Employment

Viewpoints

Filter by:

Did the NLRB Really Just Grant Employees the Presumptive Right to Use Employer-Provided Email Systems? We Break Down the Purple Communications Decision and What It Means for Employers.

December 30, 2014 | Blog

In a 3-2 decision divided along party lines, the National Labor Relations Board has ruled that employees have a presumptive right to use their employers’ email systems during non-working time to discuss unionization and the terms and conditions of their employment.
Read more

The Affordable Care Act—Countdown to Compliance for Employers, Week 0: Final Thoughts and Acknowledgements

December 29, 2014 | Blog

The Affordable Care Act is the single most important piece of Federal social legislation in more than a generation.  While there was and is broad agreement on the law’s principal goals—to expand medical coverage, increase the quality of medical outcomes, and constrain costs—there is little agreement on the “means whereby.”
Read more

The Affordable Care Act—Countdown to Compliance for Employers, Week 1: Going Live with the Affordable Care Act’s Employer Shared Responsibility Rules on January 1, 2015 . . . What Can Possibly Go Wrong?

December 22, 2014 | Blog

Regulations implementing the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility rules including the substantive “pay-or-play” rules and the accompanying reporting rules were adopted in February.  Regulations implementing the reporting rules in newly added Internal Revenue Code Sections 6055 and 6056 came along in March.
Read more

Yet Another Tale of (Alleged) LinkedIn Indiscretion in a Non-Compete Matter

December 22, 2014 | Blog | By Jennifer Rubin

For those of you following the saga our Employee Mobility Practice Group has been documenting about the many ways in which social media appears to be impacting the non-compete world, I present to you yet another case that highlights the treasure trove of evidence that LinkedIn may provide.
Read more

San Francisco Board of Supervisors Continues to Reshape Working Environment for Low-Wage and Part-Time Workers; Becomes First Jurisdiction in Nation to Approve So-Called “Retail Workers Bill of Rights”; Forces Large Retailers to Address Automated Sch

December 19, 2014 | Blog

Just before the Thanksgiving break, as retailers were gearing up for “Black Friday,” “Cyber Monday,” and the newly-minted “Gray Thursday,” the San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors unanimously approved two new ordinances collectively known as the “Retail Workers Bill of Rights” – the first of its kind in the nation.
Read more

Update to the Update: New York Employers Will Likely Be Relieved of the Requirement to Distribute Annual Pay Notices in January 2015 After All

December 18, 2014 | Blog

Okay, so despite our previous post saying the opposite, employers likely will not have to distribute New York State Wage Theft Act Annual Pay Notices after all.
Read more

EEOC's Attempt to Limit Reach of Severance Agreements Hits Roadblock… Again

December 16, 2014 | Blog

A federal judge in Colorado has once again stymied the EEOC’s efforts to successfully challenge an employer’s standard separation agreement as violating the Age Discrimination in Employment Act.
Read more

Supreme Court Finds that Post-Shift Employee Security Screenings Noncompensable Activity Under the Fair Labor Standards Act

December 16, 2014 | Blog

Last week, in Integrity Staffing Solutions, Inc. v. Busk, the United States Supreme Court issued a rare unanimous opinion holding that post-shift employee security screenings were noncompensable activities under the Fair Labor Standards Act because those screenings were neither the principal activity the employees were hired to perform.
Read more

The Affordable Care Act—Countdown to Compliance for Employers, Week 2: Explaining the Look-Back Measurement Method to Employees

December 16, 2014 | Blog

Many applicable large employers—i.e., employers that are subject to the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility rules—have a pretty good sense of what these rules are, how they work, and what they plan to do to comply.
Read more

Back at it Again: NLRB Invalidates Employer’s “Overbroad” Solicitation Rule

December 15, 2014 | Blog

We have posted extensively about the NLRB’s crusade against overbroad workplace policies (see our most recent posts here and here), ranging from social media policies to workplace conduct and disciplinary policies and everything in between.  Well the Board is back at it again -- handing down two solicitation decisions in the past couple of weeks.
Read more

Staffing Companies Hit with Class Action Alleging Violation of Fair Credit Reporting Act

December 15, 2014 | Blog

Fair Credit Reporting Act class actions remain on the rise.
Read more

Massachusetts Becomes the Latest Jurisdiction to Require Paid Sick Leave

December 12, 2014 | Blog

Massachusetts voters recently approved a ballot initiative amending the Commonwealth’s labor statute to require employers to provide workers with up to 40 hours of paid sick time per year.
Read more

NLRB Again Attempts to Invalidate Mandatory Arbitration Clauses for Employment Claims

December 10, 2014 | Blog

In its Murphy Oil decision, the National Labor Relations Board affirmed its 2012 holding in D. R. Horton, which found an employer violates the NLRA when it requires employees
Read more

Update: New Jersey Supreme Court to Address Contractually-Shortened Statute of Limitation Provisions

December 9, 2014 | Blog

Over the summer, we posted about an interesting New Jersey appellate court decision (Rodriquez v. Raymours Furniture) enforcing a provision in a job application that reduced the period in which an employee could sue an employer to six months from the date of the adverse employment action.
Read more

The Affordable Care Act—Countdown to Compliance for Employers, Week 3: Group Health Plan, Cafeteria Plan and Health FSA Nondiscrimination Theory and Practice

December 8, 2014 | Blog

As applicable large employers grapple with the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility (pay-or-play) rules, two questions arise with notable frequency
Read more

Update: New York Employers Will Still Be Required to Distribute Annual Pay Notices in January 2015

December 4, 2014 | Blog

To the consternation and bewilderment of many, the New York State Legislature never sent to Governor Cuomo the bill it passed earlier this year repealing the New York State Wage Theft Act’s Annual Pay Notice Requirement.  As a result, employers will be forced next month to once again distribute pay notices to all of their employees.
Read more

Social Media and Non-Solicitation Covenants – Another LinkedIn Cautionary Tale, but this One for Employers

December 3, 2014 | Blog

Those of you who joined us for our November 13 webinar on “Post-Employment Solicitation of Customers & Employees in the Social Media Age” will be interested in a recent social media-related non-solicitation case from Connecticut that – you guessed it – echoes some of the guidance that I, together with my partners Michael Arnold and Bret Cohen
Read more

The Affordable Care Act—Countdown to Compliance for Employers, Week 4: EEOC v. Honeywell and the Future of Wellness Programs

December 1, 2014 | Blog

While my entries have focused principally on the employer shared responsibility rules of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), every once in a while an item comes along that nevertheless grabs my attention. The treatment of wellness plans at the hands of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is such an item.
Read more

The Affordable Care Act—Countdown to Compliance for Employers, Week 5: Health and Human Services (HHS) Wastes No Time Issuing Proposed Rules Modifying Minimum Value Rules

November 24, 2014 | Blog

Over the last couple of months, we have followed and reported on a particular ACA compliance strategy under which an employer subject to the Affordable Care Act’s employer shared responsibility
Read more

Sixth Circuit Decision Confirms that Employers May Lawfully Choose Not to Hire a Job Applicant with a Prior History as a False Claims Act Whistleblower

November 21, 2014 | Blog | By David Barmak

Some employers in the health care and other industries who regularly deal with the federal government and are subject to the False Claims Act ("FCA") have felt helpless in trying to weed out serial whistleblowers in the hiring process. After all, most anti-retaliation provisions prohibit retaliation against both employees and applicants.
Read more

Subscribe

Sign up to receive email updates from Mintz.
Subscribe Now
Coronavirus Blog Button

Coronavirus Insights Center

Employer Roadmap in the Time of 2019 Blog Button

Roadmap for Employers in the Time of COVID-19

AHP Blog Button

Association Health Plan Perspectives

Viewpoint Editors

Explore Other Viewpoints:

I'm Looking For...