatory pay decisions in the past,

she cannot maintain a suit based on that past discrimination

at this time.

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criminatory acts, see Brief for Petitioner 13, 15 (arguing that

payment of each paycheck constituted a separate violation of

Title VII), each of which was independently identiﬁable and

actionable, and Morgan is perfectly clear that when an em-

ployee alleges “serial violations,” i. e., a series of actionable

wrongs, a timely EEOC charge must be ﬁled with respect to

each discrete alleged violation. 536 U. S., at 113.

While this fundamental misinterpretation of Morgan is

alone sufﬁcient to show that the dissent’s approach must be

rejected, it should also be noted that the dissent is coy as to

whether it would apply the same rule to all pay discrimina-

tion claims or whether it would limit the rule to cases like

Ledbetter’s, in which multiple discriminatory pay decisions

are alleged. The dissent relies on the fact that Ledbetter

was allegedly subjected to a series of discriminatory pay de-

cisions over a period of time, and the dissent suggests that

she did not realize for some time that she had been victim-

ized. But not all pay cases share these characteristics.

If, as seems likely, the dissent would apply the same rule

in all pay cases, then, if a single discriminatory pay decision

made 20 years ago continued to affect an employee’s pay

today, the dissent would presumably hold that the employee

could ﬁle a timely EEOC charge today. And the dissent

would presumably allow this even if the employee had full

knowledge of all the circumstances relating to the 20-year-

old decision at the time it was made.

The dissent, it ap-

pears, proposes that we adopt a special rule for pay cases

based on the particular characteristics of one case that is

The dissent admits as much, responding only that an employer could

resort to equitable doctrines such as laches. Post, at 657–658. But ﬁrst,

as we have noted, Congress has already determined that defense to be

insufﬁcient. Supra, at 632. Second, it is far from clear that a suit ﬁled

under the dissent’s theory, alleging that a paycheck paid recently within

the charging period was itself a freestanding violation of Title VII because

it reﬂected the effects of 20-year-old discrimination, would even be barred

by laches.

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Ledbetter’s appeal to the Fair Labor Standards Act of

1938 (FLSA) is equally unavailing. Stating that it is “well

established that the statute of limitations for violations of

the minimum wage and overtime provisions of the [FLSA]

runs anew with each paycheck,” Brief for Petitioner 35, Led-

better urges that the same should be true in a Title VII pay

case. Again, however, Ledbetter’s argument overlooks the

fact that an FLSA minimum wage or overtime claim does

not require proof of a speciﬁc intent to discriminate. See 29

U. S. C. § 207 (establishing overtime rules); cf. § 255(a) (estab-

lishing 2-year statute of limitations for FLSA claims, except

for claims of a “willful violation,” which may be commenced

within 3 years).

Ledbetter is on ﬁrmer ground in suggesting that we look

to cases arising under the National Labor Relations Act

(NLRA) since the NLRA provided a model for Title VII’s

remedial provisions and, like Title VII, requires the ﬁling

of a timely administrative charge (with the National Labor

Relations Board) before suit may be maintained. Lorance,

490 U. S., at 909; Ford Motor Co. v. EEOC, 458 U. S. 219, 226,

n. 8 (1982). Cf. 29 U. S. C. § 160(b) (“[N]o complaint shall

issue based upon any unfair labor practice occurring more

than six months prior to the ﬁling of the charge with the

Board”).

Ledbetter argues that the NLRA’s 6-month statute of lim-

itations begins anew for each paycheck reﬂecting a prior vio-

lation of the statute, but our precedents suggest otherwise.

In Machinists v. NLRB, 362 U. S. 411, 416–417 (1960), we

istrate Judge’s Report and Recommendation, 1 Record in No. 03–15264–G

(CA11), Doc. 32. The District Court sustained this objection as to the

“disparate pay” claim, but without speciﬁcally mentioning the EPA claim,

which had been dismissed by the Magistrate Judge on the same basis.

See App. to Pet. for Cert. 43a–44a. While the record is not entirely clear,

it appears that at this point Ledbetter elected to abandon her EPA claim,

proceeding to trial with only the Title VII disparate-pay claim, thus giving

rise to the dispute the Court must now resolve.

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and this means that any unlawful employment practice, in-

cluding those involving compensation, must be presented to

the EEOC within the period prescribed by statute.

* * *

For these reasons, the judgment of the Court of Appeals

for the Eleventh Circuit is afﬁrmed.

It is so ordered.

Justice Ginsburg, with whom Justice Stevens, Jus-

tice Souter, and Justice Breyer join, dissenting.

Lilly Ledbetter was a supervisor at Goodyear Tire &

Rubber’s plant in Gadsden, Alabama, from 1979 until her re-

tirement in 1998. For most of those years, she worked as an

area manager, a position largely occupied by men. Initially,

Ledbetter’s salary was in line with the salaries of men per-

forming substantially similar work. Over time, however,

her pay slipped in comparison to the pay of male area manag-

ers with equal or less seniority. By the end of 1997, Ledbet-

ter was the only woman working as an area manager and the

pay discrepancy between Ledbetter and her 15 male counter-

parts was stark: Ledbetter was paid $3,727 per month; the

lowest paid male area manager received $4,286 per month,

the highest paid, $5,236. See 421 F. 3d 1169, 1174 (CA11

2005); Brief for Petitioner 4.

Ledbetter launched charges of discrimination before the

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in

March 1998. Her formal administrative complaint speciﬁed

that, in violation of Title VII, Goodyear paid her a discrimi-

2983682, *2 (EEOC Ofﬁce of Fed. Operations, Dec. 17, 2004). Agencies

have no special claim to deference in their interpretation of our decisions.

Reno v. Bossier Parish School Bd., 528 U. S. 320, 336, n. 5 (2000). Nor do

we see reasonable ambiguity in the statute itself, which makes no distinc-

tion between compensation and other sorts of claims and which clearly

requires that discrete employment actions alleged to be unlawful be moti-

vated “because of such individual’s . . . sex.” 42 U. S. C. § 2000e–2(a)(1).

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The Court’s insistence on immediate contest overlooks

common characteristics of pay discrimination. Pay dispari-

ties often occur, as they did in Ledbetter’s case, in small

increments; cause to suspect that discrimination is at work

develops only over time. Comparative pay information,

moreover, is often hidden from the employee’s view. Em-

ployers may keep under wraps the pay differentials main-

tained among supervisors, no less the reasons for those dif-

ferentials. Small initial discrepancies may not be seen as

meet for a federal case, particularly when the employee, try-

ing to succeed in a nontraditional environment, is averse to

making waves.

Pay disparities are thus signiﬁcantly different from ad-

verse actions “such as termination, failure to promote,...or

refusal to hire,” all involving fully communicated discrete

acts, “easy to identify” as discriminatory. See Na tional

Railroad Passenger Corporation v. Morgan, 536 U. S. 101,

114 (2002). It is only when the disparity becomes apparent

and sizable, e. g., through future raises calculated as a per-

centage of current salaries, that an employee in Ledbetter’s

situation is likely to comprehend her plight and, therefore,

to complain. Her initial readiness to give her employer the

beneﬁt of the doubt should not preclude her from later chal-

lenging the then current and continuing payment of a wage

depressed on account of her sex.

On questions of time under Title VII, we have identiﬁed

as the critical inquiries: “What constitutes an ‘unlawful em-

ployment practice’ and when has that practice ‘occurred’?”

Id., at 110. Our precedent suggests, and lower courts have

overwhelmingly held, that the unlawful practice is the cur-

rent payment of salaries infected by gender-based (or race-

based) discrimination—a practice that occurs whenever a

paycheck delivers less to a woman than to a similarly situ-

ated man. See Bazemore v. Friday, 478 U. S. 385, 395 (1986)

(Brennan, J., joined by all other Members of the Court, con-

curring in part).

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tension Service was divided into two branches: a white

branch and a “Negro branch.” Id., at 390. Employees in

the “Negro branch” were paid less than their white counter-

parts. In response to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which

included Title VII, the State merged the two branches into

a single organization, made adjustments to reduce the salary

disparity, and began giving annual raises based on nondis-

criminatory factors. Id., at 390–391, 394–395. Nonethe-

less, “some pre-existing salary disparities continued to linger

on.” Id., at 394 (internal quotation marks omitted). We re-

jected the Court of Appeals’ conclusion that the plaintiffs

could not prevail because the lingering disparities were sim-

ply a continuing effect of a decision lawfully made prior to

the effective date of Title VII. See id., at 395–396. Rather,

we reasoned, “[e]ach week’s paycheck that delivers less to a

black than to a similarly situated white is a wrong actionable

under Title VII.” Id., at 395. Paychecks perpetuating past

discrimination, we thus recognized, are actionable not simply

because they are “related” to a decision made outside the

charge-ﬁling period, cf. ante, at 636, but because they dis-

criminate anew each time they issue, see Bazemore, 478

U. S., at 395–396, and n. 6; Mo rgan, 536 U. S., at 111–112.

Subsequently, in Morgan, we set apart, for purposes of

Title VII’s timely ﬁling requirement, unlawful employment

actions of two kinds: “discrete acts” that are “easy to iden-

tify” as discriminatory, and acts that recur and are cumula-

tive in impact. See id., at 110, 113–115. “[A] [d]iscrete ac[t]

such as termination, failure to promote, denial of transfer,

or refusal to hire,” id., at 114, we explained, “ ‘occur[s]’ on

the day that it ‘happen[s].’ A party, therefore, must ﬁle

a charge within . . . 180 . . . days of the date of the act or

lose the ability to recover for it.” Id., at 110; see id., at

113 (“[D]iscrete discriminatory acts are not actionable if time

barred, even when they are related to acts alleged in timely

ﬁled charges. Each discrete discriminatory act starts a new

clock for ﬁling charges alleging that act.”).

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She charged insidious discrimination building up slowly

but steadily. See Brief for Petitioner 5–8. Initially in line

with the salaries of men performing substantially the same

work, Ledbetter’s salary fell 15 to 40 percent behind her

male counterparts only after successive evaluations and

percentage-based pay adjustments. See supra, at 643–644.

Over time, she alleged and proved, the repetition of pay deci-

sions undervaluing her work gave rise to the current dis-

crimination of which she complained. Though component

acts fell outside the charge-ﬁling period, with each new pay-

check, Goodyear contributed incrementally to the accumulat-

ing harm. See Morgan, 536 U. S., at 117; Bazemore, 478

U. S., at 395–396; cf. Hanover Shoe, Inc. v. United Shoe

Machinery Corp., 392 U. S. 481, 502, n. 15 (1968).

The realities of the workplace reveal why the discrimina-

tion with respect to compensation that Ledbetter suffered

does not ﬁt within the category of singular discrete acts

“easy to identify.” A worker knows immediately if she is

denied a promotion or transfer, if she is ﬁred or refused em-

ployment. And promotions, transfers, hirings, and ﬁrings

are generally public events, known to co-workers. When an

employer makes a decision of such open and deﬁnitive char-

acter, an employee can immediately seek out an explanation

and evaluate it for pretext. Compensation disparities, in

contrast, are often hidden from sight. It is not unusual, de-

cisions in point illustrate, for management to decline to pub-

National Railroad Passenger Corporation v. Morgan, 536 U. S. 101,

117 (2002), the Court emphasizes, required that “an act contributing to the

claim occu[r] within the [charge-]ﬁling period.” Ante, at 638, and n. 7

(emphasis deleted; internal quotation marks omitted). Here, each pay-

check within the ﬁling period compounded the discrimination Ledbetter

encountered, and thus contributed to the “actionable wrong,” i. e., the suc-

cession of acts composing the pattern of discriminatory pay, of which she

complained.

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male employee is selected over a female for a higher level

position, someone still gets the promotion and is paid a

higher salary; the employer is not enriched. But when a

woman is paid less than a similarly situated man, the em-

ployer reduces its costs each time the pay differential is

implemented. Furthermore, decisions on promotions, like

decisions installing seniority systems, often implicate the

interests of third-party employees in a way that pay differ-

entials do not. Cf. Teamsters v. United States, 431 U. S. 324,

352–353 (1977) (recognizing that seniority systems involve

“vested...rights of employees” and concluding that Title

VII was not intended to “destroy or water down” those

rights). Disparate pay, by contrast, can be remedied at any

time solely at the expense of the employer who acts in a

discriminatory fashion.

In light of the signiﬁcant differences between pay dispari-

ties and discrete employment decisions of the type identiﬁed

in Morgan, the cases on which the Court relies hold no sway.

See ante, at 625–629 (discussing United Air Lines, Inc. v.

Evans, 431 U. S. 553 (1977), Delaware State College v. Ricks,

449 U. S. 250 (1980), and Lorance v. AT&T Technologies, Inc.,

490 U. S. 900 (1989)). Evans and Ricks both involved a sin-

gle, immediately identiﬁable act of discrimination: in Evans,

a constructive discharge, 431 U. S., at 554; in Ricks, a denial

of tenure, 449 U. S., at 252. In each case, the employee ﬁled

charges well after the discrete discriminatory act occurred:

When United Airlines forced Evans to resign because of its

policy barring married female ﬂight attendants, she ﬁled no

charge; only four years later, when Evans was rehired, did

she allege that the airline’s former no-marriage rule was un-

lawful and therefore should not operate to deny her seniority

credit for her prior service. See Evans, 431 U. S., at 554–

557. Similarly, when Delaware State College denied Ricks

tenure, he did not object until his terminal contract came to

an end, one year later. Ricks, 449 U. S., at 253–254, 257–258.

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of Marshall, J.). See also § 3, 105 Stat. 1071 (1991 Civil

Rights Act was designed “to respond to recent decisions of

the Supreme Court by expanding the scope of relevant civil

rights statutes in order to provide adequate protection to

victims of discrimination”).

True, § 112 of the 1991 Civil Rights Act directly addressed

only seniority systems. See ante, at 627, and n. 2. But

Congress made clear (1) its view that this Court had unduly

contracted the scope of protection afforded by Title VII and

other civil rights statutes, and (2) its aim to generalize the

ruling in Bazemore. As the Senate Report accompanying

the proposed Civil Rights Act of 1990, the precursor to the

1991 Act, explained:

“Where, as was alleged in Lorance, an employer adopts

a rule or decision with an unlawful discriminatory mo-

tive, each application of that rule or decision is a new

violation of the law. In Bazemo re ..., for example,...

the Supreme Court properly held that each application

of th[e] racially motivated salary structure, i. e., each

new paycheck, constituted a distinct violation of Title

VII. Section 7(a)(2) generalizes the result correctly

reached in Bazemore.” Civil Rights Act of 1990,

S. Rep. No. 101–315, p. 54 (1990).

See also 137 Cong. Rec. 29046, 29047 (1991) (Sponsors’ In-

terpretative Memorandum) (“This legislation should be

interpreted as disapproving the extension of [Lorance] to

contexts outside of seniority systems.”). But cf. ante, at 637

(relying on Lorance to conclude that “when an employer is-

sues paychecks pursuant to a system that is facially nondis-

criminatory and neutrally applied” a new Title VII violation

does not occur (internal quotation marks omitted)).

Until today, in the more than 15 years since Congress

amended Title VII, the Court had not once relied upon

No Senate Report was submitted with the Civil Rights Act of 1991,

which was in all material respects identical to the proposed 1990 Act.

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Ginsburg, J., dissenting

Forsyth v. Federation Employment and Guidance Serv., 409

F. 3d 565, 573 (CA2 2005) (“Any paycheck given within the

[charge-ﬁling] period... would be actionable, even if based

on a discriminatory pay scale set up outside of the statutory

period.”); Shea v. Rice, 409 F. 3d 448, 452–453 (CADC 2005)

(“[An] employer commit[s] a separate unlawful employment

practice each time he pa[ys] one employee less than another

for a discriminatory reason” (citing Bazemore, 478 U. S., at

396)); Goodwin, 275 F. 3d, at 1009–1010 (“[Bazemore] has

taught a crucial distinction with respect to discriminatory

disparities in pay, establishing that a discriminatory salary

is not merely a lingering effect of past discrimination—in-

stead it is itself a continually recurring violation....[E]ach

race-based discriminatory salary payment constitutes a fresh

violation of Title VII.” (footnote omitted)); Anderson v. Zu-

bieta, 180 F. 3d 329, 335 (CADC 1999) (“The Courts of

Appeals have repeatedly reached the... conclusion” that

pay discrimination is “actionable upon receipt of each pay-

check.”); accord Hildebrandt v. Illinois De pt. of Natural Re-

sources, 347 F. 3d 1014, 1025–1029 (CA7 2003); Cardenas v.

Massey, 269 F. 3d 251, 257 (CA3 2001); Ashley v. Boyle’s

Famous Corned Beef Co., 66 F. 3d 164, 167–168 (CA8 1995)

(en banc); Brinkley-Obu v. Hughes Training, Inc., 36 F. 3d

336, 347–349 (CA4 1994); Gibbs v. Pierce Cty. Law Enforce-

ment Support Agcy., 785 F. 2d 1396, 1399–1400 (CA9 1986).

Similarly in line with the real-world characteristics of pay

discrimination, the EEOC—the federal agency responsible

for enforcing Title VII, see, e. g., 42 U. S. C. §§ 2000e–5(f),

2000e–12(a)—has interpreted the Act to permit employees

to challenge disparate pay each time it is received. The

EEOC’s Compliance Manual provides that “[r]epeated occur-

rences of the same discriminatory employment action, such

as discriminatory paychecks, can be challenged as long as

one discriminatory act occurred within the charge ﬁling

period.” 2 EEOC Compliance Manual § 2–IV–C(1)(a),

p. 605:0024, and n. 183 (2006); cf. id., § 10–III, p. 633:0002

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Ginsburg, J., dissenting

The Court asserts that treating pay discrimination as a

discrete act, limited to each particular pay-setting decision,

is necessary to “protec[t] employers from the burden of de-

fending claims arising from employment decisions that are

long past.” Ante, at 630 (quoting Ricks, 449 U. S., at 256–

257). But the discrimination of which Ledbetter complained

is not long past. As she alleged, and as the jury found,

Goodyear continued to treat Ledbetter differently because

of sex each pay period, with mounting harm. Allowing em-

ployees to challenge discrimination “that extend[s] over long

periods of time,” into the charge-ﬁling period, we have pre-

viously explained, “does not leave employers defenseless”

against unreasonable or prejudicial delay. Morgan, 536

U. S., at 121. Employers disadvantaged by such delay may

raise various defenses. Id., at 122. Doctrines such as

“waiver, estoppel, and equitable tolling” “allow us to honor

Title VII’s remedial purpose without negating the particular

purpose of the ﬁling requirement, to give prompt notice to

the employer.” Id., at 121 (quoting Zipes v. Trans World

Airlines, Inc., 455 U. S. 385, 398 (1982)); see 536 U. S., at 121

(defense of laches may be invoked to block an employee’s suit

“if he unreasonably delays in ﬁling [charges] and as a result

harms the defendant”); EEOC Brief 15 (“[I]f Ledbetter un-

reasonably delayed challenging an earlier decision, and that

delay signiﬁcantly impaired Goodyear’s ability to defend it-

self... Goodyear can raise a defense of laches.... ”).

In a last-ditch argument, the Court asserts that this dis-

sent would allow a plaintiff to sue on a single decision made

Further, as the EEOC appropriately recognized in its brief to the Elev-

enth Circuit, Ledbetter’s failure to challenge particular pay raises within

the charge-ﬁling period “signiﬁcantly limit[s] the relief she can seek. By

waiting to ﬁle a charge, Ledbetter lost her opportunity to seek relief for

any discriminatory paychecks she received between 1979 and late 1997.”

EEOC Brief 14. See also supra, at 654–656.

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Furthermore, the difference between the EPA’s prohibi-

tion against paying unequal wages and Title VII’s ban on

discrimination with regard to compensation is not as large

as the Court’s opinion might suggest. See ante, at 640.

The key distinction is that Title VII requires a showing of

intent. In practical effect, “if the trier of fact is in equipoise

about whether the wage differential is motivated by gender

discrimination,” Title VII compels a verdict for the em-

ployer, while the EPA compels a verdict for the plaintiff. 2

C. Sullivan, M. Zimmer, & R. White, Employment Discrimi-

nation: Law and Practice § 7.08[F][3], p. 532 (3d ed. 2002).

In this case, Ledbetter carried the burden of persuading the

jury that the pay disparity she suffered was attributable to

intentional sex discrimination. See supra, at 643–644; infra

this page and 660.

III

To show how far the Court has strayed from interpretation

of Title VII with ﬁdelity to the Act’s core purpose, I return

to the evidence Ledbetter presented at trial. Ledbetter

proved to the jury the following: She was a member of a

protected class; she performed work substantially equal to

work of the dominant class (men); she was compensated less

for that work; and the disparity was attributable to gender-

based discrimination. See supra, at 643–644.

Speciﬁcally, Ledbetter’s evidence demonstrated that her

current pay was discriminatorily low due to a long series

of decisions reﬂecting Goodyear’s pervasive discrimination

against women managers in general and Ledbetter in partic-

ular. Ledbetter’s former supervisor, for example, admitted

to the jury that Ledbetter’s pay, during a particular one-year

period, fell below Goodyear’s minimum threshold for her po-

sition. App. 93–97. Although Goodyear claimed the pay

disparity was due to poor performance, the supervisor ac-

knowledged that Ledbetter received a “Top Performance

Award” in 1996. Id., at 90–93. The jury also heard testi-

mony that another supervisor—who evaluated Ledbetter in

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tices and devices . . . .” (internal quotation marks omitted));

Albemarle Paper Co. v. Moody, 422 U. S. 405, 418 (1975)

(“It is...the purpose of Title VII to make persons whole

for injuries suffered on account of unlawful employment

discrimination.”).

This is not the ﬁrst time the Court has ordered a cramped

interpretation of Title VII, incompatible with the statute’s

broad remedial purpose. See supra, at 652–654. See also

Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio, 490 U. S. 642 (1989) (su-

perseded in part by the Civil Rights Act of 1991); Price

Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 490 U. S. 228 (1989) (plurality opin-

ion) (same); 1 B. Lindemann & P. Grossman, Employment

Discrimination Law 2 (3d ed. 1996) (“A spate of Court deci-

sions in the late 1980s drew congressional ﬁre and resulted

in demands for legislative change[,]” culminating in the 1991

Civil Rights Act (footnote omitted)). Once again, the ball is

in Congress’ court. As in 1991, the Legislature may act to

correct this Court’s parsimonious reading of Title VII.

* * *

For the reasons stated, I would hold that Ledbetter’s claim

is not time barred and would reverse the Eleventh Circuit’s

judgment.

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Opinion of the Court

Ledbetter’s appeal to the Fair Labor Standards Act of

1938 (FLSA) is equally unavailing. Stating that it is “well

established that the statute of limitations for violations of

the minimum wage and overtime provisions of the [FLSA]

runs anew with each paycheck,” Brief for Petitioner 35, Led-

better urges that the same should be true in a Title VII pay

case. Again, however, Ledbetter’s argument overlooks the

fact that an FLSA minimum wage or overtime claim does

not require proof of a speciﬁc intent to discriminate. See 29

U. S. C. § 207 (establishing overtime rules); cf. § 255(a) (estab-

lishing 2-year statute of limitations for FLSA claims, except

for claims of a “willful violation,” which may be commenced

within 3 years).

Ledbetter is on ﬁrmer ground in suggesting that we look

to cases arising under the National Labor Relations Act

(NLRA) since the NLRA provided a model for Title VII’s

remedial provisions and, like Title VII, requires the ﬁling

of a timely administrative charge (with the National Labor

Relations Board) before suit may be maintained. Lorance,

490 U. S., at 909; Ford Motor Co. v. EEOC, 458 U. S. 219, 226,

n. 8 (1982). Cf. 29 U. S. C. § 160(b) (“[N]o complaint shall

issue based upon any unfair labor practice occurring more

than six months prior to the ﬁling of the charge with the

Board”).

Ledbetter argues that the NLRA’s 6-month statute of lim-

itations begins anew for each paycheck reﬂecting a prior vio-

lation of the statute, but our precedents suggest otherwise.

In Machinists v. NLRB, 362 U. S. 411, 416–417 (1960), we

istrate Judge’s Report and Recommendation, 1 Record in No. 03–15264–G

(CA11), Doc. 32. The District Court sustained this objection as to the

“disparate pay” claim, but without speciﬁcally mentioning the EPA claim,

which had been dismissed by the Magistrate Judge on the same basis.

See App. to Pet. for Cert. 43a–44a. While the record is not entirely clear,

it appears that at this point Ledbetter elected to abandon her EPA claim,

proceeding to trial with only the Title VII disparate-pay claim, thus giving

rise to the dispute the Court must now resolve.

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642 LEDBETTER v. GOODYEAR TIRE & RUBBER CO.

Opinion of the Court

held that “where conduct occurring within the limitations

period can be charged to be an unfair labor practice only

through reliance on an earlier unfair labor practice[,] the use

of the earlier unfair labor practice [merely] serves to cloak

with illegality that which was otherwise lawful.” This in-

terpretation corresponds closely to our analysis in Evans

and Ricks and supports our holding in the present case.

Ledbetter, ﬁnally, makes a variety of policy arguments in

favor of giving the alleged victims of pay discrimination

more time before they are required to ﬁle a charge with the

EEOC. Among other things, she claims that pay discrimi-

nation is harder to detect than other forms of employment

discrimination.

We are not in a position to evaluate Ledbetter’s policy ar-

guments, and it is not our prerogative to change the way in

which Title VII balances the interests of aggrieved employ-

ees against the interest in encouraging the “prompt process-

ing of all charges of employment discrimination,” Mohasco,

447 U. S., at 825, and the interest in repose.

Ledbetter’s policy arguments for giving special treatment

to pay claims ﬁnd no support in the statute and are inconsist-

ent with our precedents.

We apply the statute as written,

We have previously declined to address whether Title VII suits are

amenable to a discovery rule. National Railroad Passenger Corporation

v. Morgan, 536 U. S. 101, 114, n. 7 (2002). Because Ledbetter does not

argue that such a rule would change the outcome in her case, we have no

occasion to address this issue.

Ledbetter argues that the EEOC’s endorsement of her approach in its

Compliance Manual and in administrative adjudications merits deference.

But we have previously declined to extend Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natu-

ral Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837 (1984), deference to

the Compliance Manual, Morgan, sup ra, at 111, n. 6, and similarly decline

to defer to the EEOC’s adjudicatory positions. The EEOC’s views in

question are based on its misreading of Bazemore. See, e. g., Amft

v. Mineta, No. 07A40116, 2006 WL 985183, *5 (EEOC Ofﬁce of Fed.

Operations, Apr. 6, 2006); Albritton v. Po tter, No. 01A44063, 2004 WL