Meet The Working Mother Taking Her Pregnancy Discrimination Case To The Supreme Court

WASHINGTON -- When Peggy Young became pregnant in 2006, she had every intention of continuing to work delivering packages for UPS in Maryland. At the urging of the company's occupational health manager, Young visited her doctor to obtain a note detailing any work restrictions she might need. Her doctor recommended that she not lift more than 20 pounds for the first 20 weeks of her pregnancy.

Based on the doctor's note, UPS placed Young on unpaid leave, an all too common experience for women nationwide. Although UPS often put workers with other conditions on light duty, it told Young that such accommodations wouldn't apply to an "off-the-job" condition such as her pregnancy. Not only would she lose her income, she would have to suddenly switch to her husband's health insurance plan, changing the hospitals at which she could potentially give birth.

"I wanted to work," Young told The Huffington Post. "I all but begged for them to let me work."

The unborn child Young was carrying in 2006 is now a 7-year-old girl named Trinity. Young no longer works for UPS, but she's still fighting the shipping giant for denying her accommodations while she was pregnant. Young sued UPS alleging discrimination, and her case, Young v. UPS, is now before the Supreme Court, with oral arguments expected in December.

If the policy enforced on Young in 2006 doesn't seem particularly enlightened, UPS itself would seem to agree. In a memo sent to employees this week, the company announced that it will begin offering light duty to pregnant workers on Jan. 1, the Washington Post reported Wednesday. The turnaround puts UPS in the peculiar position of defending before the Supreme Court a policy that it is already walking away from.

In a brief filed last Friday, UPS maintains that its decision to deny Young an accommodation was "lawful at the time it was made," a position it reiterated to HuffPost. The company said it decided to alter the policy to respond in part to new guidelines from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which investigates workplace discrimination.

"Laws have been changing, and there's a growing consensus looking at best practices," said Kara Gerhardt Ross, a UPS spokeswoman. "We want to provide good benefits. We saw this as a good thing for our employees."

Even though it may now be moot for UPS's own workforce, Young's case could have far-reaching consequences for working women throughout the country. The underlying question is whether or not the Pregnancy Discrimination Act compels companies to offer light-duty options to pregnant workers if they already do so for non-pregnant workers in other situations. The 1978 law, which amended the Civil Rights Act, forbids companies from treating pregnant workers differently from workers who are "similar in their ability or inability to work."

UPS maintains that its leave policy was pregnancy "neutral," treating workers like Young no better or worse than their colleagues who aren't pregnant. The circumstances under which UPS drivers were entitled to light duty, the company notes in its argument, were laid out in a collective bargaining agreement with the Teamsters union. Under that agreement, the company didn't have to provide temporary accommodations to workers with "off-the-job injuries or conditions," unless it was a cognitive disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Ultimately, the company argues, the policy "treats a lifting restriction resulting from pregnancy in exactly the same way" as, say, a "back injury sustained off the job."

Young's legal team says the policy violated the "plain language" of the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, deeming the company's off-the-job distinction irrelevant. They note that the law includes no exceptions for a "pregnancy-blind" reason to deny a pregnant worker accommodations. If the company is willing to provide light duty to other workers, then it has to grant them to pregnant workers, they argue.

"If a person wasn't pregnant but was injured on the job and had the same restrictions, UPS would have provided an accommodation," Sam Bagenstos, a lawyer for Young and a professor at the University of Michigan Law School, told HuffPost shortly before UPS announced its policy change. "UPS actually accommodates a very large swath of its drivers who have lifting restrictions, but not for workers whose restrictions result from pregnancy."

Bagenstos said the case is more likely to affect women in low-wage and manual-labor jobs than anything else. After all, women in higher-paying, white-collar positions generally don't have to worry about heavy lifting in the course of their job duties, and are therefore less likely to find themselves having to request light duty from their employer.

Given the stakes of the case, a broad and rather unusual coalition of stakeholders have lined up behind Young. Those filing briefs in her support include not only a host of women's rights organizations and the American Civil Liberties Union, but also the U.S. Women's Chamber of Commerce and 23 pro-life groups. The interest of the pro-life crowd is obvious. As the groups note in their brief, "economic pressure is a significant factor in many women’s decision to choose abortion over childbirth."

Ariela Migdal, a lawyer handling pregnancy discrimination cases at the ACLU, said the ideological diversity of Young's alliance is an asset for her.

"They kind of came together around this because it offends many people to think workplaces should be forcing pregnant workers to make horrible choices," Migdal said.

Now 42 years old and a mother of three, Young works for a government contractor outside of Washington, D.C. Eight years after becoming pregnant with Trinity, she still has the same lawyer, Sharon Fast Gustafson, who pressed UPS to accommodate her pregnancy in 2006.

Last year, Young and Gustafson celebrated Maryland's passage of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, a law that requires the state's employers to make reasonable accommodations for their pregnant employees. Similar laws have been passed in other states since Young first filed her case, and a federal version has been championed by Democrats in Congress, though it hasn't passed either the House or Senate yet.

Despite the progress that has been made, Young said that both the law and corporate America have plenty more catching up to do.

"It's not just about me; it's about all women considering becoming pregnant," Young said. "You're not pregnant forever, and a lot of families these days need both their incomes. I think if hard-working women want to work and become pregnant, then we should let them."

What's Behind Dear Kate's No-Underwear Yoga Pants

Lingerie company Dear Kate's new no-underwear yoga pants make a lot of promises: No panty lines. No bunching. No riding up. No camel toe. No stressing about comfort. And they'll make your butt look great.

If they can deliver all that, the new pants, which have a thick, absorbent lining around the crotch, may be able to shove their way into the busy market for yoga gear. That's the plan, at least, for Dear Kate founder Julie Sygiel, whose company is making its first foray away from undergarments.

"We surveyed our customers and said, 'Hey what do you want to see from us next,'" Sygiel, who studied chemical engineering at Brown University, told the Huffington Post in an interview. "Yoga wear was by far the winner."

She may have caught on to something.

Most women wear a thong or other kind of panties with their yoga pants. But around 17 percent of women wear nothing at all underneath their pants when they work out, according to Dear Kate's market research. A survey conducted by Groupon earlier this year found that about 25 percent of women go commando while practicing yoga.

Alexandra Seijo, who teaches yoga at Equinox and Pure Yoga in New York City, said she doesn't usually wear underwear while practicing, and will definitely check our Dear Kate's new pants. She wants to be focused on what's happening internally when she's doing yoga, so something that would keep her mind from getting distracted would be a plus, she said.

"Sometimes we do get caught up in the external, when the purpose of yoga is to go within," Seijo told HuffPost. "The last thing you want to worry about is tugging, pulling, pinching, having any kind of clothing malfunction because you want to be fully immersed in the practice."

Still, no-underwear yoga pants have their limits. Some may have issues trusting the concept of shunning their underwear, especially after Lululemon's see-through yoga pant debacle in 2013. And they need to be washed after each use without an undergarment.

Dear Kate started as an underwear company, but decided to expand into yoga-wear. (Photo courtesy Dear Kate)

Founded in 2012, Dear Kate has raised $1.2 million thus far from private investors, selling a selection of undergarments that present an alternative to "period panties." They have extra lining and are made of materials that wick moisture, release stains and resist leaks. They're also aimed at women who have bladder issues after pregnancy.

Now, Dear Kate is trying to grab a piece of the growing market for yoga gear. Global sales of so-called "activewear" climbed 7 percent and surpassed $33 billion in the 12 months ending in June, according to data from market research firm NPD Group. Athletic wear companies, fast-fashion emporiums and even some haute couture labels are trying to claim their slice of the yoga pie. Meanwhile, smaller yoga apparel makers are battling each other, vying to be the next Lululemon.

The regular, full-length yoga pant from Dear Kate costs $118. Lululemon charges between $82 and $128 for most of its yoga pants, while many similar styles from rival Athleta run from $64 to $98.

While items like no-underwear running shorts have been around for a long time, Sygiel is hoping that her more versatile yoga product will set it apart. And the stretchy pants aren't just for yoga -- women use them for many athletics, from pilates to running and biking.

Sygiel's yoga pants, made at a factory in Queens, New York, are getting attention even before they become available to the public. A 30-day Kickstarter campaign for the pants attracted more than $150,000 in funding. Though Sygiel declined to share precise sales numbers, she said that in 2014, the company expects to triple its revenue total from the year prior.

Dear Kate's pants are expected to launch in mid-November, but are available for pre-order now.

Dear Kate's no-underwear yoga pants have a thick, moisture-wicking lining. (Photo courtesy Dear Kate)

How Ordering Food Online Is Making You Fat

Whether it's newcomers like Seamless and grubHub or veterans like Apple and Starbucks, companies of all sorts are making it easier than ever to order and pay with as little human interaction as possible.

That might be convenient and faster, but it’s not great for our health.

Ordering food online from restaurants causes people to do two unhealthy things: order more food and choose items that are higher in calories. In fact, a 2012 study centered around a North Carolina pizza restaurant found that total calories in online orders were about 6 percent higher than phone orders. That came out to about 100 calories more per order, according to Ryan McDevitt, an assistant professor at Duke University Fuqua School Of Business and the author of the study.

GrubHub and Seamless make it possible to avoid almost all social interaction while ordering. (Tim Boyle/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

So why do we order with more reckless abandon when we're using our smartphones and laptops? McDevitt said these barriers to human interaction essentially also act as barriers to shame. If there’s no waiter, there’s no other person to make them feel guilty for making less-sensible choices.

“There’s no social interaction [when ordering online] like there is at a restaurant, or even on the phone,” McDevitt told The Huffington Post. “No one’s judging [the customer] implicitly, even if it’s just the waiter at the restaurant. If that social force isn’t in play, you might change the way you act.”

Other recent research backs up the idea that we act differently when separated from the world by a screen. One study, for example, found that patients were more likely to admit to binge drinking over text message than they were over the phone. Alone, we can be more honest with ourselves about who we are and what we want. When it comes to admitting to drunk driving, that's a good thing. When you're choosing between fries and a salad, not so much.

Ordering online is not exactly new -- Pizza Hut claims to have taken the first web-based order back in 1994 -- but with the rise of the app economy and online ordering platforms like Seamless and GrubHub, its popularity has grown. GrubHub alone has seen its number of regular users grow by 50 percent, to 4.6 million, in the past year. And with new corporate inventions coming out all the time, it could “get worse well before it gets better,” as McDevitt put it.

Chili’s, for example, has set up touchscreen tablets in roughly 1,000 restaurants across the country. And yes, Chili's told HuffPost in an email that guests using the tablets "typically order more," especially when it comes to dessert.

Touch screens not only let customers order more easily they also allow restaurants to promote specific menu items.

Domino's has come to a similar conclusion about customers' preference for ordering. Domino's didn't respond to an email from HuffPost, but now some 40 percent of Domino’s U.S. customers order online, according to recent figures reported by Bloomberg.

“We look at surveys of our customers, and they’re pretty clear in telling us they like ordering on digital better than talking on the telephone,” Domino’s chief financial officer Michael Lawton was quoted by Bloomberg as saying.

A screengrab of Domino's online ordering system from 2010.

Starbucks also looks to be trying to cash in on the phenomenon with its recently released order-ahead smartphone app. The app allows customers to place their orders before even arriving at the store. Now, rather than dealing with that disapproving look from your barista when you say you'd like some whipped cream, you can just order it up on your phone.

But eating more could just be a side effect of spending more. Apple's new mobile payment platform that allows customers to make purchases with the tap of their iPhone, known as Apple Pay, allows customers to spend much more easily. Instead of being used for a simple pizza joint, the platform is taking the phenomenon across industries. As HuffPost's Ben Walsh pointed out, the ease of the platform encourages what researchers call "decoupling," that is spending without thinking, which can't be good for our health or bank accounts.

But McDevitt said there’s another way that ordering on-screen, specifically with a smartphone or tablet, can be detrimental. Unlike desktops, smartphones and tablets offer limited space and may contribute to a customer being less thorough about exploring the menu, especially when it's through a restaurant’s own app. The room that is available can instead be used by the restaurant to push deals that feature less-healthy food upon the customer.

Domino's (left) and Starbucks (right) mobile ordering apps shown side by side.

The Domino's mobile app, for example, offers a plain "Build your own pizza" option, before offering more exotic and expensive options like "Artisan," "American Legend" and "Feast" pizzas.

“I can see a place like Domino’s pinging you with what they think you should order,” McDevitt said. “It’s clearly in their interest to get you to order more stuff so they’re going to be focused on getting you the less healthy choices.”

AT&T Sued For Reducing Speed Of 'Unlimited' Data Plans

The Federal Trade Commission announced on Tuesday that it is suing AT&T for slowing down the data speeds for some customers who thought they were getting an “unlimited” data plan.

After some customers exceeded a certain amount of data during a billing cycle, AT&T slowed, or "throttled," the customers' Internet speed, the agency claims.

"The company has misled millions of its mobile customers, charging them for so-called unlimited data plans that were in reality not unlimited at all," Edith Ramirez, chairwoman of the FTC, said during a call with reporters Tuesday afternoon.

The FTC said AT&T did not "adequately" inform customers who had signed up for the company's unlimited data plan that their speeds would be slowed if they used a certain amount of data, which was sometimes as little as 2 gigabytes during a billing cycle. Streaming one hour of Netflix in HD can use as much as 3 gigabytes.

The agency alleged that in some cases, AT&T slowed the data speeds of some of these customers by more than 90 percent, preventing people from being able to stream movies, load websites or use the phone's GPS function. The FTC said 3.5 million customers have been throttled 25 million times.

In a statement, AT&T's general counsel, Wayne Watts, called the FTC's complaint "baseless" and said that the company has been "completely transparent with customers since the very beginning” that it would throttle people with unlimited plans. The company began the practice in 2011.

"We informed all unlimited data-plan customers via bill notices and a national press release that resulted in nearly 2,000 news stories, well before the program was implemented," Watts wrote in a statement to The Huffington Post.

From 2007 to 2011, AT&T was the only carrier in the U.S. to offer the iPhone. The company stopped offering "unlimited" plans in June 2010. Customers who had previously purchased unlimited plans were "grandfathered" in when they signed new contracts, though the FTC said they weren't informed that they may be throttled.

The FTC said that AT&T got thousands of complaints from customers who said their speeds were slowing down. Then, AT&T went after people who canceled their service, the agency said

"When customers canceled their contracts after being throttled, AT&T charged those customers early termination fees, which typically amount to hundreds of dollars," the FTC said in a statement.

As phones and apps have become more advanced and wireless networks have gotten faster, consumers have gobbled up increasing amounts of data. The average mobile customer in the U.S. used 1.4 gigabytes per month in 2013, according to Cisco, the networking equipment company. That figure is expected to increase to 9.1 gigabytes per month by 2018.

In response to increased data consumption, wireless companies have moved to tiered data plans, which offer a fixed amount of data each month. If a person goes over their plan, they have to pay a penalty.

AT&T said that throttling has to do with managing network congestion -- there is a finite amount of spectrum, and the more people use it, the slower it gets for everyone. But Ramirez told reporters that the throttling "had no particular relation to the network's congestion at the specific time."

"It looks like AT&T was trying to push people into more expensive plans," Delara Derakhshani, policy counsel for Consumers Union, an advocacy organization, said in a statement to HuffPost. “Consumers have been complaining about throttling for years. We’re glad the feds are going after companies that are ripping people off."

"We think that millions of customers have been affected and we hope to put money back in their pockets," Ramirez told reporters.

Disclosure: The author of this post has an unlimited plan with AT&T and may be affected by any settlement that is reached.

Walmart Was Offering A Special 'Fat Girl Costumes' Section In Its Online Store

Walmart has everyone's Halloween needs covered this year -- especially if you happen to fall into the category known as "fat girl."

No, we're not kidding, though we wish we were. Until just after 11am this morning, the mega-retailer actually had a subsection of online Halloween costumes marked as "fat girl costumes." (See below.)

A screenshot from Walmart.com taken on October 27.

This is an ill-advised category name, to say the least. "Fat girl" still remains a derogatory label, though it shouldn't be. And it's also unclear what the retailer's motivations were for creating such a category. As Anna Merlan at Jezebel pointed out, many of the costumes featured in the "Fat Girl" section were also available on a page labeled "Women's Plus Size Adult." So was this someone's idea of a funny joke? Or did Walmart actually think people were searching for "Fat Girl" costumes?

Walmart did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but the section was taken down shortly after HuffPost contacted them. The "Fat Girl Costumes" page now redirects to an empty "Women's Plus Size Costumes" page.

In case you're not a fat girl but just think it would be hilarious to dress up as one for Halloween, why not try the Walmart "Fat Tinkerbell" getup? Or purchase a straight-up fat suit?

Halloween, brought to you by Walmart -- the best time of year to make fun of any woman over a size 6.

If you want some actually clever costume ideas, check out our list here.

H/T Jezebel

Follow HuffPostWomen's board Halloween! on Pinterest.

Lululemon Partners With Dalai Lama, Enrages Critics

Lululemon can't even donate to charity without miring itself in controversy.

The yoga-wear retailer is getting slammed after announcing a partnership this week with the Dalai Lama Center for Peace and Education. Lululemon will contribute $750,000 to the Tibetan spiritual leader's nonprofit organization over the next three years to expand education initiatives and for "researching the connection between mind-body-heart," according to the company's press release.

Some critics say the alliance is hogwash. They don't think the Dalai Lama's name should be associated with a money-making enterprise and complain he's been "hijacked" and turned into a mere corporate marketing tool.

A mob flocked to Lululemon's official blog, lighting up the comments section with accusations of hypocrisy.

"As he believes that luxuries are not necessities, you believe in $100 yoga pants," one commenter pointed out.

"It is offensive that you have sunk so low as to use the Dalai Lama and his image as part of your branding," another wrote.

"I am put-off by Lululemon’s bizarre effort to hijack the Dalai Lama for brand-building and commercial gain," a third added.

A few who spoke out against the partnership claimed not to like the Dalai Lama, with one calling him "cruel" and another calling him "greedy."

Lululemon appears to disagree. "Both organizations share a common vision for developing the next generation of compassionate leaders in the world and are committed to engaging and empowering healthy communities," the company said in its press release.

Lululemon and the Dalai Lama Center did not respond to requests for additional comment.

Lululemon has a lot on its plate. Last spring, quality control issues sparked a recall of too-sheer yoga pants. Then, last fall, co-founder Chip Wilson irked many customers when he said Lululemon's pants "don't work" for some women's bodies. Earlier this month, Lululemon managed to offend the entire city of Buffalo, New York, by making fun of its NFL team.

One commenter summarized: "Dear Lulu, your product is still in question, don’t get me wrong. Great marketing, done! Now get back to improving your product and winning clients back."

Brace Yourself: Ugg Season May Be Even Bigger Than Usual This Year

Each year as the temperature dips, women across the country turn to their closets and dig their Ugg boots out of hibernation. Others head to stores to score a pair of the squat sheepskin booties in preparation for a chilly winter.

This year the Ugg frenzy may be even bigger than usual. Sales at the Ugg brand rose nearly 24 percent last quarter to $417 million, compared to $337 million for the same period the year prior, parent company Deckers reported Thursday. The spike was due to higher wholesale sales, online sales and new retail store openings worldwide.

And now, Ugg is about to enter its prime season.

"With temperatures turning cold in recent weeks, sell-through of weather boots and classics have gained pace across the majority of our markets," Deckers chief executive Angel Martinez said on a conference call with analysts on Thursday.

Ugg's upcoming product lines are "as compelling as we have ever seen for the company," Sam Poser, an analyst at Sterne Agee, wrote in a note to clients on Friday. He added that Ugg's reaping the benefits of favorable fashion trends, as shoppers search the aisles for comfy clothes like stretchy leggings and oversized sweaters.

However Ugg's holidays turn out, "Ugg Season" will remain. The annual donning of the Uggs has even made its way into memes, like "Girls be like."

Meanwhile, Ugg's plan to diversify its offerings seems to be working. Ugg is now selling more items that aren't dependent on cold weather. It launched a home goods line in October, offering an assortment of sheepskin area rugs, knit pillows and floor poufs. There's also Ugg's loungewear line, a casual clothing label. On the call, Martinez said that Ugg's home and loungewear businesses are still "small but burgeoning" and early results have been "very strong." Ugg will be pushing both lines hard through the holidays.

In an attempt to tell customers Ugg sells more than just shearling boots, the brand launched an advertising campaign in August with the tagline "THIS IS UGG," featuring sketch artist Langley Fox Hemingway and New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady.

But until those lines get bigger, Ugg remains a slave to the elements. According to a report from Nomura Securities, Deckers is the best example of a company that's exposed to weather risk, something it could never hope to control. So far, the climate has treated Deckers, which also owns footwear brands Teva and Sanuk, quite well this year.

"Despite the mild weather conditions over the last two winters, this year was more seasonably cool and snowy in many parts of the U.S., which had a substantially large impact on companies with a great deal of cold weather product including Deckers," Nomura analyst Bob Drbul wrote in the report.

Chiquita Abandons Plan To Dodge U.S. Taxes In Ireland

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Chiquita shareholders have rejected plans to merge with Irish fruit importer Fyffes that would have made the world's largest banana supplier.

Chiquita Brands International Inc. said Friday that the shareholders didn't approve a revised transaction agreement between the two companies during a special shareholders meeting. Chiquita and Fyffes PLC have given notice to terminate their agreement.

The proposed agreement with Fyffes was an all-stock deal, with the companies planning to incorporate in Dublin to take advantage of lower tax rates. Chiquita is now based in Charlotte, North Carolina.

On Monday proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services recommended that Chiquita investors support the Fyffes deal because it is the best option for shareholders. ISS had previously said shareholders should vote against the deal because Chiquita might get a better offer elsewhere.

Chiquita President and CEO Edward Lonergan said in a statement that while the company was convinced Fyffes would have been a strong merger partner, the companies "will now go forward as competitors."

Chiquita said it now expects to enter talks with investment firm Safra Group and juice company Cutrale Group on their competing offer of $14.50 per share in cash, or $681 million. Chiquita received the latest bid from the pair on Wednesday after previously rejecting buyout offers from the two Brazilian companies. The prior offer from Safra and Cutrale was $14 per share. They had bid $13 per share in August.

Shares of Chiquita added 49 cents, or 3.6 percent, to $14.25 in morning trading.

Obama's Inversion Crackdown Not Enough To Keep Chiquita In America

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times for companies to dodge taxes by moving to Ireland.

So far, results have been mixed for new Treasury Department rules designed to thwart deals known as "tax inversions," in which a U.S. company buys a company in Ireland or some other low-tax locale and moves its headquarters there to cut its tax bill.

Banana giant Chiquita on Tuesday stuck by a plan to merge with Irish rival Fyffes and relocate from Charlotte, North Carolina, to Ireland in one such deal. This came less than a week after Chicago-based pharmaceutical maker AbbVie abandoned a similar bid to buy Irish firm Shire specifically because of the new Treasury Department rules.

Chiquita's decision to press on with its inversion underscored the limitations of the new Treasury rules and the need for stricter laws that could raise more serious obstacles to inversions.

“We need stronger legislation that is more of a deterrent to do these deals by making it less lucrative to do these kinds of things,” Roger Hickey, the co-director of the nonprofit Campaign for America’s Future, told The Huffington Post on Tuesday. “We’re going to be pressuring Congress to act as soon as possible because we’re convinced that we don’t want to be doing this company by company.”

One way the new Treasury rules were effective was in prohibiting a scheme known as a "hopscotch loan," a way for multinational companies to tap cash held overseas by foreign subsidiaries without having to pay taxes on it. This strategy was a major reason for companies with a lot of money stashed abroad to go through an inversion deal. AbbVie’s inversion plans -- reportedly driven by the fact that a “significant portion” of its $10.2 billion in cash is stowed away overseas -- were dashed after the Treasury announced its new guidelines on Sept. 22.

But “earnings stripping,” another strategy used to shrink a company's U.S. tax bill, is still intact under the new rules. This is when a company with headquarters overseas lends a bunch of money to its U.S. subsidiary. Then, every time the U.S. subsidiary turns a profit, it sends that profit to its foreign headquarters as interest payments on the money it owes. Interest payments are partially tax-deductible under the U.S. tax code, so under that strategy, much of the company's U.S. profit is untaxed.

This means that under current law, ChiquitaFyffes -- the proposed new Irish parent company -- will be able to load the U.S.-based Chiquita up with debt, then wipe out most of its U.S. profits by absorbing them as interest payments on loans. Chiquita has only about $1.7 billion in cash overseas, so the end of hopscotch loans shouldn't bother it much. With earnings stripping still legal, Chiquita still has a financial incentive to go ahead with its inversion deal.

"In America, it’ll be making half of the payments it should be making to the American government because it’s making interest payments on the loans from the new foreign parent, which is really to itself," Frank Clemente, the executive director of the nonprofit Americans for Tax Fairness, told HuffPost.

Chiquita spokesman Steve Himes did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

To close this particular loophole, the Obama administration may need Congress’s legislative muscle. But that would mean going against the interests of Wall Street banks, which have raked in about $1 billion in fees on inversion deals in the past three years, according to Rebecca Wilkins, a senior counsel at the nonprofit Citizens for Tax Justice.

Given the cozy relationship between Wall Street power-brokers and the Republican Party, and the need for Democrats to raise money from those same financial giants, a strong legislative crackdown on other inversion incentives seems unlikely.

“In order for any legislation to get through Congress, they’ll have to stand up to multinationals and Wall Street,” Wilkins told HuffPost. “No to be cynical but,” she laughed, “I don’t know about that.”