Employment

On September 12, 2011, the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (“DFEH”) announced its largest-ever administrative award of $846,300 (and no, that’s not a typo) against electrical supplier Acme Electric Corporation (“Acme”) for firing an employee, Mr. Charles Richard Wideman, because he had cancer.

The New York Wage Theft Prevention Act went into effect last April.  (You can read our two previous alerts about this Act here and here).  Among other things, that Act amended Section 198(1-a) of the Labor Law to require courts to impose a liquidated damages award of 100% of the total unpaid wages found to be due – up from the previous 25% cap. 

Classifying workers as independent contractors in California- already a difficult minefield to navigate for employers– is about to get a bit harder, more convoluted and, unfortunately, more expensive. Under existing California law, a worker is presumed to be an employee, rather than an independent contractor.

In a case of first impression, the Department of Labor’s Administrative Review Board (ARB) finds that the meaning of the term “adverse action” under the whistleblower protection provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) is substantially broader than the meaning of the same term under Title VII

We recently alerted you that beginning on November 14, 2011, union and non-union employers alike must post unionization rights notices in their workplaces. You can access that alert here.

My colleagues Ivan Blumenthal and Robert Gault just published an Alert describing a recent decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court pertaining to a challenge to a company’s imposition of certain fees and costs on service providers it classified as franchisees/independent contractors.

My colleague, Tyrone Thomas, writes that "The Governor of New York has taken a strong and outspoken stance aimed at placing those with the largest paychecks at institutional nonprofits under a microscope.

My colleagues Richard Block and David Katz just published a new alert, describing the new NLRB rule requiring private sector employers to post notices explaining employees’ unionization rights, regardless if their workplaces are unionized or union free.

Next week, millions of children around the country will return to school, which serves as a good time to remind employers that they may have to provide short-term unpaid job-protected leave to their employees seeking to participate in their children’s school-related activities.

On August 26, the Department of Justice reached a settlement with Kinro Manufacturing Inc. with regard to allegations that it “engaged in a pattern or practice of discrimination against work-authorized non-citizens in the employment eligibility verification process” by requiring certain new hires to provide proof of employment eligibility beyond that required by law.

In a short but interesting opinion by Justice Souter, sitting by designation, the First Circuit Court of Appeals held that, under Massachusetts law, the court may not enter an injunction enforcing a non-compete or other restrictive covenant which expired during the course of litigation, at least where the contract does not expressly provide for tolling of the covenant

An earthquake and a hurricane in one week in New York and elsewhere!? With the former, you may have had to evacuate your employees from the building; with the latter, it is becoming increasingly likely that your east coast employees may not even make into the building.

In a case all employers should find troubling, the EEOC recently held that a federal agency-employer discriminated on the basis of disability by denying an employee’s request for accommodation, despite the fact that information the employee provided when making his request and during the time in which the employer and employee engaged in the required interactive process

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals recently dismissed a Fair Labor Standards Act retaliation claim where the plaintiff alleged that the defendant refused to hire her because she had sued her previous employer for wage and hour violations.

The number of religious discrimination cases has risen steadily over the past decade. This trend may continue, at least in New York City, well into the future.

Last week, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Millea v. Metro-North R.R. Co., --- F.3d ----, 2011 WL 3437513 (2d Cir. Aug. 8, 2011), found that  a “material adverse employment action” in the context of a Family Medical Leave Act (“FMLA”) retaliation claim need not be all that “material” .

Many employers have employees sign confidentiality agreements aimed at prohibiting disclosure of confidential business information to third parties, and it has been widely assumed that such clauses were lawful.

In this day and age, all employers know that sexual harassment in the workplace is wrong.  Right?  Not so fast.  If the allegations set forth in a case filed in in Utah on August 4, 2011 prove to be true, there is at least one supervisor out there who simply does not get it.

It is no secret that employers were not pleased with U.S. Supreme Court’s decision, Staub v. Proctor handed down in March.  And why would they be? 

The Old Testament describes a “Nazirite” as a man or woman who vows to abstain from eating grapes or raisins, or drinking any beverage derived from grapes; to refrain from cutting or combing his or her hair; and to avoid corpses and graves, even those of family members.  The vow may be temporary or permanent, and the rules for each differ slightly.