Beginning January 1, 2023,
Illinois employers will be required to annually submit a report to the State of Illinois that includes “information that is substantially similar" to the current federal EEO-1 report, to be published on the Secretary of State's official website.
Additionally, by March 24, 2024, companies with over 100 employees in Illinois will be required to provide to the state a detailed equal pay compliance statement and obtain an equal pay registration certificate or pay a penalty equal to 1% of gross profits. This follows current law in Iceland, which Vice President Kamala Harris famously used to develop her pay equity proposal during the presidential campaign.
According to the
legislation, companies will be required to apply for recertification every two years and provide the following to the state:
- A list of employees by gender and race/ethnicity as reported in the most recent EEO-1 report and the total wages paid to each employee during the previous calendar year;
- A detailed equal pay compliance statement signed by a corporate officer, legal counsel, or authorized agent that includes how the company sets its compensation and benefits (e.g., a market pricing approach, union contract requirement, a performance pay system, or an alternative approach) and how often wages and benefits are evaluated for compliance; and
- A copy of the company’s most recently filed EEO-1 report for each county in which the business has a facility or employees.
This bill follows California’s recently enacted
pay equity disclosure laws. Those regulations came into effect in March and require California employers to annually report the total number of U.S. employees and hours worked for 12 pay bands and 10 EEO-1 job categories, by race, ethnicity, and sex. This applies to employers with 100 or more employees in the state. The California law does not carry the same risk of financial penalty or require certification (though the state can seek compensation for compelling compliance). Further, aggregated data may be published by the state, but individual company data will be kept confidential.
