Back in the day, the mere promise of Cheerios and chocolate milk was all it took to dupe my two oldest kids (then three and five) to shovel the driveway for a few hours. Come to think of it, I preferred the stick to the carrot. So I probably threatened…
Articles Posted in Wage and Hour
Join me on Wednesday, January 17, at 1 PM for a webinar on the new DOL Independent Contractor Rules
Last week, the U.S. Department of Labor finalized its rules on how to analyze and determine who is an employee or independent contractor under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), which I wrote about here. This week, I’m co-presenting “Independent Contractor Update – How Am I to Determine if I Am Compliant?”…
Today’s free “wage and hour 101” post is the silver lining to an employer’s $1.6M screw-up
The Fair Labor Standards Act can be a veritable legal liability minefield for the uninitiated. Just ask several of my friends who practice law on the plaintiff’s side. Heck, it can put an employment lawyer’s kids through college, no matter on which side of the “v” they practice. 😏 Last…
Here are five things for employers to know about the DOL’s new independent contractor rule
Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Labor finalized its rules on how to analyze and determine who is an employee or independent contractor under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). In a nutshell, the final rule applies six factors — none of which is dispositive — to analyze employee or independent…
New employment laws may not just expose employers to liability; they may double it!
Among the top employment issues that companies will need to navigate in 2024 is enforcing laws that have more recently taken effect. Take the PUMP for Nursing Mothers Act, for example. The PUMP Act, which amended the Fair Labor Standards Act, took effect in December 2022. It provides additional workplace…
281,870 reasons not to attempt a kickback scheme to avoid paying overtime
It’s not often that I attempt to locate images for blog posts using ‘kickback’ as a search term. But when I do, rest assured that some employer really stepped in it. Last year, I wrote about a home healthcare agency that allegedly retaliated against employees for cooperating with a U.S. Department…
Some drug rehabilitation center patients sued for, get this, unpaid overtime. And they may win!
The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) is the federal wage and hour law that protects all covered workers from substandard wages and oppressive working hours by requiring that employers pay employees minimum wage and overtime when they work more than 40 hours in a workweek. Determining who counts as an…
The EEOC and DOL are teaming up to enforce federal employment law
Chances are, if one of your employees complained externally about discrimination, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was all up in your company’s business. Perhaps your business has had the not-so-good fortune of undergoing a Fair Labor Standards Act or Family and Medical Leave Act audit from the U.S. Department…
Class-action lawyers could be salivating at this new “wage theft” bill in Congress.
There are members of Congress who believe that many employers commit something called “wage theft.” Wage theft sounds ominous. I picture some fat-cat company owner intentionally purloining money from an employee’s paycheck and re-depositing it into some company slush fund. But it’s more than that. A prior version of a…
This is not a drill. A new, federal overtime proposal will cost employers $1.2 billion.
For the first time in four years, the U.S. Department of Labor plans to increase the minimum salary level to be exempt from the Fair Labor Standard Act’s overtime requirements. What is the Department proposing? Under the current FLSA regulations, a covered employer must generally pay executive, administrative, or professional (EAP)…