On January 27, 2020, Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). Three days later, the state joined with Illinois and Nevada to file a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of...
Employment Law Letter
Healthcare providers, especially hospitals and clinics, routinely deal with people who are injured, but when is a patient's injury reportable? It depends on the circumstances. For example, if a person shows up at the...
About a year ago, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit reminded employers that employees must have a covered "disability" to be protected under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This year, the 1st...
For many employers, asking whether a job applicant or employee has a disability is a recipe for a discrimination lawsuit. For those of you who are HR professionals for government contractors, however, "don't ask" is not...
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit (whose rulings apply to all Mississippi employers) recently addressed a former employee's claim that his firing amounted to disability discrimination because the conduct...
State and local governments throughout the country have increasingly adopted laws and regulations that prohibit employers from inquiring about a job applicant's salary history during the interview process. Wisconsin has...
Q We have a nonexempt employee who sent an e-mail requesting time off in lieu of pay for overtime hours he already worked. Are we allowed to grant his request? Providing nonexempt employees with compensatory time in lieu...
When you sit down to write an employee handbook, you'll probably start by trying to think of all the subjects you need to cover. The obvious ones come easily. Of course, you must tell your employees about how they will...
Q Could you confirm if we are required to cover domestic partners on medical, dental, vision, life, or disability benefits? A Typically, spouses are afforded certain rights based on the marriage, including certain...
In January 2020, the unemployment rate was 3.6% (up slightly from the 50-year low of 3.5% in September 2019). According to WalletHub, Scottsdale was ranked the top community for jobseekers out of 180 cities. Also in the...
By choice or by force, Illinois employers are increasingly offering paid sick leave to their employees. For instance, the city of Chicago and Cook County each have a paid sick leave ordinance, and Illinois school law...
The new decade started off with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) announcing on consecutive days that it had settled lawsuits involving disability discrimination claims against two Hawaii companies. The...
The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals (which has jurisdiction over Kentucky and Tennessee employers) has dismissed an African-American state trooper's race discrimination claim even though a Caucasian trooper who engaged...
Several years ago, an Illinois court held for the first time that the Illinois Human Rights Act's (IHRA) ban on disability discrimination includes hostile environment claims. (See "Illinois court says IHRA prohibits...
It seems like a very, very long time ago—at least in the world of employment law—that Congress revised the standards courts apply in disability discrimination claims brought under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA...