Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. Puget Sound Log Scaling and Grading Bureau, and Northwest Log Scalers Association

In this enforcement action EEOC appeals from an adverse partial summary judgment which disposed of the one claim not covered by stipulation.

Until 1979, the health insurance policy which Puget Sound offered its employees did not provide full coverage for pregnancy-related expenses of female employees or spouses of male employees. Following passage in 1978 of the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA), 42 U.S.C. 2000e(k) (1982) , Puget Sound amended its health policy to cover the pregnancy-related expenses of female employees, but continued to exclude those of spouses of male employees. In January 1982, a male employee and the employees’ union filed a discrimination complaint with the EEOC alleging that the policy, as amended, discriminated against male employees by providing them with less comprehensive health insurance benefits than it provided to female employees and their spouses. In September 1983, EEOC brought an action in federal district court on behalf of Puget Sound’s male employees whose spouses had incurred non-covered pregnancy-related expenses which would have been covered if incurred by female employees.

The substantive question in that action had been decided several…