It's amazing how big the settlements are for discrimination lawsuits vs. other labor law violations. Wage and hour violations get a slap on the wrist. Safety violations seldom cost a company more than a few thousand dollars unless someone is killed, and even then payments rarely exceed 5 figures.
A commenter on a previous post a few months ago pointed out that different countries/legal systems have different approaches that I think they may have referred to as punitive vs restorative? And even in systems with both, certain classes of crimes may only be able to approach sentencing from on of those approaches. Which can mean the outcome is more about making the aggrieved party whole again (with potentially a little extra for the inconvenience). It leaves no room for the kind of very very large outcome that acts as a signal to the defendant and any others to not break this law again.