On August 23, 2024, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a final rule promulgated by the Department of Labor (“DOL”) restricting when employers could take a tip credit for tipped employees under the Fair Labor...more
8/29/2024
/ Administrative Agencies ,
Chevron Deference ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Food Service Workers ,
Hospitality Industry ,
Loper Bright Enterprises v Raimondo ,
Minimum Wage ,
Restaurant Industry ,
Tip Credit ,
Tipped Employees ,
Tips ,
Wage and Hour
As every employer in the U.S. is likely aware, the Federal Trade Commission’s (“FTC”) near-universal ban on non-competes nationwide, which the FTC voted to implement via regulatory rulemaking on April 23 of this year, has...more
8/21/2024
/ Chevron Deference ,
Employment Contract ,
Enforceability ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Final Rules ,
Non-Compete Agreements ,
Pending Legislation ,
Preliminary Injunctions ,
Regulatory Authority ,
Restrictive Covenants ,
Unfair Competition
As we previously reported, the Department of Labor (“DOL”) issued a Final Rule adjusting the minimum annual salary that an employee must be paid to qualify for the executive, administrative, and professional (“EAP”)...more
8/9/2024
/ Compliance ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Exempt-Employees ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Federal Labor Laws ,
Final Rules ,
Highly Compensated Employees ,
Minimum Salary ,
Pending Legislation ,
Salaried Employees ,
Threshold Requirements ,
Wage and Hour ,
White-Collar Exemptions
Over the past several years, the National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) under the Biden administration has taken several measures to make union election procedures more union-friendly....more
Update: Since the alert below was issued on March 13, 2024, the National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) appealed the lower court’s decision to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. On July 19, 2024, the Board filed an...more
7/26/2024
/ Administrative Procedure Act ,
Arbitrary and Capricious ,
Franchises ,
Joint Employers ,
Motion to Dismiss ,
New Rules ,
NLRA ,
NLRB ,
Regulatory History ,
Rulemaking Process ,
Staffing Agencies
After the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) voted on April 23 to enact its nationwide ban on non-competes, employers and business organizations did not have to wait long—not even a day—before challengers began opposing the...more
On June 28, 2024, the Supreme Court issued a landmark decision in a pair of consolidated cases, Loper Bright Enterprises et al. v. Gina Raimondo and Relentless Inc. et al. v. Department of Commerce. ...more
7/1/2024
/ Chevron Deference ,
Chevron v NRDC ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Government Agencies ,
Joint Employers ,
Judicial Authority ,
Loper Bright Enterprises v Raimondo ,
National Marine Fisheries Service ,
Regulatory Authority ,
Relentless Inc v US Department of Commerce ,
SCOTUS ,
Statutory Interpretation ,
Title VII
On June 13, 2024, the Supreme Court struck a blow to the NLRB and provided employers a major win in a case involving a preliminary injunction issued against Starbucks under §10(j) of the National Labor Relations Act....more
EEOC Title VII Guidance Challenged -
On May 21, the Texas attorney general sought a permanent injunction to block the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s (“EEOC”) enforcement guidance over gender identity and...more
5/24/2024
/ Bostock v Clayton County Georgia ,
Cemex ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Enforcement Guidance ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Final Rules ,
Gender Identity ,
Mercedes-Benz ,
Minimum Salary ,
Threshold Requirements ,
Title VII ,
UAW ,
White-Collar Exemptions
On the heels of the United Auto Workers’ (“UAW”) successful campaign to organize Volkswagen workers in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Mercedes-Benz workers in Vance, Alabama chose a different path, rejecting the UAW as their...more
For the first time in a quarter-century, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has issued enforcement guidance on workplace harassment. The April 29-guidance consolidates and supersedes several iterations of...more
5/7/2024
/ Bostock v Clayton County Georgia ,
Disability Discrimination ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Enforcement ,
Enforcement Guidance ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Gender Discrimination ,
Harassment ,
New Guidance ,
Race Discrimination ,
Religious Discrimination ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Sexual Orientation Discrimination ,
Title VII ,
Workplace Harassment Guidance
On April 17, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously lowered the burden applicable to discriminatory transfer claims brought under Title VII. According to the Court, a showing of some harm—rather than significant or some...more
4/26/2024
/ Adverse Employment Action ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Employee Transfers ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Litigation ,
Employment Policies ,
Lateral Transfers ,
Muldrow v City of St Louis ,
Protected Class ,
SCOTUS ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Title VII
Less than one day after the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) issued its Final Rule that would enact a nationwide ban on most non-competition agreements, at least two lawsuits have been filed against the FTC which seek to...more
On April 23, 2024, the Department of Labor (“DOL”) issued its widely anticipated Final Rule adjusting the minimum annual salary that an employee must be paid as of July 1, 2024, in order to qualify under some of the FLSA’s...more
A bill on the ballot in California this November asks the state’s voters to give the controversial Private Attorney General’s Act (PAGA) a final approval or rejection. ...more
The U.S. Department of Labor recently published a final rule clarifying the rights of employees to authorize a representative to accompany an Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) compliance officer during an...more
In early 2023, the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB or “Board”) decision in McLaren Macomb, 372 NLRB 58, revoked employers’ ability to require their employees to keep the terms of severance packages confidential and to...more
4/1/2024
/ Confidential Communications ,
Confidentiality Policies ,
Contract Terms ,
Disclaimers ,
Disparagement ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Hiring & Firing ,
NLRA ,
NLRB ,
Profanity ,
Severance Agreements ,
Severance Pay ,
SpaceX ,
Surveillance ,
Unfair Labor Practices ,
Unions
A National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) rule set to take effect on Monday, March 11 and slated to significantly expand the circumstances in which a company would be deemed a joint employer under the National Labor...more
In a win for employers located in Florida, Georgia and Alabama, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit recently concluded that retaliation claims brought under the Family and Medical Leave Act are subject to a...more
3/13/2024
/ Appeals ,
Burden of Proof ,
But For Causation ,
Causation ,
Employment Litigation ,
Employment Policies ,
Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) ,
Intermittent Leave ,
Performance Improvement Plans ,
Retaliation ,
Summary Judgment
The Fallout from the NLRB’s Cemex Decision -
As we previously addressed, the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) August 25, 2023, decision in Cemex Construction Materials Pacific, LLC overturned long-established...more
On Friday, January 12, the United States Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal from Starbucks on a case involving the termination of seven Memphis, Tennessee employees....more
1/23/2024
/ Appeals ,
Elon Musk ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Employment Litigation ,
Forum Shopping ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Injunctive Relief ,
Multi-Factor Test ,
NLRA ,
NLRB ,
Reinstatement ,
SCOTUS ,
SpaceX ,
Starbucks ,
Termination ,
Unfair Labor Practices ,
Unions
On January 9, 2024, the U.S. Department of Labor released details of its final rule regarding the proper circumstances for independent contractor classification under the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”). On January 10,...more
1/12/2024
/ Biden Administration ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Economic Realities Test ,
Employee Definition ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Federal Labor Laws ,
Final Rules ,
Independent Contractors ,
Misclassification ,
Multi-Factor Test ,
Trump Administration ,
Wage and Hour
In a win for employers, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals issued a decision on December 13, 2023, which formally adopted the “but for” causation standard for retaliation claims brought under the Family Medical Leave Act...more
On December 8, 2023, the National Labor Relations Board’s (“NLRB”) General Counsel published a Memorandum outlining the differences between the new union-friendly election rule that becomes effective on December 26, 2023 and...more
On August 25, 2023, the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”) decided Cemex Construction Materials Pacific, LLC, which lowered the threshold for the Board to issue a bargaining order rather than re-run an election when it...more
11/27/2023
/ Bargaining Units ,
Cemex ,
Collective Bargaining ,
Labor Law Violations ,
Labor Relations ,
NLRA ,
NLRB ,
NLRB General Counsel ,
Unfair Labor Practices ,
Union Elections ,
Unions