Inflation Reduction Act
How To Enhance Your Company's Efforts To Recruit A More Diverse Workforce Without Creating Risk of a Successful Legal Challenge
Businesses today are more focused than ever on building a more diverse workforce and inclusive corporate culture. At the same time, management and human resource professionals often worry that their enhanced efforts at diversity and inclusion could draw charges of...
Employer Considerations in Light of Updated CDC Recommendations for Fully Vaccinated People
NOTE: Following this update, the EEOC published revised guidance regarding, among other things, confidentiality status of employee vaccine records. For updated information, please see Bracewell’s alert entitled “EEOC Issues Guidance Confirming Vaccine Incentives are Lawful, Among Other Updates”, which can...
Biden's Selection of Doug Parker as OSHA Head Signals Aggressive Safety and Health Enforcement and Close Collaboration with Organized Labor
On this past Friday, April 9, President Biden announced his intent to nominate Doug Parker, the current chief occupational safety and health regulator in California, to serve as the United States Department of Labor’s Assistant Secretary for Occupational Safety and...
Employment Background Check Class-Action Litigation: Avoiding the Seemingly Minor Mistakes Fueling a Costly Wave of New Lawsuits
Federal courts, most notably the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, have recently taken an increasingly hyper-technical view of employer obligations under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) in conducting applicant background checks, including criminal background checks. The result has been...
Texas Governor Lifts Mask Mandate, but Employers Must Still Comply with the Occupational Safety and Health Act
Yesterday, March 2, 2021, the Governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, issued an order lifting his previously-imposed face covering mandate effective March 10. The order also removes certain other COVID-19 mitigation requirements previously implemented by the Governor. Under his order, the...
Virus Mitigation Steps for Employers Amid OSHA Ramp-Up
Just over a week after President Joe Biden, by executive order, instructed the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to publish revised guidance to employers on worker safety during the COVID-19 pandemic, the agency complied on Jan. 29, with the issuance...
Signaling More Aggressive Enforcement Going Forward, OSHA Issues "Stronger" COVID-19 Guidance For Workplaces
Just eight days after President Biden ordered OSHA to publish “revised guidance to employers on workplace safety during the COVID-19 pandemic,” the agency complied this past Friday, January 29, with the release of a 12-page document which the Department of...
Vaccine Incentives: How Employers Can Encourage Employee Vaccination
As COVID-19 vaccines become available to broader groups during winter and spring 2021, employers are considering how they can encourage employees to get vaccinated. While the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has stated that employers may require that employees get...
Fifth Circuit Sets New Framework for Fair Labor Standards Act Certification Analysis
Yesterday, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit rejected the commonly used and admittedly lenient Lusardi framework for Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) conditional certification and set a new framework for courts to determine whether and to...
EEOC Says Employers May Mandate COVID-19 Vaccinations - Subject to Limitations
With one pharmaceutical company already receiving emergency use authorization for its COVID-19 vaccine, and a second drug maker apparently on the cusp of receiving authorization, employers, eager to return to normal business operations, are considering whether they c an require...
The 2020 Election: Previewing the Potential for Shifts in Labor & Employment Law
As Election Day approaches, employers nationwide consider the changes that may come with a victory by Senator Joseph Biden in the Presidential race and/or shift in representation in the U.S. Senate. While we cannot be certain of what the future...
The COVID-19 Vaccine: An In-Depth Discussion Exploring Emerging Legal Issues for Consideration by Employers
In a time where employers face scrutiny with respect to the obligation to provide a safe working environment, the approval of a COVID-19 vaccine is certain to present employers with difficult decisions regarding workplace policies. Please join partners Becky Baker...
IRS Provides Guidance on Presidential Payroll Tax Deferral
On August 28, 2020, the IRS issued Notice 2020-65 (the “Notice”) to provide guidance with respect to the Memorandum on Deferring Payroll Tax Obligations in Light of the Ongoing COVID-19 Disaster , issued by President Trump to the Secretary of...
The COVID-19 Vaccine: Now Is Time for Employers to Plan for Whether They Can, and Should, Require Employees to Be Vaccinated
A Gallup survey released earlier this month indicates that more than one in three Americans, specifically 35 percent, intend to decline to have any COVID-19 vaccine that ultimately is approved by the FDA — even if offered free of cost...
Religious Education Employers see Two Significant Jurisdictional Decisions in Summer 2020
Educational institutions across the nation are grappling with decisions on returning teachers, staff and administrators to work for the academic year 2020-2021 in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Each institution must consider a myriad of factors to decide when...