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Each year, HR Hero surveys readers about your organizations’ benefits packages. Because 2010’s health care reform laws created sweeping changes in how businesses offer health insurance to workers, this year our January survey focused only on health insurance and health care reform. According to the survey, an overwhelming majority (96.46%) of you work for organizations […]
By Steven L. Brenneman and Brian J. Kurtz Ford and Harrison The day after the Chicago Bears’ agonizing loss (note, this is written by Illinois attorneys) to the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Championship, John Stone decided to show off his Packers pride at work. Stone was a salesman at Webb Chevrolet in Oak […]
Yesterday, in Thompson v. North American Stainlessi LP, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an employee-friendly ruling in a third-party (or associational) retaliation case. The Court unanimously held that a man who was fired after his fiancée filed a gender discrimination charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) could sue for retaliation under Title VII […]
On Wednesday, January 19, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act (H.R. 2), a largely symbolic bill that would repeal the health care reform legislation enacted last year, in a 245-189 vote. The new legislation, backed unanimously by House Republicans, would repeal the Patient Protection and Affordable Care […]
Wednesday, in NASA v. Nelson, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously held that the government didn’t violate federal contract employees’ constitutional rights by using certain background investigations. In this case, contract employees at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory sued NASA, alleging that the background checks it was using violated their constitutional rights to informational privacy. The background […]
Yesterday, in one of its first rulings of 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously held that medical residents are considered employees when it comes to social security taxes. In Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research v. United States, Mayo challenged regulations issued by the Treasury Department that clarify what types of students are not […]
An agency Web chat hosted by the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) Wage and Hour Division (WHD) on Thursday, January 6, provided expected dates for proposed regulations on record-keeping under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). A Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on the “Right to Know Under the Fair Labor Standards Act” initiative is expected […]
by Timothy D. Edwards On January 1, 2011, new rules for the discovery (pretrial exchange of evidence) of electronically stored information went into effect in Wisconsin. One of the most significant changes is a “meet-and-confer” provision requiring the parties to address issues pertaining to electronically stored information early in the litigation. Back in April 2010, […]
On Wednesday, January 5, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) hosted a live Q&A Web chat to answer questions about its Fall 2010 Regulatory Agenda. The assistant secretary of labor for OSHA, Dr. David Michaels, started the session by listing some of OSHA’s 2010 achievements. He noted that the agency: published final rules/interim final […]
Tuesday, January 4, the Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) hosted a live Q&A Web chat to discuss its regulatory priorities for the next several months and to answer questions. Phyllis Borzi, assistant secretary for EBSA, started the session by stating that the focus of the chat would be on EBSA’s pension initiatives that appear in […]