Supreme Court considering 5 ageism cases

"The importance of protecting older workers as the work force ages is enormous," said Stu Cohen, AARP's director of legal advocacy. "More older workers remain in the workforce and projections are that the percentage will continue to expand."

The percentage of people 65 and older who work has grown from 10.8 percent in 1985 to 16 percent last year, AARP said. For people ages 55 to 64, the numbers also are up, from 54.2 percent in 1985 to 63.8 percent in 2007.

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act applies to workers at least age 40. It prohibits discrimination based on age in hiring and firing, promotions, and pay.

"Literally every employee at some point is going to be protected by it because all of us get older. It's true whether you are a male, female, minority, or not. It's not true for any other statute. It's a very broad class of protected people," said Steven R. Wall, a partner at the Morgan, Lewis & Bockius law firm in Philadelphia.

The cases at the court this year include what kind of evidence an employee may present to bolster an age discrimination claim; whether retirement-age workers are entitled to disability payments; and whether federal workers who complain about age discrimination are protected from retaliation. Decisions in all the cases are expected by late June.

The retaliation case, which will be the subject of oral arguments tomorrow, involves a postal worker in Puerto Rico who complained of discrimination and retaliation. Federal courts dismissed the retaliation claim, saying there is nothing in the age discrimination law that allows such claims by federal employees.

Other antidiscrimination laws provide protection from retaliation for government workers, said Eric Dreiband, former general counsel to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The language in the laws are different "and it would appear deliberately different," Dreiband said.

The AARP and the National Treasury Employees Union are backing the employee.

The most important case from employers' perspective involves "me-too" evidence in a lawsuit filed by a woman who was 51 when she was laid off by a subsidiary of Sprint Nextel Corp.