With few exceptions, employers with 100 or more employees and certain government contractors are required to submit a workplace profile, broken down by race, sex, ethnicity, and job category, to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) by May 31, 2019. This year, covered employers must also comply with a second deadline.  By September 30, 2019, EEO-1 filers must report W-2 wages and hours worked within 12 specific pay bands by race, gender and ethnicity to the EEOC.

The Obama administration added the pay data reporting requirement in 2016. But when the Trump administration took over, the Office of Management and Budget (“OMB”) stayed the pay data reporting requirement, so employers never had to comply.  Recently, a federal district court ruled in National Women’s Law Center v. Office of Management and Budget, Civil Action No. 17-cv-2458 (D.D.C.), that the OMB lacked the authority to issue a stay of the pay data reporting requirement.

In response to the court’s order, the EEOC has now reinstated the pay data reporting requirement. Affected employers must report pay data for calendar years 2017 and 2018 by September 30, 2019.

The EEOC expects to begin collecting pay data in mid-July 2019. Although the Department of Justice has appealed the court’s ruling in National Women’s Law Center, affected employers will still be required to submit pay data by the September 30, 2019 deadline.