A group of 26 employees from Meta has initiated legal action against the company, asserting that it used artificial intelligence systems to determine layoffs, disproportionately affecting employees on medical, parental, or family leave. These employees are part of the 8,000 workers, around 10% of its total workforce, that Meta announced it would lay off in May 2023.
The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in Oakland, California, outlines that Meta employed various internal AI systems, including keystroke and activity monitoring data, AI token-usage dashboards, and algorithmically assisted performance rankings to make layoff decisions. The lawsuit claims that many of the scoring and rating systems employed by Meta are inherently designed such that employees on protected leave cannot accumulate the necessary performance metrics. It criticizes the company for failing to account for protected leave in its assessments and for not pausing its algorithm-driven evaluations to comply with legal requirements for individualized reviews.
Consequently, the lawsuit states that individuals on protected medical or family leave were disproportionately chosen for layoffs. All 26 plaintiffs had taken protected leave and requested reasonable accommodations for their disabilities, although none have been officially separated from the company yet, with layoffs scheduled to begin on July 22, 2023.
Many plaintiffs were on parental leave or took medical leave due to serious health conditions. One employee reported facing discouragement from management regarding taking medical leave, with a manager indicating that such action might lead to selection for layoffs. The lawsuit states that Meta did not provide accommodations for this employee’s disability.
According to Meta's statement, the allegations put forth by the plaintiffs lack merit and are not grounded in factual evidence, emphasizing that workforce management decisions were made by personnel, not AI systems. Approximately half of the employees involved in the lawsuit had taken leave related to caregiving or pregnancy, including eight women on maternity leave and four men who had taken parental leave.
The lawsuit alleges violations of several laws, including the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, and the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. It also invokes the concept of "disparate impact liability," which pertains to the idea that even seemingly neutral policies can be discriminatory if they disproportionately negatively impact a protected group of employees. This principle, embedded in Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, was deprioritized by the Trump administration but still remains enforceable through private lawsuits, a route available to employees if the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) declines their claims.
The complaint against Meta highlights that the company’s algorithmic selection process, which records absences as reduced performance, has a more severe effect on women than men. This is primarily because women are more likely to take pregnancy and caregiving leave. The lawsuit references the prohibition of such employment practices under Title VII, as well as a significant Supreme Court ruling from 1971 that affirmed the doctrine of disparate impact.
Legal representatives for the plaintiffs state that the lawsuit primarily seeks to maintain the current employment status of the workers until arbitration can take place. They argue that once layoff procedures are finalized, the damages incurred—such as the loss of employer-subsidized healthcare during critical periods, extinguishing time-bound leave rights, forfeiture of unvested equity, and triggering immigration issues—are irreversible.
