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News Notes: Workplace Deaths Are Down, But Homicides Rose In 2000

Data just released by the U.S. Labor Department show that in 2000 the annual fatality rate for U.S. workplaces dropped 2% to 5,195, an all-time low since the agency began keeping fatality statistics nearly a decade ago. However, while workplace deaths for white and black workers declined, fatality rates increased sharply for Hispanic workers, with […]

Non-Fed Government Plans Can Remove ERISA Promises from Reform’s Denial Notices

Non-federal governmental plans may omit language describing how participants can seek remedies under ERISA in notices to be given when the plan makes an adverse decision. Notices of adverse benefit determinations are required as part of health reform’s claims appeal and external review rules. Such plans need not include the language because ERISA remedies are […]

Wage And Hour: Workers Charge Employer Didn’t Calculate Overtime Correctly; Helpful Pointers

Calculating overtime is usually a straightforward process of multiplying the worker’s regular hourly rate by one and a half. However, a recent Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals case illustrates that the computation is more complex if you pay an employee a flat rate per day. That’s because you need to figure out what the hourly […]

Holidays PTO Survey: How Sick Leave May Be Used

Sick days may be used by employees to care for (check all that apply):   Dependent Child Parent Other Exempt Employees 418 (92%) 356 (78.4%) 249 (54.8%) Nonexempt Employees 408 (89.9%) 345 (76%) 238 (52.4%)   Previous       Next

Health Reform Action to Correct 30-hour week Unlikely Before 2015

Congressional aides from both chambers of Congress and both parties said they do not expect immediate action on changing health care reform’s 30-hour a week definition of a full-time workers, or on banning “skinny” health plans that do not cover major categories of health benefits. The staffers predicted that even if enrollment is lower than […]

Do Interns Crash the Learned House of Geeks?

It’s hard to believe that the “wedding crashers” would be allowed to crash into the citadel of Internet security and secrecy, that house of learned geeks—the Google campus! A new movie, “The Internship,” starring Will Farrell, Vince Vaughn, and Owen Wilson, was rumored to be filming in Silicon Valley.   And yes, these 40-ish guys are […]

News Notes: EDD Rescinds New Pregnancy Disability Policy

Last month we reported that the California Employment Development Department announced it would pay maternity disability benefits only for the time period a woman is actually disabled from working rather than for the four weeks before childbirth and six weeks after (or eight for a cesarean). The agency has now abruptly reversed itself-and reinstated the […]