On this day in Labor History the year was 1997.
That was the day that a group of female employees at the investment firm Smith Barney came to a tentative agreement to settle a sexual harassment law suit against the firm.
Smith Barney was one of the oldest Wall Street firms, with a reputation for respectability.
But behind closed doors the firm more closely resembled what the Chicago Tribune described as a “fraternity-house atmosphere.”
The accounts women told of their treatment at the firm were lewd and disgusting.
In the basement of the Garden City, New York office there was a room called the “Boom, boom room,” where female employees were told to entertain clients.
Fed up with this treatment, more than 20 women joined together and filed a class-action law suit.
To settle the suit, the firm agreed to invest $15 million in diversity training, along with settlements to the harassed women.
But sexual harassment of women in the financial industry was not only a problem at Smith Barney.
Female brokers in Chicago filed a suit against Merrill Lynch, who agreed to a settlement with the plaintiffs.
Smith Barney also did not learn its lesson.
Just over a decade later, the firm again settled another sexual harassment law suit to the tune of 33 million.
This time according to Forbes Magazine, the suit was filed by “four female brokers who accused Smith Barney of preventing them from competing fairly for new accounts, promotions and pay, and depriving women of equal training and sales support.”
Over the course of fifteen years Merrill Lynch paid out almost half a billion dollars in discrimination suits to women and minority brokers.
October 6 - Fannie Lou Hamer is Born
October 5 - Labor Candidates Step Up
October 4 - Truman Seizes the Nation’s Oil Refineries
October 3 - The Father-Son Strike
October 2 - Striking for a Future
October 1 - Molding the Future
September 30 - Homestead Strikers Tried for Treason
September 29 - Murdered in Estevan
September 27 - Uprising of the 20,000
September 28 - The Journey Toward Equal Treatment
September 26 - Shays’ Rebellion
September 25 - Lewis Hine is Born
September 24 - The Build of the Supreme Court
September 23 - The Nixon Plan in Philadelphia
September 22 - A Pepperoni Pizza and a Union
September 21 - The March of Mother Jones
September 20 - Upton Sinclair is Born
September 19 - The Solidarity March
September 18 - The Horse Race
September 17 - The Southern Differential
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