Forty years ago, the Supreme Court adopted a doctrine that has allowed federal agencies to make the final call on interpreting ambiguous laws. Today, the court overruled that doctrine and held that courts, not agencies, are...more
7/1/2024
/ Administrative Procedure Act ,
Chevron Deference ,
Chevron v NRDC ,
Constitutional Challenges ,
Government Agencies ,
Judicial Authority ,
Loper Bright Enterprises v Raimondo ,
National Marine Fisheries Service ,
Regulatory Authority ,
Relentless Inc v US Department of Commerce ,
SCOTUS ,
Stare Decisis ,
Statutory Interpretation ,
Unconstitutional Condition
The construction industry has long been the subject of scrutiny by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission with regard to sexual and other harassment issues. Several unique features of constructions sites make prevention...more
In unusual circumstances arising during unionization campaigns, the National Labor Relations Board can seek a so-called Section 10(j) injunction to immediately order the employer or union to cease illegal acts associated with...more
Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, employers bear the burden of proving the applicability of an exemption from overtime and/or minimum wage requirements. Earlier this year in E.M.D. Sales Inc. v. Carrera, the Fourth Circuit...more
Following the issuance of the Federal Trade Commission’s regulations essentially banning use of noncompetition agreements for most U.S. employers, many companies expected quick judicial relief from legal challenges filed...more
In two high-profile union elections this year, the United Auto Workers went one for two. In April, workers at a Tennessee Volkswagen plant voted to unionize, while Mercedes-Benz employees in Alabama rejected the union’s...more
In the days before cellphones, employees required to remain on-call for work were generally entitled to compensation for time spent at home waiting for the landline to ring. Given the ubiquity of mobile communication...more
In order to claim overtime exempt status under the Fair Labor Standards Act’s white-collar exemptions, the position in question must meet both the duties and salary tests set forth under Department of Labor regulations. The...more
5/31/2024
/ Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Litigation ,
Exempt-Employees ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Minimum Salary ,
Multi-Factor Test ,
Over-Time ,
Salaried Employees ,
Wage and Hour ,
White-Collar Exemptions
Companies with 100 or more U.S. employees are required to annually file Form EEO-1 with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEO-1 provides demographic information about various classes of employees broken down by...more
For several years, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration has been working on a safety standard intended to address worker exposure to heat stress and related medical issues. With summer temperatures...more
In recent years, we have had a number of clients report suspected employee overdoses at their facilities. The growing availability and potency of fentanyl and other opiates has resulted in an epidemic of overdoses and deaths....more
Mandatory arbitration agreements remain popular for employers concerned about the cost, delays, and unpredictability of traditional litigation. The Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) requires federal courts to defer in most...more
When litigating claims under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), litigants are aware of long-standing case law that essentially awards a prevailing plaintiff with their attorneys’ fees absent extraordinary...more
When consulting with employers regarding employee accommodation requests under the Americans with Disabilities Act, we frequently hear concerns that granting a requested accommodation will likely result in coworkers making...more
Disputes between employees and employers over COVID-19-era vaccination and masking policies continue to work their way through the legal system. Earlier this month, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals (which includes...more
5/17/2024
/ Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Disability ,
Disability Discrimination ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Policies ,
Masks ,
Reasonable Accommodation ,
State Labor Laws ,
Vaccinations ,
Workplace Safety
Last month to much fanfare, the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division announced significant increases to the minimum salaries needed to claim the Fair Labor Standards Act’s so-called white collar exemptions found at 29...more
The tip wars between hospitality employers and employees continue unabated. Numerous lawsuits contend that restaurants and other employers wrongfully retain or require sharing of customer gratuities, as well as violate Fair...more
The "Same Actor Inference" is a legal principle that recognizes the logical gap when an employee alleges that they were terminated based on membership in a protected classification, by a manager who recently hired them with...more
Like most states, North Carolina law protects employers from misappropriation of confidential and proprietary trade secrets. Last month, the North Carolina Business Court (a division of the Superior Court that handles complex...more
In order to demonstrate discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, plaintiffs must show that they suffered an adverse employment action. When this action involves a termination, salary reduction or other...more
The Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) provides employers with wide discretion to require that disputes with employees be subject to mandatory arbitration rather than proceeding through the court system. Many employers favor...more
After investigating allegations of sexual harassment and taking disciplinary action, we see a surprising number of claims from the accused harassers that they were actually the victims of alleged discriminatory behavior that...more
Most affected employers understand their obligations to comply with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s control of hazardous energy (commonly called “lockout/tagout”) rules found at 29 C.F.R. §1910.147. These...more
Over the past few years, the National Labor Relations Board has taken aggressive measures to extend labor law protections to some non-unionized employees. These decisions have involved employer policies restricting social...more
In recent years, a number of states and municipalities have adopted measures that restrict employers’ ability to base a new hire’s starting salary on what they made in their prior job. In the past, it was common for...more
4/5/2024
/ Corporate Counsel ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Employment Litigation ,
Equal Pay ,
Equal Pay Act ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Job Applicants ,
Pay Equity Laws ,
Salary/Wage History ,
Wage and Hour