Insights

April 01, 2022
|
Category: Arbitration and Dispute Resolution

House-Approved Bill Would Ban Use of Employment-Related Pre-Dispute Arbitration Agreements

As expected, Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives have once again approved one of their long-sought legislative priorities, a bill (H.R. 963) to prohibit the use and enforcement of pre-dispute arbitration agreements for a range of disputes, including employment and civil rights claims. Although expectations were high among the bill’s supporters that this time around the bill had a...
Read More
April 01, 2022
|
Category: Discrimination and Harassment

New York Expands Workplace Anti-Retaliation Protection, Creates Complaint Hotline

The state legislature of New York, in response to the sex harassment allegations that led to the resignation of former Governor Andrew Cuomo, has amended its already broad anti-retaliation law to prohibit covered employers from releasing personnel records of an employee who has complained about alleged discriminatory conduct. Senate Bill 5870 became effective immediately upon Governor Kathy Hochul’s signature on...
Read More
April 01, 2022
|
Category: Affirmative Action and Diversity

Latest BLS Disability Employment Data Show Positive Albeit Modest Trend

The Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has published its 2021 report on disability employment in the United States. While the agency’s annual report covers only data at the national level, limiting its overall value for purposes of corporate benchmarking, it does contain several data points that still may be of interest to CWC members. Perhaps most significantly,...
Read More
March 25, 2022
|
Category: Agency Enforcement

OFCCP Once Again Proposing To Revise Its Enforcement Standards

The Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) has published a formal proposal to once again revise the rules the agency follows for resolving alleged material violations discovered during a compliance evaluation. The proposed rule would amend the Enforcement Rule issued by the Trump OFCCP in late 2020 that established a framework regarding how discrimination allegations are...
Read More
March 25, 2022
|
Category: Contingent Workers

Federal Court Rules DOL Acted Unlawfully in Rescinding Trump-Era Independent Contractor Rule

A federal district court ruled recently that the Biden Administration’s Labor Department acted unlawfully when it delayed and later repealed Trump-era regulations governing classification of workers as employees or independent contractors under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The court’s ruling in Coalition for Workforce Innovation v. Walsh effectively reinstates the Trump Administration’s regulatory reforms retroactively. Importantly, the court’s decision...
Read More
March 25, 2022
|
Category: Compensation

New Biden E.O. Instructs Contracting Agencies To Consider Salary History Ban

Last week, as part of the White House commemoration of “Equal Pay Day,” an annual event created by pay equity advocates to draw attention to gender-based pay disparities, President Biden signed a new Executive Order (E.O.) directing federal contracting agencies to consider whether and to what extent federal contractors should be prohibited from considering applicant salary history information as part...
Read More
March 25, 2022
|
Category: Government Contracts

DOL’s Proposed Davis-Bacon Regulatory Revisions Would Benefit Union Construction Contractors

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has proposed a significant overhaul of the regulations implementing the Davis-Bacon Act (DBA) and Davis-Bacon Related Acts for the first time in 40 years. Not surprisingly given President Biden’s frequently expressed desire to be known as the most pro-labor president in history, if implemented, these changes are likely to significantly increase the use of...
Read More
March 18, 2022
|
Category: Affirmative Action and Diversity

New OFCCP Directive Instructs COs To Review Contractors’ “Pay Equity” Analyses

In the first agency directive issued since she was appointed, Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) Director Jenny Yang has instructed OFCCP compliance officers (COs) to collect and analyze federal contractors’ “pay equity audits” during routine compliance evaluations, regardless of whether those studies were conducted with the assistance of in-house or outside counsel under the “attorney-client privilege” or “attorney...
Read More
March 18, 2022
|
Category: Agency Enforcement

EEOC, DOL, NLRB Once Again Promote Their Inter-Agency Anti-Retaliation Initiative

Top officials from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) recently held a second online discussion on their joint, inter-agency initiative to raise awareness about workplace retaliation, particularly with respect to so-called vulnerable populations (i.e., migrant workers, workers with limited-English proficiency, and low-wage workers). The February 24...
Read More

Categories

Talk with an EASI Consultant.

Get in Touch

Talk with an EASI Consultant.

Get in Touch