Image Credit: Pixabay.com (https://pixabay.com/vectors/alarm-clock-clock-retro-time-watch-146469/) Remember that f**king fire drill? Back in 2016, the United States Department of Labor proposed a rule that would have made millions of workers eligible to earn overtime for the first time by raising the salary-level that exempts certain individuals from overtime eligibility under the Fair Labor…
Copyright Free – Stock Free images. Public Domain image dedication. CC0 1.0 Universal Licence – http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ For nearly ten years, from September 1, 1997 through July 23, 2007, the federal minimum wage was $5.15 per hour. Three times in the following two years, the minimum wage rose, settling in at $7.25 per…
By Mikamote [CC BY-SA 3.0], from Wikimedia CommonsGenerally, if a wage and hour dispute arises in the workplace, the parties need approval from either the U.S. Department of Labor or a federal court to resolve claims under the Fair Labor Standards Act. When parties agree to resolve these claims as…
Image Credit: Pixabay.com (https://pixabay.com/en/autohaus-car-dealers-auto-sales-2138927/) Service Advisors at an auto dealership don’t get overtime They are salespeople, primarily engaged in servicing autos. A dictionary textual analysis It is all you need It’s wrong to construe FLSA exemptions narrowly. Really. That premise is flawed. The Ninth Circuit can pound sand, says the…
Image Credit: Photofunia.com Who is still breathing a sigh of relief that the proposed U.S. Department of Labor overtime rules never took effect? Not so fast Pennsylvania employers. You may want to take a deep breath and start clutching your pearls. New Overtime Rules in PA On Wednesday, Pennsylvania Governor…
Image Credit: Photofunia.com Last week, the U.S. Department of Labor did more for employers than just revamp its internship test. It re-issued a slew of opinion letters to help employers with sticky wage-and-hour issues. I’ve highlighted a few of the more notable ones below. [Fair warning: We get kinda wonky by…
If an employer violates the Fair Labor Standards Act, like by not paying overtime, the plaintiff(s) can generally recover two years of unpaid overtime for the two years preceding the lawsuit. Those plaintiffs may also recover liquidated damages equal to the unpaid overtime. So, if an employer owes $100 in…
Yesterday, a Texas federal judge killed ’em dead. Now, I could go on for a few hundred words and re-explain the entire history of the overtime rules. But, it’s five o’clock somewhere and Kate Tornone did all of the heavy lifting already in this article for HRDive.com. So, put down your adult…
A few years back, some progressive (?) restaurants around the country made headlines by paying their waitstaff more than minimum wage and putting the kibosh on customer tips. This broke with the traditional way of paying customarily-tipped employees in scratch offs and iced animal crackers. That is, most employers would pay the minimum-required…
I see your lawsuit and raise you a contempt motion! (It sounded baller in my head. But, seeing it in print, not so much.) Although that .gif… Injunction? What injunction? Remember a few months ago when I blogged about a class-action lawsuit filed in a New Jersey federal court. That’s…
