The Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) nationwide ban on post-employment noncompetition agreements is no more following a Northern District of Texas judge’s ruling imposing a nationwide permanent injunction. Although a long and...more
8/22/2024
/ Administrative Procedure Act ,
Arbitrary and Capricious ,
Employees ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Litigation ,
Federal Bans ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Final Rules ,
Lack of Authority ,
Non-Compete Agreements ,
Preliminary Injunctions ,
Statutory Authority ,
Texas
The US Department of Labor (DOL) released its final rule to increase the federal salary threshold for exemption under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) on April 23, 2024. DOL had previously issued On August 30, 2023, the US...more
4/24/2024
/ Comment Period ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Exempt-Employees ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Minimum Salary ,
Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR) ,
Over-Time ,
Proposed Rules ,
Public Comment ,
Wage and Hour ,
White-Collar Exemptions
Restrictive covenants have traversed a tumultuous road since the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on January 5, 2023, purporting to ban noncompetition agreements throughout the...more
4/24/2024
/ Biden Administration ,
Employment Contract ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Bans ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Final Rules ,
NLRB General Counsel ,
Non-Compete Agreements ,
Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR) ,
NRLA ,
Restrictive Covenants ,
Unfair Competition
On August 30, 2023, the US Department of Labor (DOL) announced a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that it claims will “restore and extend overtime protections to 3.6 million salaried workers” throughout the United States....more
On May 30, 2023, the federal government continued its crusade against employee non-compete agreements. Jennifer A. Abruzzo, the NLRB’s General Counsel, issued a Memo to all Regional Directors, in which she stated that, absent...more
It is hardly a secret that most employers routinely incorporate confidentiality and non-disparagement obligations in severance agreements for departing employees. On February 21, 2023, the National Labor Relations Board...more
The US Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division (DOL) released its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) pertaining to independent contractor analysis on October 11, 2022. The proposed rule is intended to revise the...more
Since 1996, the US Department of Labor granted more than 1,200 individual exemptions from the ERISA prohibited transaction rules.
One of the distinctive features of ERISA is its prohibition, in ERISA section 406 as a...more
1/5/2022
/ 401k ,
403(b) Plans ,
Benefit Plan Sponsors ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) ,
Exemptions ,
Fiduciary Duty ,
Individual Retirement Account (IRA) ,
Internal Revenue Code (IRC) ,
Prohibited Transactions ,
Reinsurance ,
Related Parties
On November 4, 2021, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) announced an “Emergency Temporary Standard” (ETS) on workplace safety and coronavirus. The ETS is in response to President Biden’s directive in...more
11/8/2021
/ Biden Administration ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Covered Employer ,
Employer Mandates ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Contractors ,
General Duty Clause ,
OSHA ,
Preemption ,
Reasonable Accommodation ,
Religious Accommodation ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Subcontractors ,
Temporary Regulations ,
Vaccinations ,
Virus Testing ,
Workplace Safety
On December 22, President Trump signed a significant tax bill (originally named the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act but later renamed to comply with Senate rules) that includes a provision impacting settlement of employment-related...more
Employers with salaried employees earning under $47,476 annually should evaluate the impact on their organizations of major changes to employee compensation following new federal wage requirements effective December 1,...more
In 2014, the Department of Labor (DOL) maintained a diminished program of advance guidance under the Employment Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, as amended (ERISA), in response to requests from the regulated community....more
On December 30, the Departments of Treasury, Labor, and Health and Human Services published a joint notice of proposed rulemaking modifying the Summary of Benefits and Coverage (SBC) final regulations issued in 2012. In...more
The principal regulators of U.S. employee benefits have recently published updates to their guidance plans for the coming months. The updated plans are reflected in the attached chart.
...more
In December 2014, the Treasury Department opened the myRA (my Retirement Account) program to employers and employees. President Obama announced the myRA program in his 2014 State of the Union Address. The program is intended...more
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit makes pleading Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) violations more difficult by applying the heightened standard in Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), and Ashcroft...more
On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court announced that it would review the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit’s decision in King v. Burwell. In that case, the Fourth Circuit held that tax credits for health insurance...more
11/12/2014
/ Affordable Care Act ,
Employer Mandates ,
Halbig v Burwell ,
Health Insurance ,
Health Insurance Exchanges ,
IRS ,
King v Burwell ,
Popular ,
SCOTUS ,
Subsidies ,
Tax Credits
This past weekend the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) indefinitely delayed enforcement of the requirement that all self-insured health plans obtain a Health Plan Identifier number (HPID). ...more
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is requiring all self-insured health plans to obtain a Health Plan Identifier number (HPID) as part of its compliance efforts under the Health Insurance Portability and...more
On October 23 and 24, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Department of Labor (DOL) issued coordinated guidance on lifetime income provided through target date funds held by retirement plans. According to an...more
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) recently issued Notice 2014-49 which describes a proposed approach for determining an employee’s full-time or part-time status for purposes of the employer shared responsibility rules under...more
On September 18, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued Notice 2014-54, which clarifies that, subject to some limitations, a single distribution of pre-tax and after-tax amounts from a qualified retirement plan, a 403(b)...more
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Department of Treasury (Treasury) have issued final regulations under section 162(m)(6) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (Code), which limit the deduction certain...more
The Internal Revenue Service has issued Notice 2014-55 to permit new health plan elections in two situations where they were not previously allowed. ...more
On August 7, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit decided in Moyer that the contractual time limits governing the period during which a participant must initiate judicial review of a benefits denial must be...more