Yesterday, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission announced (here) that an employer will fork over $400,000, split among 11 women, stemming from a written policy that violates both the Pregnancy Discrimination Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act. Continue reading
On April 10, 2023, Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Amul R. Thapar offered his two cents on the role the federal courts should have in second-guessing the business judgment of companies making hiring decisions: Continue reading
You’ll find an important update if you head over to the official Layoffs and Closings website for New Jersey’s Department of Labor & Workforce Development. Continue reading
The Family and Medical Leave Act guarantees eligible employees up to 12 workweeks of leave in a 12-month period for a qualifying reason, such as taking care of a parent with a serious health condition. Employers, on the other hand, cannot interfere with employees’ FMLA rights.
But, are there circumstances in which an employer can provide FMLA leave to an eligible employee and then require them to work extra time — maybe a Saturday — to make up the time they missed?
The EEOC has guided employers to accommodate employee use of certain prescribed medications, and excuse failed drug tests that reflect the presence of those drugs — if it is done safely — because those individuals who test positive likely have an underlying disability.
But, when employee self-medicate — like with CBDs for stress and anxiety — not only is there no duty to accommodate, the employee may not be able to establish an underlying disability. Continue reading
They were so bad that a federal judge applied a rarely-used rule of civil procedure to consider summary judgment on its own after identifying for the parties material facts that may not be genuinely in dispute.
Boy, that was about as witty as Groundskeeper Willie’s standup routine at Springfield Elementary.
(Note to self: take after the Clown.) Continue reading
I get that employee handbooks are not contacts and are subject to change and all that stuff. But, companies should be prepared to enforce any existing policy in an employee handbook as written.
A multi-billion-dollar company with an overly broad attendance policy learned this lesson the hard way recently. Continue reading
Proving age discrimination can be difficult because plaintiffs must ultimately establish that their age was a determinative factor in the defendant’s decision. In other words, if not for the plaintiff’s age, the [adverse employment action] would not have occurred. Continue reading
Federal law requires most companies to pay minimum wage and overtime pay for employees unless they qualify for an exemption. Employees generally must meet certain tests regarding their job duties and get a salary of at least $684 per week, which works out to just $35,568 per year.
But a new overtime reform bill introduced earlier this week in both the House and the Senate aims to boost that salary level yearly until 2027 to make it much easier for salaried American workers to be overtime eligible. Continue reading
As more businesses transition from allowing remote work to mandating a return to the office, apart from the general employee backlash, one of the biggest HR compliance issues companies face is how to address the spike in medical-related requests to continue to work from home. Continue reading
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