Detroit District Court Certifies Antitrust Class Of Registered Nurse

What is the right compensation for a particular job? That's the question virtually every employer must face. Pay too little, and the employer may not be able to fill a position or must settle for less than the best candidates. Pay too much, and the employer loses money and may create other problems, including the morale of other employees, additional hurdles in managing substandard performers, and other aberrations in its compensation system.

For that reason, many employers investigate what wages are being paid in the market place, often subscribing to third party services to provide competitive wage data. The use of these services is driven in part by Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission guidelines that create a safe harbor of sorts to permit employers to use data that is sufficiently non-specific to assist in making compensation decisions. The purpose for these guidelines is to avoid potential antitrust violations where it can be claimed that employers have conspired to fix wages. If that system fails, the employer can be faced with potentially staggering liability, as a recent case demonstrates.

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