Opinion ID: 166694
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Insignificant Age Difference

Text: 27 Nordam urges us to establish a bright-line rule that a five-year age difference is insignificant as a matter of law in age-discrimination cases, and therefore it is entitled to a JMOL. It relies on O'Connor, 517 U.S. at 312-15, 116 S.Ct. 1307, for the proposition that there cannot be an inference of age discrimination when the plaintiff is insignificantly older than the similarly situated employees who received better treatment. In O'Connor the question was whether an employer could be guilty of age discrimination when replacing an older worker by another who was within the protected class (i.e., was over 40 years old). Id. at 312. The Court reversed the district court's grant of summary judgment for the employer, emphasizing that the difference in age was obviously more important in inferring age discrimination than was whether the younger replacement was himself within the group protected by the ADEA. Id. at 312-13. The Court noted that such an inference cannot be drawn from the replacement of one worker with another worker insignificantly younger, id. at 313, but it did not explore further whether any particular age difference would be significant. 28 Nordam argues that Mr. Overbey, who was only five years younger than Mr. Whittington, was the only employee who was similarly situated to Mr. Whittington and therefore the only one to whom he should be compared. It urges that an age difference of five years or less is insignificant as a matter of law and should therefore always bar a finding of age discrimination. (Nordam actually makes this argument in the context of Mr. Whittington's alleged failure to satisfy the fourth element of the McDonnell Douglas prima facie case. As we have discussed, however, we need not consider satisfaction of a prima facie case when reviewing a jury verdict. But we consider the rule proposed by Nordam anyway, because it could be applied to foreclose a finding of sufficient evidence on the ultimate issue of discrimination.) 29 There are two flaws in Nordam's argument. First, Nordam is assuming that Mr. Overbey is the only employee against whom Mr. Whittington should be compared. Mr. Whittington, however, claims, and the jury could have agreed, that he was similarly situated to all nine Leads in the division, because all those jobs involved essentially the same skills and roles. The youngest of these Leads was 28 at the time of Mr. Whittington's termination. It is not contestable that several of them would be considered significantly younger than Mr. Whittington. 30 Second, even if it is appropriate to compare Mr. Whittington only to Mr. Overbey, we disagree with Nordam that the five-year age difference would be dispositive. To be sure, the extent of the age difference between comparable employees is obviously relevant to the ultimate question of age discrimination. That Mr. Whittington was only five years older than Mr. Overbey, who kept his job, makes it more difficult for the jury to infer that Nordam discriminated against Mr. Whittington (at least insofar as he is compared to Mr. Overbey) because of his age. But that fact should be but one factor weighed by the jury. 31 Nordam relies on cases from the Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Circuits in arguing that we should adopt a bright-line rule that five years is an insignificant difference in age as a matter of law. None of those courts, however, applies such a bright-line rule. The Sixth and Seventh Circuits both allow for other evidence to overcome a presumption that a difference is insignificant. See Grosjean v. First Energy Corp., 349 F.3d 332, 340 (6th Cir.2003) ([I]n the absence of direct evidence that the employer considered age to be significant, an age difference of six years or less between an employee and a replacement is not significant.); Cianci v. Pettibone Corp., 152 F.3d 723, 728 (7th Cir.1998) ([A]n age disparity of less than ten years is presumptively insubstantial unless the plaintiff directs the court to evidence that her employer considered her age to be significant. (internal quotation marks omitted)). And the Eighth Circuit requires a fact-specific determination. See Schiltz v. Burlington N. R.R., 115 F.3d 1407, 1413 (8th Cir.1997) ( On these facts, the age disparities do not raise an inference of discrimination. . . . (emphasis added)); cf. Hammer v. Ashcroft, 383 F.3d 722, 726 n. 3 (8th Cir.2004) (Our Circuit has not decided [whether a six-year age difference preludes a prima facie case].) In one case we observed that a two-year age difference was obviously insignificant, see Munoz v. St. Mary-Corwin Hosp., 221 F.3d 1160, 1166 (10th Cir.2000), but we did not purport to establish a firm rule outside the context of that case. 32 In our view, a definitive five-year rule is unjustified. We are not convinced that all five-year age differences are the same. The replacement of a 45-year-old by a 40-year-old would be less suspicious than the replacement of a 62-year-old by a 57-year-old. Comparing a 62-year-old worker with one who is 57, an employer may think it better to retain someone who will stay with the company another eight years (until age 65) rather than one who would be retiring in three years, less than half the time. Or a company may simply wish to rid itself of its older workers, beginning with the oldest. 33 To the extent that other circuits establish a direct-evidence requirement when the age difference is less than five years, we choose not to follow them. The authorities are legion that circumstantial evidence can be every bit as compelling as direct evidence. See, e.g., Rogers v. Mo. Pac. R.R. Co., 352 U.S. 500, 508 n. 17, 77 S.Ct. 443, 1 L.Ed.2d 493 (1957) (citing The Robert Edwards, 19 U.S. (6 Wheat.) 187, 190, 5 L.Ed. 238 (1821)) (Circumstantial evidence is not only sufficient, but may also be more certain, satisfying and persuasive than direct evidence.); United States v. Becker, 62 F.2d 1007, 1010 (2d Cir.1933) (Hand, J.) (The requirement [that the jury be separately charged as to circumstantial evidence] seems to us a refinement which only serves to confuse laymen into supposing that they should use circumstantial evidence otherwise than testimonial.); 1A John Henry Wigmore, Evidence § 26 (Peter Tillers rev. 1983) (Wigmore's view that circumstantial evidence may be as persuasive and as compelling as testimonial evidence, and sometimes more so, is now generally accepted.). We decline to set rigid guidelines and will leave to the jury the evaluation of the evidence, subject as always to the oversight of the district court to refuse to permit unreasonable findings.