Interesting...you should definately consider a lawsuit.
My ex-wife was "let go" from a national home improvement chain when she was 8 months pregnant with my daughter and suffering a difficult pregnancy. It was obviously a move to simply save money by the scumbag management and put my ex-wife and my unborn daughters health in pretty serious jeopardy.
It was a comedy-of-errors (without the humor, of course) for the management, and they broke so many laws the lawyer we eventually retained told us it was the most open and shut case he had ever seen.
My ex eventually settled for a decent settlement 18 months later, although I basically begged her to take it trial and make as much noise as possible about it to put pressure on the corporation to never do it to anyone else.
In the end, of course, it was her decision and she took the money and moved on.
IMO, you have every right to be jaded, and hope you do what you feel is right for you to do.
The firing illegally cancelled her health insurance even though she had worked more than the amount of hours necessary to earn the insurance benefits.
I forget the details...its been 13 years...but that was one of the more open-and-shut points our attorney used to easily force a settlement.
You do know there are federal employment laws that make it illegal to fire women just for being pregnant, don't you?
Also, there was no documented reason why they were firing her...her work record was spotless and in fact, she was the new store trainer for her position due to her hard work and skill.
One of the more egregious things I remember was the manager actually called her and told her, while she was in the hospital no less, that they would rehire her after my daughter was born, even thought they just cancelled her insurance and left us both in a huge financial bind and put her health and her baby's health is serious risk.
Do you really think that women should be fired and have their health insurance cancelled for no reason besides being pregnant?
No I don't think that. I think US employment practises are downright disgusting and that Americans should not put up with it. I've always been told there's no recourse with the at-will employment system so I was interested to hear more about this case of yours and what that recourse was.
If they are evil and stupid, such having put something discriminatory in writing then it is a winable suit.
The other way is to look for patterns over a longer period of time and maybe say "look all 10 last employees who were let go were women who got pregnant, there is something here".
But unfortunately if they are not too stupid they would use convenient double-speak euphemisms between themselves. Like say they'd call it "restructuring". Or due to "culture fit". Or just "business reasons". They could be winking to each other when saying that but you'd really need of the people in charge to turn on others and testify.
My ex-wife was "let go" from a national home improvement chain when she was 8 months pregnant with my daughter and suffering a difficult pregnancy. It was obviously a move to simply save money by the scumbag management and put my ex-wife and my unborn daughters health in pretty serious jeopardy.
It was a comedy-of-errors (without the humor, of course) for the management, and they broke so many laws the lawyer we eventually retained told us it was the most open and shut case he had ever seen.
My ex eventually settled for a decent settlement 18 months later, although I basically begged her to take it trial and make as much noise as possible about it to put pressure on the corporation to never do it to anyone else.
In the end, of course, it was her decision and she took the money and moved on.
IMO, you have every right to be jaded, and hope you do what you feel is right for you to do.