“Substantially Equal” Means Substantially Equal: Harris v. International Paper Co.
Clarifying Comparator and Pretext Requirements in Equal Pay Act & Title VII Litigation

Introduction

In Joni Harris v. International Paper Company, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reaffirmed two pivotal principles: (1) the “substantially equal work” requirement of the Equal Pay Act (EPA) is stringent and cannot be satisfied by pointing to employees who merely share broad job categories, and (2) under the familiar McDonnell-Douglas burden-shifting framework applicable to Title VII claims, an employer’s burden is one of production, not persuasion. Once an employer articulates a “clear and reasonably specific” non-discriminatory reason for a pay disparity, the plaintiff must do more than critique the employer’s business judgment; she must show that the proffered justification is a pretext for discrimination.

Plaintiff-Appellant Joni Harris, a wastewater (water) environmental engineer, alleged that International Paper Company (“IP”) violated (a) the Equal Pay Act by compensating a male air-emissions engineer, Lance McCray, at a higher rate for what she characterized as substantially similar work, and (b) Title VII by discriminatorily paying McCray more on the basis of his race and sex. After losing on both claims in the district court—via an adverse jury verdict on the EPA claim and summary judgment on the Title VII claim—Harris appealed. The Eleventh Circuit, in an unpublished, non-argument calendar opinion, affirmed across the board.

Summary of the Judgment

• Motion for New Trial (EPA claim): Denial affirmed. Even assuming arguendo that the district court erred by excluding compensation evidence about two additional male engineers (Shanks and Baker), the error was harmless. Harris failed to show that the exclusion probably swayed the jury’s verdict given substantial evidence that McCray’s air-emissions position was materially different from her wastewater role.
• Summary Judgment (Title VII claim): Affirmed. IP articulated legitimate, non-discriminatory reasons for paying McCray more (greater urgency, complexity, and supervisory responsibilities in the air-emissions position plus a competing external offer). Harris offered no evidence that those reasons were dishonest or pretextual; she merely disagreed with IP’s business assessment.

Analysis

1. Precedents Cited

The panel rooted its reasoning in a well-developed line of Eleventh Circuit and Supreme Court cases:

• Brochu v. City of Riviera Beach, 304 F.3d 1144 (11th Cir. 2002) – Sets the abuse-of-discretion standard for reviewing a district court’s denial of a new trial.
• Furcron v. Mail Centers Plus, LLC, 843 F.3d 1295 (11th Cir. 2016) – Explains abuse-of-discretion parameters and harmless-error doctrine for evidentiary rulings.
• Proctor v. Fluor Enterprises, 494 F.3d 1337 (11th Cir. 2007) – Provides the “substantial influence on the verdict” test for evidentiary error.
• Tracy v. Florida Atlantic University Bd. of Trustees, 980 F.3d 799 (11th Cir. 2020) – Cautions that a judge may not substitute her own judgment for that of the jury when assessing motions for new trial.
• Bowen v. Manheim Remarketing, Inc., 882 F.3d 1358 (11th Cir. 2018) – Restates the EPA prima-facie elements: different wages for equal work requiring equal skill, effort, responsibility, and similar conditions.
• McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973) – Establishes the burden-shifting protocol for circumstantial-evidence discrimination cases under Title VII.
• Lewis v. City of Union City, 918 F.3d 1213 (11th Cir. 2019) (en banc) – Clarifies the employer’s burden of production (not persuasion) at the second stage of McDonnell-Douglas.
• Texas Dep’t of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248 (1981) – Requires an employer to offer a “clear and reasonably specific” reason for its challenged action.
• Kragor v. Takeda Pharm. Am., Inc., 702 F.3d 1304 (11th Cir. 2012) – Holds that pretext analysis centers on whether the employer “gave an honest explanation.”

2. Legal Reasoning

2.1 Equal Pay Act – Harmless Error & Comparator Stringency

The court began by framing the standard: to win a new trial on excluded evidence, a movant must show the ruling “probably had a substantial influence on the jury’s verdict.” Even if the exclusion was erroneous, the question is harmlessness.

Harris’s theory was that male predecessors Shanks and Baker received pay comparable to (or higher than) McCray, thereby undercutting IP’s claim that McCray’s higher salary derived from his unique qualifications and a competing offer. However, trial testimony from another engineer (Stacey) and from McCray himself depicted the air-emissions role as more complex, time-critical, and supervisory in nature. Because the record already demonstrated the material differences between air and wastewater engineering duties, additional evidence about Shanks and Baker—neither of whom performed wastewater work—would not likely have altered the outcome. Thus, any exclusion was harmless, and the motion for new trial was properly denied.

2.2 Title VII – Employer’s Minimal Burden & Failure to Prove Pretext

At the summary-judgment stage, once Harris established a prima facie case of disparate pay, IP only needed to articulate (not prove) a legitimate reason: (i) greater urgency and risk profile of air-emissions compliance, and (ii) McCray’s supervisory scope and external job offer. That shifted the burden back to Harris to demonstrate that these justifications were false and that discrimination was the real motive.

The Eleventh Circuit emphasized that Harris did not “meet the employer’s reasons head-on”; she merely quarreled with IP’s business wisdom—an approach foreclosed by circuit precedent. Absent affirmative evidence that IP’s explanation was dishonest, the district court correctly entered summary judgment.

3. Impact of the Decision

• Comparator Evidence: Plaintiffs in EPA and pay-disparity Title VII cases within the Eleventh Circuit must marshal comparators whose positions align closely in skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions. Merely showing the employer once paid someone else more in the same department is insufficient; the work itself must be “substantially equal.”
• Harmless-Error Buffer: Even if evidence exclusion decisions are imperfect, appellate courts will not disturb verdicts where overwhelming record evidence independently supports the outcome.
• Employer’s Burden of Production: This opinion reiterates that the employer’s burden at step two of McDonnell-Douglas is “light.” So long as a “clear and reasonably specific” explanation is proffered—e.g., differing job duties, urgency, supervisory reach, or market factors—the onus shifts back to the employee.
• Business Judgment Rule: Challenges based purely on the employee’s disagreement with an employer’s business calculus, without evidence the calculus was disingenuous, will not preclude summary judgment.
• Strategic Litigation Guidance: Plaintiffs must (a) conduct granular job-task comparisons and (b) secure evidence—documents, testimony, or comparative data—that an employer’s stated reason is untrue. Absent such evidence, equal-pay and disparate-pay claims are vulnerable at both the trial and summary-judgment stages.

Complex Concepts Simplified

• Substantially Equal Work: Under the EPA, jobs don’t have to be identical, but they must require equal skill, effort, and responsibility and occur under similar conditions. Think of “substantially equal” as “interchangeable” in the real-world shop floor sense, not just sharing the same job title.
• Abuse of Discretion: An appellate standard of review that asks not whether the lower court’s decision was would have been different but whether it was “clearly unreasonable.” If reasonable judges could differ, no abuse exists.
• Harmless Error: Even if a judge makes a mistake, a verdict stands unless the mistake likely changed the outcome—much like ignoring a minor foul that didn’t affect the final score of a game.
• Burden-Shifting Framework (McDonnell-Douglas): A three-step ping-pong of evidentiary burdens: (1) employee raises a presumption of discrimination (prima facie); (2) employer rebuts with a neutral reason (production, not persuasion); (3) employee must show that reason is pretext (lies or smokescreen).
• Pretext: Evidence that the employer’s reason is not just wrong but disingenuous—akin to proving a stated excuse is a cover-story.

Conclusion

Harris v. International Paper Company does not blaze new doctrinal trails, but it crisply consolidates and applies established standards in two fertile areas of employment law. First, it underscores the meticulous comparator analysis required in Equal Pay Act suits—titles, departments, and generalized duties will not suffice if the roles diverge in urgency, consequence, or supervisory scope. Second, it re-affirms the modest nature of an employer’s step-two burden under McDonnell-Douglas and the plaintiff’s concomitant obligation to surface genuine evidence of pretext, not merely business-judgment quibbles.

Practitioners should view Harris as a cautionary tale: plaintiffs must marshal robust, job-specific evidence early, while employers, armed with a clear articulation of job-duty distinctions or market forces, can secure summary judgment or defend jury verdicts on appeal. The decision thereby fortifies the analytical gatekeeping for EPA and Title VII wage-disparity claims throughout the Eleventh Circuit.