The U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling that plaintiffs are entitled to rely on statistics to prove their case also “provides some important guidance” on the court’s opinion in Wal-Mart Stores Inc. v. Dukes, 131 S. Ct. 2541 (2011), Professor Adam Steinman told Bloomberg BNA.
Wal-Mart involved a proposed class of over a million female Wal-Mart workers who alleged pay and promotion discrimination. The Supreme Court held that the workers’ statistical evidence of discrimination failed to establish a nationwide pay or promotion pattern across all Wal-Mart’s stores, and didn’t tie all of the workers’ claims together to satisfy commonality.
Commonality, a prerequisite to class certification under Rule 23, requires questions of law or fact common to the class.
But the court here clarified that “ does not stand for the broad proposition that a representative sample is an impermissible means of establishing class-wide liability.”
Steinman said it’s significant that the court rejected a categorical rule against the use of such evidence.
For more, read “SCOTUS Upholds Use of Statistics in Class Overtime Fight.”