Leeds Morelli & Brown has been contacted by clients in connection with Delta Airlines (“Delta”) offering voluntary severance payouts to approximately 30,000 employees. Those payouts are designed to reduce Delta’s workforce so as to lower overhead to compensate for rising fuel prices.Delta is not likely the only airline making such offers.  However, such strategies are troubling to Leeds Morelli & Brown.

Most significantly, the employees most likely to be pressured to take severance payouts are older workers due to the fact that they are earning higher salaries.  In contrast, employees in the early or middle stages of their careers are less likely to be pressured to  accept severance payouts because of their more affordable salaries.  Therefore, a company’s severance policy may have the effect of forcing out a greater number of older workers.  This may be a subtle form of age discrimination, against which Leeds Morelli & Brown continues to fight.

Moreover, Leeds Morelli & Brown believes that when a company uses economic troubles as a pretext to force out older workers, a careful analysis of the totality of all circumstances must be applied.

For example, it is rare to find an airline flight for under $300 per round-trip, and most airlines have found an increasing number of ways to charge passengers (such as for extra baggage, for food, and even for water).  However, the airlines continue to claim poverty.  As a result of the alleged economic pressures, the older and dedicated employees may be forced out in a disparate manner.

Leeds Morelli & Brown’s objective is to create a blog to educate airline workers about their rights and the ways in which they can protect themselves against airline downsizing.