On December 16, 2019, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued a decision in Apogee Retail LLC d/b/a Unique Thrift Store and Kathy Johnson upholding employers' ability to instruct employees involved in workplace...
Employment Law Letter
Q Our organization has four separate entities with their own distinct handbooks. Is it advisable to create a drug testing policy for one entity, but not the others? Does the work environment make a difference (e.g., a...
On February 3, 2020, President Donald Trump announced his intention to nominate Office of Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) Director Craig Leen to become the inspector general of the Office of Personnel Management...
When seeking to establish a prima facie, or minimally sufficient, case of discriminatory discharge, an employee must prove he (1) is a member of a statutorily protected class, (2) was discharged, (3) was qualified for...
Oklahoma remains one of about only a dozen states that recognize common-law marriages. Despite the legislature's sporadic attempts to effectively abolish such marriages, the Oklahoma Supreme Court has recently determined...
PNC Bank and its parent company were hit with two class action suits for unpaid time in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and state laws in 2019. In late January 2020, they agreed to settle the combined...
Karim Salehpoor was an engineering professor at New Mexico Institute of Mining & Technology (NM Tech). Salehpoor taught under a series of annual employment contracts. As the 2011-12 academic year came to an end, he was...
Q We are moving into a new office space with two buildings joined in the middle by a breezeway. Will we need to post workers' compensation and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) notices in both...
Some tout the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in hiring as a means of quickly and efficiently screening job applicants and, perhaps more important, removing human bias from hiring. But others point to AI doing just...
A Pew Research Center study found the average hourly wage for females increased 45 percent between 1980 and 2018, while the average hourly wage for males increased only 14 percent, resulting in an overall decrease in the...
Figuring out when a joint-employment arrangement exists can be like traveling a dusty, winding road. When will the dust settle, and where will the road go? Those questions haven't been completely answered. One answer...
When an employee responded to a suspension notice by sending an e-mail stating simply, “I sue,” his employer fired him. Unsurprisingly, he sued, and an appeals court found his termination was retaliatory. Facts Nityanand...
A continuing theme of the Trump administration has been to reduce the burden of regulations on American businesses. One of the earliest indications of the seriousness of that pledge was the administration's unprecedented...
Thinking about employment discrimination claims, business owners might assume that if an individual were to file one, they would be served with a lawsuit. It might surprise small business owners checking their mail, then...
In a 2-1 decision on December 18, 2019, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit declared the Affordable Care Act's (ACA) individual health insurance mandate unconstitutional as a result of Congress's elimination of...