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Employment Law

A new year, a new anti-harassment initiative

01/04/2018

The #MeToo movement is expanding, and employers have a new worry: A group of wealthy Hollywood stars, producers, directors, writers and agents have added #TIMESUP to the anti-sexual harassment social media conversation. Employers are the target.

Austin sued by employee spurned after fire merger

01/03/2018

The former president of the union that represented employees of Travis County Emergency Services District 4 is suing the city of Austin and its fire chief over Austin’s refusal to hire him following the merger of ESD4 and the Austin Fire Department.

Acting fast to stop harassment brings quick end to lawsuit

01/03/2018

Employers that take prompt action after learning about sexual harassment generally won’t be held liable, as long as the harassment actually stops.

Training may be nonexempt even for exempt staff

01/03/2018

Do you offer an extended training period for newly hired workers who will be performing high-skill, exempt administrative jobs? If so, you may have to treat them as hourly workers during the training period when they are not actually performing work, but learning how to do their new jobs.

Employee’s lack of records won’t get pay lawsuit tossed, so make sure yours are accurate

01/03/2018

Workers who claim they should have been paid overtime don’t have to come forward with detailed pay records to move the case into discovery. That’s because record keeping is the employer’s responsibility under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Arbitration won’t work on wage claims if agreements are too one-sided

01/03/2018

If you structure an arbitration agreement so it takes away too many employee rights, you may find yourself in federal court anyway—first to litigate the validity of the agreement and then to try the case. 

Court OKs double trouble in pay bias case

01/03/2018

A federal court hearing a case brought by the EEOC against a Texas county has allowed an alleged victim of discrimination to add additional charges in an Equal Pay Act case the EEOC is already litigating. As a practical matter, that means the employer will have to fight even more attorneys while defending its pay practices.

Title VII doesn’t cover sexual orientation

01/03/2018

A federal court has dismissed a lawsuit alleging a hostile work environment based on sexual orientation, despite the EEOC’s position that sexual orientation discrimination is sex discrimination under Title VII.

Kaplan named NLRB chair

01/03/2018

President Trump has appointed Marvin E. Kaplan to succeed Philip Miscimarra as chair of the National Labor Relations Board.

Snapshot: Sex discrimination comes in many forms

01/03/2018

A substantial percentage of working women say they have experienced gender-based bias in a variety of ways.