Articles by PC Editorial Staff

On July 17th, 2023, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) announced a final rule requiring electronic injury and illness reporting by specific employers in designated high-hazard industries. The final rule affects injury and illness data that OSHA already requires these employers to keep. Meanwhile, OSHA also announced a National Emphasis Program (NEP) focused on preventing c...

This month, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission extended the 2022 EEO-1 Component 1 or EEO-1 reporting deadline to a tentative date in Fall 2023. The EEOC previously announced it would begin accepting EEO-1 reports in mid-July. However, this deadline now extends past the summer. Thus, employers have a little more time to prepare for filing ahead of an official deadline. The EEOC us...

Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL’s) Wage and Hour Division (WHD) announced it is seeking claimants for a case settlement of over $5.6 million for illegal employee misclassification. The DOL is seeking out over 1,300 affected current and former employees as claimants in the settlement. In October 2022, the DOL proposed an independent contractor rule that would apply a six-...

Recently, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released a policy statement addressing the use of consumer biometric information and its potential to harm consumers and violate the Federal Trade Commission Act (FTC Act). The policy statement also discussed related technologies that collect such information from consumers and included those powered by machine learning. Overall, the guidance covers ...

On July 1st, 2023, several California local minimum wage increases went into effect. As of January 2023, the California state minimum wage rate is $15.50 for all employers. However, many cities and counties within the state have set a higher minimum wage rate for employers within their jurisdiction. Additionally, other states had minimum wage increases that went into effect on July 1. Businesse...

This month, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) announced that a construction contractor in American Samoa must pay over $1 million in new penalties for failing to provide adequate fall protection. In fact, since 2018, OSHA has cited the same contractor with 22 serious violations, including willful and repeated violations, in 26 separate inspections. Similar to the recent v...

The U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) recently ruled on the standard for undue hardship in a religious accommodation case. In a unanimous decision, SCOTUS stated that “showing more than a de minimis cost” does not suffice to establish undue hardship under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII). Title VII left it to the court to specifically define undue hardship. In brief, the recent d...

Recently, a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) administrative law judge (ALJ) issued a decision stating that adverse employment action taken against an employee for legitimate business reasons does not violate the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) even if the employer violated the NLRA elsewhere. Briefly, the employee had engaged in protected concerted activity in discussing wages with cow...

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) recently announced that an owner of a roofing business in Maine is personally liable for nearly $1.6 million when they willfully exposed workers to fall hazards resulting in a fatality. Before the fatal incident and subsequent inspections, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) had cited the owner for violations at least five times beginning ...

As the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) took effect today, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) began accepting charges under the law and issued guidance on pregnancy accommodations in the workplace. In brief, the PWFA requires covered employers to provide reasonable accommodations to an employee or applicant based on their pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical condit...