On June 10, 2021, OSHA released a long-awaited new Emergency Temporary Standard (“ETS”), which establishes new mandatory workplace safety requirements for employers providing healthcare services or healthcare support services. The ETS aims to protect employees from exposure to COVID-19 in the workplace by requiring the following:

• a COVID-19 plan based on an assessment of COVID-19 hazards;
• patient screening;
• transmission-based precautions;
• continued personal protective equipment (PPE) usage;
• social distancing while indoors;
• proper cleaning and disinfecting ...

Last week a federal judge in Washington, D.C. directed the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to revisit its regulations governing employee wellness programs but did not vacate the regulations.  The court noted that striking down the regulations until they could be revised may have significant disruptive consequences and it assumed that the EEOC could address the failings it identified in short order.  Nonetheless, the decision not to stay implementation or vacate the regulations creates confusion for employer wellness programs.

The EEOCs wellness regulations took ...

The Minnesota unemployment law generally provides that employees terminated through no fault of their own are entitled to benefits.  Individuals who voluntarily quit ...

The holiday season picks up in full swing this week with the celebration of Thanksgiving. Along with the merriment of the holiday season, though, comes a dramatic drop in productivity and a rise in vacations, flu epidemics, religious celebrations, weather contingencies, employee reviews, and holiday party antics. Here are answers to some of the vexing employment law questions that typically become as ubiquitous at this time of year as snowflakes in Minnesota:

• Are employees entitled to time-and-a-half pay for holidays worked?  No unless time worked on a holiday includes overtime ...

On June 15, 2015, the Colorado Supreme Court held that an employer was permitted to discharge an employee due to his licensed medical use of marijuana at home during nonworking hours. In the case, Coats v. Dish Network, the employee had worked for the employer for three years before he tested ...

On Monday a federal jury in California awarded $185 million to a former AutoZone store manager who alleged that throughout her employment she had been discriminated against, demoted, and ultimately terminated because of her gender and in retaliation for complaining about discrimination. Rosario Juarez worked at an AutoZone retail store in San Diego from 2000 to 2008. Although she received promotions and advanced in positions within the store, these allegedly occurred only after she raised complaints about disparate treatment of women employees. 

After Juarez informed the ...

I love wellness programs. I am a sucker for discounts of any sort, and I especially like the idea of rewarding healthy behavior. My bicycle has a tag that logs my work commute when I pass the electronic stations throughout the Twin Cities, and I smile every time I hear its gratifying beep.

So, I understand why employers like wellness programs. What's not to like about incentivizing healthy lifestyle changes while also lowering health insurance costs, decreasing absenteeism, and increasing productivity? As is so often the case, however, the devil is in the details.  If wellness ...

Dust off your handbooks and rethink your employment policies the EEOC has just announced some significant changes in how it is going to investigate and litigate pregnancy discrimination claims.

In its first comprehensive pregnancy guidance update in thirty years, the EEOC issued new pregnancy discrimination guidance in mid-July. The updated guidance is effective immediately, superseding the prior guidance and addressing the application of many laws passed since 1983 - including the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the 1993 Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) - to ...

Minnesota recently became the 22nd state to legalize medical marijuana use and, as part of the new law, to enact new potential employment protections for registered users of medical marijuana. Minnesota's new marijuana law has already gone into effect, but distribution of marijuana for medical purposes is not expected until July 1, 2015. Employers should use this extra time to familiarize themselves with Minnesota's new law and its potential implications. While the new Minnesota law purports to impose some new employment law obligations on employers, it also raises many ...

New federal and state laws are continuing to impact our relationship with technology and online resources.  This was recently illustrated by the roll out of web-based health insurance exchanges under the federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The roll out did not go smoothly, and the news was filled with stories of technological glitches and errors that, to some extent, took center stage over the continued partisan split over the substance of the law. At the state level, California passed a law that gives people under the age of eighteen the right to have personal ...

 Health Exchange Notice Due to Employees by October 1

What is the exchange notice?

Last week, I presented an employment law update at my firms annual Health Law Institute.  While the presentation was aimed at employers in the health care industry, it also involved a review of recent state and federal law developments that affect all employers.  I knew the audience would be looking for practical take-aways, so I put together a checklist of employer to-do items in light of the recent developments.   I thought the readers of this blog might appreciate a list too.  So here are some important employment law compliance to-do items:

     1.  Post the new FMLA poster, update your FMLA ...

The Obama Administration announced on the afternoon of July 2 that it would not penalize employers that do not provide health insurance in 2014. The Affordable Care Act initially required that all employers with more than 50 employees provide coverage to workers or pay significant fines, beginning in 2014. The Treasury Department now says that it will postpone its implementation until 2015, largely due to employers' concerns. Stay tuned for more specifics as the Treasury Department clarifies this and as employers figure out what this means for them going forward.

For an E-Benefits ...

The Minnesota Legislature is in full swing, and as always, employers will want to monitor the proposals under consideration at the Capitol. Bills that may impact employers include:

• Health Insurance Exchange. Governor Dayton has just signed legislation creating Minnesota's health insurance exchange, which is a significant part of the federal health insurance overhaul.

• Minimum Wage Increase. Lawmakers appear to be moving forward with House and Senate bills that would increase Minnesota's minimum wage for most employees to $9.95 or tie the required wage to inflation. Currently ...

• The Society of Human Resource Management provides a brief summary of the decision on its Web site.
• Kaiser Permanente (the largest medical provider network in the country) has a helpful summary (aimed at consumers) at After The Ruling: A Consumers Guide.
• Other sites are providing relevant analysis such as the Minneapolis/St ...

One can hardly turn on the news without seeing coverage of the stand-off in Madison, Wisconsin between Governor Walker and union protesters over the Governors proposal to require government workers to contribute more to their health care and pension costs and to largely eliminate their collective bargaining rights. Many protesters who called in sick to attend the protest rallies were allegedly able to obtain sick notes from doctors who were providing sick notes at the protest rallies without any medical examination. This raises an interesting questionwhat is an employer to do when ...