Many employers in Utah use non-competition agreements to protect their confidential information, customer relationships and investment in employee training and development. In a somewhat surprising move, the usually employer-friendly Utah State legislature has signaled its willingness to join California and a handful of other states in attempting to regulate these kinds of agreements.

The Utah…

As colleges and universities begin new terms, not all students are returning to the classroom.  Some students are headed into the “real world,” to work alongside corporate titans, small-business owners, or moms and pops in their shops, while receiving academic credit—and not wages—for their efforts.  These students are applying the lessons learned in their prior studies to real-world scenarios to gain valuable experience, build their skills, and make connections to help them succeed upon graduating.  Or at least they should be.  If they are instead used merely as a source of labor, they must be paid.  But many employers mistakenly assume that because these students are getting school credit, they need not be paid.  That is a trap into which employers reading this blog will not fall.

The Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) and state laws require employers to pay all employees for work performed.  If students who participate in unpaid internships with private employers do not qualify as “employees,” they need not be paid.  Whether those students qualify as “employees” depends on several factors, but the general rule is that these programs are lawful as long as the student, not the employer, is the primary beneficiary of the internship program.Continue Reading It’s a Trap!  Students Receiving Credit Need Not Be Paid? 

Employers with 100 or more employees take note: a major new reporting requirement may be coming your way next year.

On January 29, 2016, President Obama announced that beginning in September 2017, employers  with 100 or more employees must report the earnings and hours worked for all of their employees.  That’s right.  Employers must disclose compensation information for all employees, including executives – which many employers consider to be highly confidential – to the EEOC.

Employers will be required to disclose this compensation data as a new category on the EEO-1 report, which employers already provide to the federal government and which contains workforce data sorted by race, ethnicity, gender, and job category.  Specifically, the “revised EEO-1 will collect aggregate W-2 data in 12 pay bands for the 10 EEO-1 job categories” already used.  The EEOC noted that it does not intend to require employers to track hours worked by salaried employees, but that it is seeking input on the issue.Continue Reading EEOC Promotes Gender Equality by Imposing Another Burden on Employers

Now that the calendar has turned to 2016, this is a good time for employers in California to ensure that they are up to speed on the new laws that took effect on January 1.  Here are some of the highlights.

SB 358 (Gender Wage Differential)

Existing law already prohibits employers from paying women less…

A number of recent legal changes will have a notable impact on employee benefits law both now and in the future.  Some of the most significant of those changes are the U.S. Supreme Court’s same-sex marriage decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, and the expansion of Title VII’s discrimination protections to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (“LGBT”) individuals by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) and some federal courts.

Same-Sex Marriage:  Windsor and Obergefell v. Hodges

In the 2013 Windsor decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the federal government must recognize same-sex marriages for purposes of federal law.  After Windsor, the federal government issued guidance that it would look to the law of the state where the same-sex couple was married (state of celebration), rather than to the state law where the couple lived (state of residence), in most instances under federal law to determine if the same-sex couple was validly married.  On June 26, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court held, in a 5-4 decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, that state laws banning same-sex marriage are unconstitutional, and mandated that states both permit same-sex couples to marry and recognize same-sex marriages lawfully performed in other states.  As a result of Obergefell, the “state of celebration” test for determining whether to recognize a same-sex couple’s marriage is no longer relevant under federal law.
Continue Reading Developments in Employee Benefits Law: Same-Sex Marriage and Title VII’s Protection for LGBT Employees

The IRS issued key extensions to looming 2016 information reporting deadlines for applicable large employers. This relief applies only to the deadlines for reporting the coverage that employers offered in 2015:

  • The deadline for providing employee statements is extended to March 31, 2016 (from February 1, 2016).
  • The deadline for filing 1094-Cs and 1095-Cs with

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In DIRECTV, Inc. v. Imburgia, a decision released this week, the United States Supreme Court rejected the California Court of Appeal’s interpretation of a binding arbitration provision that would have rendered unenforceable a class arbitration waiver provision.  In doing this, the Supreme Court once again affirmed the primacy of the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”) and the invalidity of  attempts by state courts to limit the enforceability of class arbitration waiver provisions.

DIRECTV involved a claim by consumers that DIRECTV’s early termination fees violate California law.  The service agreement at issue in the action provided that any claims would be resolved by binding arbitration.  The agreement contained a class arbitration waiver but provided that if the “laws of your state” made the waiver unenforceable, then the entire arbitration provision “is unenforceable.”  The lawsuit was filed in 2008, prior to the United States Supreme Court’s 2011 decision in AT&T Mobility, LLC v. Concepcion holding that the FAA preempted California case law deeming class arbitration waiver provisions unenforceable.Continue Reading United States Supreme Court Once Again Rejects California’s Attempt To Void Class Arbitration Waivers

Stoel Rives labor and employment attorney Adam Belzberg and water resources attorney Wes Miliband were quoted in a Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) article titled “California Drought Has Wide-Ranging Effects in Business Community.” The article examines the effects of California’s long-lasting drought on the state’s job market, specifically on the agricultural and…