Employment

Spurred by a recent change in a Massachusetts wage and hour regulation, plaintiffs’ attorneys are aggressively pursuing class action lawsuits seeking unpaid overtime premium pay on behalf of car salespeople across the Commonwealth.

New job to-do list: (1) send goodbye email; (2) attend goodbye party; (3) update LinkedIn account; and (4) then use said LinkedIn account to send old colleagues new contact information. This sounds like a pretty standard modus operandi for the modern job-hopper, right?

In a decision that will provide some solace to employers asked to permit remote work as a reasonable accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit recently held that the ADA did not require the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office to permit a litigation attorney to work from home indefinitely.

Last week, lawyers for the federal government told an appeals court that the Department of Labor plans to revise the currently-blocked overtime rule issued during the Obama administration last year. But it won’t do so, it said, until the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals confirms that it has the right to set that threshold.

After the Eleventh Circuit denied a petition for rehearing en banc last week in Evans v. Georgia Regional Hospital, LGBT advocacy group Lambda Legal announced that it will appeal the dismissal of its client’s complaint to the United States Supreme Court.

The Paid Family Leave Act will provide, when fully implemented, employees in the state of New York with up to 12 weeks of job-protected paid family leave

Mayor de Blasio recently signed into law five bills collectively called the “Fair Workweek” legislative package, which will significantly impact employers in the retail and fast food industries. The laws are scheduled to take effect on November 26, 2017 – just after Thanksgiving.

California’s new Ban the Box regulation became effective last week. Effective July 1, 2017, questions by public employers concerning an applicant or employee’s criminal convictions will now be subject to the new regulation that employers can locate here.

The Second Circuit has denied a plaintiff’s request to rehear argument en banc (that is, before all of the court’s judges) in a case alleging that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation.

A recent Fourth Circuit ruling in a case handled by Mintz Levin provides some comfort to employers concerned about terminating an employee who they believe has made a false complaint of discrimination.

With its “employer mandate”—i.e., the requirement that applicable large employers make an offer of group health coverage to substantially all full-time employees or face the prospect of a penalty—the Affordable Care Act (ACA) opened a fault line in the previously monolithic market for group health insurance.

Congress adopted the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (“FMLA”) to provide job security for employees who must miss work due to their own serious health condition, the birth of their children, to care for family members suffering from a serious health condition or for reasons related to their family members’ military service.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell recently gave a candid assessment of the chances of getting an Affordable Care Act (ACA) replacement bill through the Senate, saying “I don't know how we get to 50 (votes) at the moment.” That succinctly captures the political dilemma.

On June 2, Patricia Moran was a guest on Bloomberg radio, where she discussed the Trump administration’s potential softening of the Obamacare contraception coverage mandate.

We previously discussed the conflict between a Second Circuit panel’s holding in April that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act did not prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and the Seventh Circuit’s landmark ruling the same month reaching the opposite conclusion.

In an effort to make up for a funding shortfall in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ Medicaid program, state policymakers have proposed solutions that include a “play-or-pay” option under which employers who fail to offer major medical coverage, or who offer coverage but have low take-up rates, would be required

In a previous post we discussed the significant new obligations New York City’s “Freelance Isn’t Free Act” imposes on employers that retain the services of freelance independent contractors. On May 15, these requirements became effective for all freelance contracts executed on or after that date.

As expected, the New York State Department of Labor (DOL) recently appealed the decision of the New York Industrial Board of Appeals invalidating the DOL regulations concerning employers who use direct deposit or payroll debit cards to pay employees.  The regulations, which were scheduled to take effect on March 7, 2017, were invalidated in February 2016.

Join us on Tuesday, May 16 for the final installment of our Entrepreneur Series in partnership with the University of San Diego.

As we recently blogged about here, efforts to ban inquiries related to applicants’ salary history have gained momentum across the country. Last Friday, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio joined this trend by signing into law a bill prohibiting New York City employers from inquiring about prospective employees’ salary history.