Opinion ID: 777187
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Individual Qualifications and Preferences.

Text: 54 Tidyman's next argues that Dr. Polissar's statistical analysis should have been excluded because it did not eliminate all of the possible legitimate nondiscriminatory factors, including the employee's qualifications, level of education, and preferences. This argument also fails. We begin our analysis by noting that the law does not require the near-impossible standard of eliminating all possible nondiscriminatory factors. See Bazemore v. Friday, 478 U.S. 385, 400, 106 S.Ct. 3000, 92 L.Ed.2d 315 (1986) (Importantly, it is clear that a regression analysis that includes less than `all measurable variables' may serve to prove a plaintiff's case.) (Brennan, J). 55 In Bazemore, the Supreme Court addressed the precise question presented by Tidyman's' appeal: if a study fails to account for all variables, how should a court treat the study? Justice Brennan, writing for the court, explained that [n]ormally, failure to include variables will affect the analysis' probativeness, not its admissibility. 478 U.S. at 400, 106 S.Ct. 3000. In other words, in most cases, objections to the inadequacies of a study are more appropriately considered an objection going to the weight of the evidence rather than its admissibility. See, e.g., Wilmington v. J.I. Case Co., 793 F.2d 909, 920 (8th Cir. 1986) (Virtually all the inadequacies in the expert's testimony urged here by [the defendant] were brought out forcefully at trial.... [T]hese matters go to the weight of the expert's testimony rather than to its admissibility.). 18 Vigorous cross-examination of a study's inadequacies allows the jury to appropriately weigh the alleged defects and reduces the possibility of prejudice. Fireman's Fund, 106 F.3d at 1468; United States v. L.E. Cooke Co., 991 F.2d 336, 342 (6th Cir.1993). In this case, Tidyman's cross-examined Dr. Polissar extensively about the fact that the study did not account for all possible variables, such as educational differences. 56 In some cases, however, the analysis may be so incomplete as to be inadmissable as irrelevant. Bazemore, 478 U.S. at 400 n. 10, 106 S.Ct. 3000. Tidyman's contends that failure to include the employees' individual qualifications, preferences, and education in the analysis rendered the analysis inadmissible under this standard. We disagree. 57 First, Tidyman's did not prove at trial that any of these factors were important to the subjective and undefined promotion process or compensation awards. We have recognized that a defendant may not rest an attack on an unsubstantiated assertion of error. Gen. Tel. Co., 885 F.2d at 580. Rather, the defendant must produce credible evidence that curing the alleged flaws would also cure the statistical disparity. Id. at 583. Accord Sobel v. Yeshiva Univ., 839 F.2d 18, 34 (2d Cir. 1988) ([A] defendant challenging the validity of a multiple regression analysis [must] make a showing that the factors it contends ought to have been included would weaken the showing of a salary disparity made by the analysis.). 58 In this case, the plaintiffs' expert used the best available data, which [came] from the [defendant] itself. Adams v. Ameritech Serv. Inc., 231 F.3d 414, 424 (7th Cir.2000). If the defendant believed information about the employees' educational background, for example, would have explained the differences in promotions and compensation between male and female upper level employees, Tidyman's should have provided information about educational level to the plaintiffs, or at a minimum, introduced testimony that education was a central factor in promotions. 59 We cannot say that the exclusion of preferences, individual qualifications, and education rendered the data set so incomplete as to be irrelevant. Bazemore, 478 U.S. at 400, 106 S.Ct. 3000. Dr. Polissar's regression analysis accounted for experience and seniority within the company. By tracking the employees over time, Dr. Polissar was able to control outside factors that may have contributed to women originally being placed in lower management positions. See Gen. Tel. Co., 885 F.2d at 582 (concluding that the plaintiff's statistical analysis was probative of discrimination despite its failure to include employment interests); Adams, 231 F.3d at 427-28 (concluding that the defendant's objections that the analysis did not control for outside factors went to the weight of the evidence, not its admissibility); Bruno v. W.B. Saunders Co., 882 F.2d 760, 766 (3d Cir.1989) (affirming the district court's admission of statistical studies, despite the failure of the studies to take account of the minimum qualifications of the jobs into which promotion or transfer occurred). 19 60 In sum, the testimony of Dr. Polissar had probative value. The analysis could have helped the jury determine contested facts and evaluate whether the promotion and compensation practices of Tidyman's had a disparate impact or reflected disparate treatment against women at the management level. Any inadequacies in the methodology were presented to the jury by the cross-examination of Dr. Polissar. We conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion by failing to exclude the plaintiffs' expert testimony.