The case of UPS driver Peggy Young, which was decided by the Supreme Court two weeks ago, highlighted the issue of pregnancy discrimination in the workplace. Pregnant women often face latent discrimination and unfriendly workplace policies—Young's employer wouldn't lighten her workload when she was pregnant—but federal agencies are taking note. Complaints to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) about pregnancy discrimination have steadily risen in the last two decades, and just last year the the EEOC issued new guidelines on the problem for the first time in 30 years.

These developments are crucial given that, as a report from Pew Research (based on Census data) shows, working while pregnant is increasingly popular. In the early 1960s, the percentage of women having their first child who had ever worked for six months was only 60 percent. That number has increased to 72.3 percent within the last decade. And the percentage of women working full-time during pregnancy has jumped from 40 percent in the early 1960s to 56 percent in the late aughts, with that figure for part-time workers jumping from 5 percent to 10 percent.

Percentage of Women Who Worked During Pregnancy

Pew Research/BLS

The Pew report also found that women are working longer into their pregnancies. 82 percent of female workers pregnant with their first child continued to go to work until they were within one month of their due date. The labor-force participation rate of women who have given birth in the last 12 months is at an all-time high of above 60 percent; that number was just 17 percent in the early 1960s.