On July 1, the U.S. Department of Labor increased the salary level nationwide to qualify for certain overtime exemptions to the Fair Labor Standards Act from $684/week ($35,568/year) to $844/week ($43,888). On January 1, 2025, it will increase again to $1,128 per week or $58,656 per year.
Except for the State of Texas, as an employer. Continue reading
On Monday, the Supreme Court agreed to review and establish the burden of proof that employers must satisfy to demonstrate the applicability of an overtime exemption under the Fair Labor Standards Act. Continue reading
“An employer’s free speech right to comment upon matters that affect the business is firmly established,” noted a Vermont federal judge earlier this month. “But when such commentary is a threat of retaliation … it is without the protection of the First Amendment.”
That’s fancy speak for employers can’t use social media to retaliate against employees, current or former. Continue reading
Yesterday, several employer groups and associations filed a federal lawsuit in the same court that, in 2017, stymied the U.S. Department of Labor‘s efforts to change the overtime rules by raising the minimum salary level needed to be exempt from receiving overtime. As I’ll explain below, the 2024 plaintiffs have also raised the same arguments that worked seven years ago.
It’s déjà vu all over again. Continue reading
You still have time to register (here) for The Employer Handbook Zoom Office Happy Hour, which returns today at Noon ET. My Pierson Ferdinand employment law partners, Ben Jacobs and Amy Epstein Gluck, will join me to discuss the FTC’s plan to ban most employee noncompetes and explore the Department of Labor’s proposed increase to the salary level for overtime exemptions.
See you soon!
The same week that the U.S. Department of Labor’s rules on analyzing and determining who is an employee or independent contractor under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) took effect, both houses of Congress introduced legislation to shorten the workweek. Continue reading
It’s not like I woke up in a cold sweat, fixated on this obscure bit of Fair Labor Standards Act minutiae.
But I did read this Eleventh Circuit decision last night, which did posit whether “Julie Andrews’s Mary Poppins, Martin Lawrence’s Big Momma, Fran Drescher’s Nanny Fine, Robin Williams’s Mrs. Doubtfire, or Vin Diesel’s Shane Wolfe…would have been entitled to overtime pay in the real world.”
So, let’s find out. Continue reading
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 night, I read a news release from the U.S. Department of Labor that helps put this into perspective.
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. Continue reading
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