Last week, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the United States Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (DOL) issued a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that announced they are partnering for the purpose of information sharing and joint investigations. As you know, the EEOC investigates and enforces allegations of discrimination and retaliation under Title
Department of Labor
Labor Forecast Following a Summer of Strikes
For many, this has been a summer of strikes. Beyond the high-profile, ongoing strike of Hollywood writers and actors, union actions have secured outcomes like substantial pay increases for UPS drivers and commercial air pilots. A major strike of autoworkers now looms. Despite indicators pointing to a labor market that is loosening after historic post-pandemic…
Déjà Vu All Over Again? DOL Proposes New Rule on Salaried Exemption Threshold
The DOL issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking proposing, among other things, to increase the salary threshold for white-collar overtime exemptions. You may recall that there was a lot of discussion about this back in 2016 when the DOL proposed a rule raising the threshold from $23,660 to $47,476. Litigation ensued, and a court held…
Makin’ New Davis-Bacon (Regs): DOL Issues Final Rule on Prevailing Wages
Recently the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued a final rule that provides, among many other things (the rule is more than 700 pages long), (1) an update to the formula DOL uses to set “prevailing wages” under the Davis-Bacon Act and related regulations, (2) enforcement options for DOL to penalize employers for retaliation, and…
Labor Board Maintains Course with Pro-union Agenda
The National Labor Relations Board in 2023 has continued on its pro-union path in all areas of traditional labor law. Many of the NLRB’s actions are the result of the ongoing advice memos which are being issued by General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo. We previously have blogged about some of the advice memo topics, such as…
Teach, Hit the Lab, Grade Some Papers and… Unionize? NLRB Rules That Private University Graduate Students Can Unionize
Are PhD students at a private university who also teach courses and grade papers – tasks that are a part of their development but also certainly assist the university – employees who can unionize? The NLRB said yes for a second time. This trend that allows unionization of employees who were once thought to be…
Holiday Road! DOL Weighs in on Tracking FMLA Time Against Holidays
Tracking intermittent FMLA time — it’s every HR professional’s favorite thing to do. Do you come up with a total number of hours per employee or just count portions of the workweek? What do you do if an employee takes intermittent leave during a holiday week? If you have been wrestling with this issue, the…
Poster Rollercoaster: DOL Changes FLSA Notice Required at Workplaces
All employers subject to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) must post an updated version of the FLSA “Employee Rights” poster to remain compliant with the law.
The FLSA is the Great Depression-era law that requires covered employers to pay minimum wage and overtime to non-exempt employees, among other requirements. In addition to the basic…
DOL Guidance Provides “FAB”ulous Insight as to How the Agency Will Apply the Protections under the FLSA and FMLA to Remote Workers
The United States Department of Labor recently issued Field Assistance Bulletin No. 2023-1 (FAB), which provides guidance to agency officials on a number of telework issues. The FAB addresses (1) paying workers who telework properly under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA); (2) reasonable break time for nursing employees to express milk while teleworking from…
Day Pay Nay for Highly Paid: Supreme Court Weighs in on FLSA Salary Basis for Exemption
In a highly anticipated ruling under the Fair Labor Standards Act, the U.S. Supreme Court in Helix Energy Solutions v. Hewitt held that an employee did not qualify for the highly paid exemption from the FLSA’s overtime pay requirements because he was paid a daily rate and not a guaranteed weekly salary. The Court held…