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Southern California Permanente Medical Group revoked Jerold Friedman’s computer-related employment offer after he refused a required mumps immunization because the vaccine was grown in a chicken embryo. Friedman sued for religious discrimination, claiming the employer conditioned his employment on something that violated his vegan religious belief that it was immoral to kill and exploit animals, […]
Each January, HR Hero conducts an online survey about health insurance and retirement benefits offered by our readers’ organizations. Most of the questions are similar each year and provide a good comparison to previous years. The one thing that changes is the essay question. And this year, boy did we hit a nerve with that […]
In critical HR discussions with employees, some of your managers will do best working from a script. When it comes to HR-related actions, do your line managers suffer from “wingtip in mouth disease?” You know the symptoms: They over-promise or ask inappropriate or even illegal questions during job interviews. Their performance appraisal meetings with employees […]
Because an employer health plan gave a full and fair review resulting in a reasonable benefits decision, a federal court upheld the plan’s lifetime limit on obesity services and its prohibition on payments to treat complications from earlier gastric bypass surgeries. The plan also weathered an allegation that it was not properly segregating plan funds. […]
One of the factors often cited as contributing to racial and gender disparities in the workplace is discrimination in the hiring process. This could come in the form of explicit discrimination against women or people of color by a hiring manager.
Of all class and collective actions filed in 2010 claiming employment law violations, 91 percent involved federal and/or state wage and hour claims, according to the law firm Littler Mendelson LLC. Federal and state wage and hour class and collective actions filed during the 2010 calendar year totaled about 3,785 nationwide, according to data collected […]
Employers likely will need to continue to pay close attention to how their individual states’ approach to same-sex marriage will affect their employee benefit plans, regardless of President Obama’s newly articulated support for it. The president on May 9 said that he supports same-sex marriage, but also that the states should be able to decide […]
By Stephen D. Bruce, PHR Editor, HR Daily Advisor Just My E-pinion Our recent column featuring a question about amnesty for illegal immigrants generated responses from many readers, most of whom voted (or railed) against amnesty. [Go here to read the original column.] The original questioner/writer had low-level positions to fill. No one with a […]
There has been a 20% increase in the number of companies blocking employees from using social networking sites. The percentage increases in 2009 vs. 2008 of companies banning web sites by specific categories include: social networking sites, 20%; travel-related sites, 28%; restaurant/bar websites, 27%; sports-related sites, 26%; shopping sites, 26%; job search sites, 19%; and […]
The California Department of Insurance has approved a 10.1% hike in the average workers’ compensation pure premium rates. The increase takes effect July 1, 2002, and follows on the heels of a 10.2% increase that took effect in January 2002. Although the pure premium rate is only advisory and insurers aren’t required to follow the […]