Employers often pay their employees on a fixed weekly or monthly salary on the mistaken belief that it covers all overtime hours worked by their employees. However, starting in 2013, the law is clear that salaries do not cover overtime wages. And, all overtime wages will be calculated on the legal hourly rate based on…
Continue reading ›A.B. 2617, proposed by Assemblywoman Shirley Weber, D-San Diego, and signed by Governor Brown on Sept. 30, bars people from being forced to waive civil rights protections as a condition of entering into a contract for the provision of goods or services, including the right to file a civil action with the attorney general, the…
Continue reading ›Early Saturday morning, the California Legislature voted to significantly expand working Californians’ access to paid time off for illness. Gov. Jerry Brown was sent AB 1522, which he applauded. AB 1522 enacts the Healthy Workplaces, Healthy Families Act of 2014. The Act requires most employers in the state to give workers at least three paid…
Continue reading ›One common way for an employer to avoid having to pay overtime wages and employment taxes is to misclassify an employee as an independent contractor. An independent contractor does not have the same rights and protections that are afforded to an employee. Thus, it is very tempting for an employer to classify its employees as…
Continue reading ›On June 12, 2014, the Fourth District Court of Appeal ruled that an employee who was constructively discharged for complaining about sexual harassment can maintain a common law wrongful termination action, even if the employer has a workforce of fewer than five and is immune from most claims under the Fair Employment and Housing Act…
Continue reading ›A proposed regulation which would permit certain H-4 spouses of H-1B visa holders to apply for Employment Authorization Documents (EADs) was published on May 12, 2014 by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Unfortunately not all H-4 spouses will be eligible for an EAD. The proposed regulation limits EADs to H-4 spouses where the H-1B…
Continue reading ›Employers should be reminded that starting on July 1, 2014, the California minimum wage will be $9.00. This affects not only all minimum wage earners, but also executive and administrative overtime exempt employees. One of the factors that determines whether an employee is exempt from the laws requiring overtime wages is whether they are paid…
Continue reading ›On March 26, 2014, the First District Court of Appeal in Lewis v. City of Benicia, No. A134078, _ Cal. App. 4th _ (1st Dist. Mar. 26, 2014) held in its published decision that a jury had reasonable basis to conclude that a supervisor engaged in a pervasive pattern of same-sex harassing conduct. Such conduct…
Continue reading ›The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently announced that it a sufficient number of H-1B petitions to reach the statutory cap of 65,000 visas for fiscal year (FY) 2015 has been received. It has also received more than the limit of 20,000 H-1B petitions filed under the advanced degree exemption. U.S. businesses use the…
Continue reading ›Employers and Employees should be reminded that the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) will begin accepting H-1B petitions that are subject to the FY 2015 numerical limitation (the “cap”) on April 1, 2014, for employment with a start date of October 1, 2014 or later. The H-1B numerical cap is limited to 65,000 visas…
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