Employment

Over on our sister blog, Privacy and Security Matters, Cynthia Larose has just published an article that will be of interest to any employer using or considering using biometric identifiers such as fingerprints, facial recognition, or retina scans in connection with employee identification, access and security protocols.

The Internal Revenue Service has for some time made available a comprehensive set of Questions & Answers covering the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) employer shared responsibility rules. (These are the rules that are codified in Section 4980H of the Internal Revenue Code, the compliance with which is reported on IRS Forms 1094-C and 1095-C, etc.)

As a reminder, the NYC law prohibiting employers and their agents from inquiring about or relying on an applicant's salary history goes into effect today.

Trick or Treat! This month’s Bubbler is a cauldron full of hot new developments in employment law …  the NYC Salary History law is now in effect … California followed suit and its salary history law will take effect on January 1, 2018

Hurricanes. Fires. Floods. Shootings. The evening news seems consistently laden with catastrophe. In times like these, a federal agency called the National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) often springs into action.

As 2017 starts to wind down, Massachusetts employers should start reviewing and revising their employment policies and practices so they are prepared for the Massachusetts Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA), which goes into effect on April 1, 2018

Recent cases in New York and Pennsylvania demonstrate that, at least in some jurisdictions and under some circumstances, a plaintiff can state a valid claim for unlawful gender discrimination based on a spouse's jealousy.

On October 13th, President Trump signed an Executive Order directing various federal agencies to consider how to achieve three administration health reform objectives: (1) expand access to Association Health Plans (AHPs); (2) increase the current limits on short-term health insurance; and (3) allow wider use of employer health reimbursement arrangements.

The federal courts in D.C. have long held that denial of a lateral transfer does not violate Title VII for the reason that, unlike where a promotion is denied, there is no adverse employment action when an employee is denied a purely lateral transfer.

Governor Jerry Brown has signed the New Parent Leave Act, which will become effective January 1, 2018 and requires California employers with 20 to 49 employees within 75 miles to provide up to 12-weeks of job-protected unpaid parental leave. We summarize the new law below.

California has joined a growing list of jurisdictions, including New York City, Massachusetts, Delaware and Oregon, among others, banning salary history inquiries from job applicants. Governor Brown signed the law into effect last week and it becomes effective on January 1, 2018.

Employers often struggle over compliance with state wage deduction laws, and these potential violations carry with them considerable penalties. In Massachusetts, for example, employers face triple damages for violations of wage and hour laws.

The blood remaining in the umbilical cord after childbirth contains stems cells which may be used in a variety of medical treatments. Many parents of newborns are seeking to save this “cord blood”, either with the hopes of curing known ailments, as insurance against future illnesses, or for use in yet-to-be-discovered therapies.

Beginning on January 1, 2018, New York employers will have to provide paid family leave to their employees. This post provides a comprehensive overview for employers to better understand their obligations under New York’s new Paid Family Leave law (PFL) and its accompanying regulations

In recent weeks, the Trump Administration has been considering allowing health insurance to be purchased across state lines and expanding access to “Association Health Plans” (AHPs) that could take economic advantage of cross-border purchasing. President Trump is expected to issue an executive order this week to make that happen without legislation.

Beginning on October 31st, New York City employers will be prohibited from inquiring about or relying on salary history during the hiring process. As a reminder, this ban makes it an unlawful discriminatory practice for an employer, employment agency, or employee or agent of the employer to

Last month, the EEOC filed a lawsuit against Estee Lauder in a Pennsylvania federal court alleging that Estee Lauder’s parental leave policy discriminates against employees on the basis of gender by providing unequal benefits to biological mothers and fathers.

At this writing, the prospects for success of the latest Republican effort to replace the Affordable Care Act appear bleak—but the Graham-Cassidy bill on which the GOP has pinned its last-ditch hopes highlights a major political and policy flashpoint in the fight to repeal, replace, or repair the law: the degree to which states should be free to innovate and experiment by adopting non-standard health insurance product designs in their individual and small group markets.

On Thursday, October 5, 2017, Mintz Levin will host a webinar entitled "Handling Human Resources Data Under Privacy Shield and the GDPR," which will address EU laws concerning the transfer of employee personal data to the US and the penalties for getting it wrong, which are set to increase dramatically when the GDPR goes into effect in May 2018.

What is happening in employment law? We will be providing you with quick employment law updates on a bi-monthly basis in a new series called “The Bubbler.”  It will let you know what’s what and who’s who in the continually-evolving, ever-important, hard-to-keep-track-of employment law world.