LAbl: /.4 01 [As a class, women live longer than men. The Los Angeles Department oFWauer and Power [the Department] adminis' tered its own retirement, disabiiity, and death benet programs for its employees. Because women, as a class, live longer than men, the Department required its female employees to make iarger contributions to its pension md than its male employees. Upon retirement, male and Female employees of the same age, seniority, and salary received the same monthly pension bale- ts, but belbre retirement the Ermale employees were required to pay contributions to the pension hind that were 14.84 percent higher than those paid by males. This did-cranial was based on actuarial mortality tables and the experience of the Department, which indicated that women on average live longer than men and thus would receive more retirement benth payments. A group of female employees led suit against the Department, alleging that the practice of making female employees pay higher contributions to receive equal benefits upon retire- ment violated Title VII. The trial court held for the employees, ruling that the Department's practice was illegal sex discrirni' nation; upon appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit afrmed the trial court's verdict. The Department then appealed to the US. Supreme Court.) 435 US. 702 {1978) Sievens, J. The Department . . . [contends] that . . . the differential in take-home pay between men and women was not discrimi- nation within the meaning of Section 703(a)(1) because it was offset by a difference in the value of the pension benets provided to the two classes of employees . . . [and] in any event, the retroactive monetary recovery is unjustified. We consider these contentions in turn. . . . CITY OF LOS ANGELES V. MANHART parties accept as unquestionably true: women, as a class, do live longer than men. The Department treated its women employees difFerently from its men employees because the two classes are in Fact different. It is equally true, however, that all individuals in the respective classes do not share the characteristic that differentiates the average class repre- sentatives. Many women do not live as long as the average man and many men outlive the average woman. The ques- tion, therefore, is whether the existence or nonexistence of ud'ucriminationn is to be determined by comparison of clam characteristics or individual characteristics. A \"stereotyped\" answer to that question may not be the same as the answer which the language and purpose of the statute conunand. The statute makes it unlawful \"to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual? race, color, religion, sex, or national origin." [emphasis added] The statute's focus on the individual is unambiguous. It precludes treatment of individuals as simply components of [a] racial, religious, sexual, or national class. If height is required For a job, a tall woman may not be refused employment merely because, on the average, women are too short. Even a true generalization about the class is an insufficient reason for disqualifying an individual to whom the generalization does not apply. That proposition is of critical importance in this case because there is no assurance that any individual woman working for the Department will actually t the generaliza- tion on which the Department's policy is based. Many of those individuals will not live as long as the average man. While they were working, those individuals received smaller it is now well recognized that employment decisions cannot be predicated on mere \"stereotyped\" impressions about the characteristics of males or females. . . . This case does not, however, involve a ctional diFf'erence between men and women. It involves a generalization that the paychecks because of their seat, but they will receive no compensating advantage when they retire. it is true, of course, that while contributions are being collected from the employees, the Department cannot know which individuals will predecease the average woman. Therefore, unless women as a class are assessed an extra charge, they will be subsidized, to some extent, by the class ol: male employees. It follows, according to the Department, that fairness to its class of male employees justifies the extra assessment against all of its female employees. But the question of Fairness to various classes affected by the statute is essentially a matter of policy for the legislature to address. Congress has decided that classications based on sex, iike those based on national origin or race, are unlawtl. Actuarial studies could unquestionably identify differences in life expectancy based on race or national origin, as well as sex. But a statute that was designed to make race irrel- evant in the employment market, . . . could not reasonably be construed to permit a take-home pay differential based on a racial classication. Even if the statutory language were less clear, the basic Policy of the statute requires that we Focus on fairness to individuals rather than fairness to classes. Practices which classify employees in terms of religion, race, or sex tend to preserve traditional assumptions about groups rather than thoughtful scrutiny of individuals. The generalization involved in this use illustrates the point. Separate mortality tables are easily interpreted as reecting innate differences between the sexes; but a significant part of the longevity differential may be explained by the social Fact that men are heavier smokers than women. Finally, there is no reason to believe that Congress intended a special denition of discrimination in the context of employee group insurance coverage. It is true that insurance is concerned with events that are indi- vidually unpredictable, but that is characteristic of many employment decisions. Individual risks, like individual performance, may not be predicted by resort to classifica- tions proscribed by Tide VII. Indeed, the fact that this case involves a group insurance program highlights a basic aw in the Department's fairnus argument. For when insurance and women alike; but nothing more than habit makes one \"subsidy" seem less fair than the other. An employment practice which requires 2,000 indi- viduals to contribute more money into a fund than 10,000 other employees simply because each of them is a woman, rather than a man, is in direct conflict with both the language and the policy of the Act. Such a practice does not pass the simple tat of whether the evidence shows \"treat ment of a person in a manner which but for the person's sex would be different.\" It constitutes discrimination and is unlawful unless exempted by the Equal Pay Act or some other affirmative justification. . . . The Department argues that the different contributions exacted From men and women Were based on the factor of longevity rather than sex. It is plain, however, that any individual's life expectancy is based on a number of factors, ofwhich sex is only one. The record contains no evidence that any Factor other than the employee's sex was taken into account in calculating the 14.84 percent differential between the respective contribu- tions by men and women. We agree with Judge Duniway's observation that one cannot \"say that an actuarial distinc- tion based entirely on sex is 'based on any other factor other than sex.' Sex is exactly what it is based on.\" [Wle recognize that in a case of this kind it may be neces sary to take special care in fashioning appropriaiae relief. . . . Although Title VII was enacted in 1964, this is apparently the first litigation challenging contribution differences based on valid actuarial tables. Retroactive liability could be devas- tating For a pension fund. The harm would Fall in large part on innocent third parties. If: as the courts below apparently contemplated, the plaintiffs' contributions are recovered from the pension hand, the administrators of the fund will be Forced to meet unchanged obligations with diminished asses. If the reserve proves inadequate, either the expecta- risks are grouped, the better risks always subsidize the poorer risks. Healthy persons subsidize medical benets for the less healthy; unmarried workers subsidize the pensions of married workers; persons who eat, drink, or smoke to excess may subsidize pension benets for persons whose habits are more temperate. Treating diEerent classes of risks as though they were the same For purposes of group insurance is a common Practice that has never been considered inherently unfair. To insure the abby and the fit as though they were equivalent risks may be more common than treating men tions of all retired employees will be disappointed or current employees will be forced to pay not only for their own future security but also for the unanticipated reduction in the contributions of past employees. . . . [The practice of requiring female employees to pay more into the pension system in order to receive the same bene- fits upon retirement violated Tide Vii's prohibition on sex discrimination in pay, but the Supreme Court directed that its decision would not have retroactive effect] So ordeal