Rojgar Job News

U.S. Department of Labor Headquarters A federal district court in Texas yesterday struck down (once and for all?) the changes to the overtime rules proposed by the Obama Administration.  Previously, those rules (affecting the white collar exemptions) had been stayed, but the Court’s ruling suggests that there is a fatal flaw to the proposed rules and barred its implementation. In doing so, the Court said that the salary-level test that was proposed was too high to determine which workers were exempt from overtime compensation. Of course, there was little chance that these rules were going to get the go-ahead anyways because the Trump administration has shown no desire to support them either politically or in court.  Indeed, in July, the Department of Labor sought public feedback on ways to revise the proposed rule. The ruling applies to employers nationwide. While you’ll see a round of headlines today about how this is a big decision, it really should come as no su...

Sometime soon, your e-mail inboxes are going to be bombarded from attorneys telling you that you need to pay attention NOW to new overtime rules by the U.S. Department of Labor.  ROFL.   At least based on what we know now, it’s best taking a lesson from my teenagers and ignoring the messages and hype (and all the text abbreviations too.)  SMH.  Late last week, Bloomberg news reported that the DOL is considering changing the rules regarding who is eligible to receive overtime by increasing the salary threshold from about $24,000/year to $35,000. IKR? In plain English, employees who make less than $35,000 would have to be paid overtime on any hours worked over 40 — no matter what their duties are.   MEGO.  If all this sounds vaguely familiar, you may recall that the Obama-era proposed rules were enjoined by a court before implementation and then we had an election.  Those proposed rules would have set the bar even higher to approxim...

Over the weekend, President Trump tweeted out that several prominent “‘Progressive’ Democrat Congresswomen” (who, it shouldn’t have to be said but does, are all American citizens, most of whom were born in the United States) should  “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.” This language has, rightly, been condemned.  But I wondered — what does employment law have to say about this type of language in the private workplace context? Do COURTS conclude that this language can be used to find employment discrimination? As it turns out, courts have quite a bit to say. For example, in Brewster v. City of Poughkeepsie, a District Court refused to overturn a jury verdict against an employer where there was evidence that a similar comment was made to the Plaintiff who was of Cuban national origin. When asked on direct examination if anything was said to her in the station about her race...