The Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits employers from discriminating against protected individuals with respect to terms and conditions of employment, including compensation. Employers frequently ask whether these...more
Title VII and related federal anti-discrimination laws prohibit employers from discriminating against persons based on their membership in a protected category. These discrimination prohibitions include pay disparities. What...more
Last week, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals backed the National Labor Relations Board’s position that employee social media postings are protected concerted activity under federal law, even if they use obscenities that...more
Last month, California’s Governor Brown signed new legislation intended to address what the state characterizes as persistent pay gaps between men and women working the same or similar jobs. The law builds on existing...more
On October 21, 2015, the IRS announced the 2016 dollar limitations for retirement plans based on the applicable cost-of-living adjustment guidelines. The retirement plan limitations generally will not change for 2016 because...more
Earlier this month, in a rare en banc decision, the full Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals held eight to four that the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration exceeded its authority by interpreting a safety...more
Many, if not most employers maintain policies regarding disclosure by employees of confidential business information. Sometimes these policies appear in employee handbooks, and sometimes employees are required to sign...more
Last month, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued its annual list of the ten most cited safety standards for the fiscal year that ended September 30. The list was unchanged from the prior year, and...more
In its most recent term, the U.S. Supreme Court held in the Mach Mining case that federal courts have limited ability to review whether or not the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission fulfilled its statutory duty to...more
On October 1, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the appeal of a company whose mandatory arbitration agreements with its contractors were deemed invalid by California state courts. Once again, the Court will determine...more
10/12/2015
/ Arbitration ,
Class Action ,
Contractors ,
Federal Arbitration Act ,
Independent Contractors ,
Mandatory Arbitration Clauses ,
Misclassification ,
Motion to Compel ,
Preemption ,
SCOTUS ,
Severability Doctrine ,
Unconscionable Contracts
In North Carolina, an initial offer of employment serves as adequate legal consideration to support non-competition and non-solicitation restrictive covenants. However, once a person is already employed, the employer must pay...more
Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act protects employees’ rights to engage in “concerted activity.” Concerted activity means persons acting on behalf of two or more employees with regard to issues involving terms and...more
In recent years, more Americans have begun identifying themselves as biracial or of mixed racial heritage. This shift has resulted in changes to census and other forms where people are asked to self-identify by race. In...more
As with most states, South Carolina recognizes an exception to its general employment at-will doctrine. Employers may terminate employees with or without cause, but not for any reason that violates the state’s public policy....more
10/5/2015
/ Appeals ,
At-Will Employment ,
Breach of Contract ,
Dismissals ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Contract ,
Public Employees ,
Public Employers ,
SC Supreme Court ,
Severance Pay ,
Wrongful Termination
Employers in cities like Charlotte that straddle state lines sometimes face interesting questions about the applicability of which state’s laws to their employment decisions. An employee may live in South Carolina, commute to...more
On occasion, an employee’s medical condition may cause employers concern over that person’s ability to operate heavy machinery or otherwise to work in a hazardous environment. For example, an employee with epilepsy has...more
Employers that receive requests for accommodation made by a disabled employee must remain careful about making significant changes to that employee’s terms and conditions of employment prior to concluding review and...more
Last April, President Obama issued Executive Order 13,665, prohibiting federal contractors and subcontractors from publishing or enforcing rules intended to keep employees from discussing their compensation. On September 10,...more
Last week’s EmployNews reported on efforts by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to attack employer-prepared releases because they supposedly do not contain adequate assurances that their terms do not prevent...more
On Thursday, Governor McCrory signed legislation intended to combat fraudulent unemployment insurance benefit claims. Among other changes, the new law attempts to combat UI fraud through two new measures. ...more
On September 7, President Obama signed an Executive Order requiring federal contractors to provide employees with a minimum of seven days of paid sick leave per year. The sick pay will be awarded at the rate of one hour for...more
The 60-day notice and comment period for the Department of Labor’s proposed changes to its Part 541 white collar overtime exemption rules has expired. The agency reports receiving over 200,000 comments to the proposed rules,...more
Last year, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission garnered significant criticism from employers when it sued CVS over its standard releases used in conjunction with reductions in force and similar employee terminations....more
In recent administrative actions, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has taken the position that regular attendance is not an essential job function under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The agency views...more
Earlier this year in its Abercrombie decision, the U.S. Supreme Court stated that an employee suing for religious discrimination did not have to demonstrate actual knowledge of an employee’s religious practices to trigger...more