The Laboring Oar Blog
Visit the Full BlogThe Laboring Oar® is Greenberg Glusker's employment blog that provides the latest employment and labor law trends and updates to help clients remain informed in an ever-changing, dynamic world.
New Season Springs More Layoffs: What Employers Should Know
Spring has sprung. Unfortunately, for many employers, however, the new season is not marked by its characteristic hope and promise. Employers have been hit hard by decreased revenues, funding cuts, and increased costs. Last month, Los Angeles city officials thought the elimination of thousands of positions might be “inevitable." As...
Three Things Employers Should Know Now
California employers face new compliance updates in 2025, including the expiration of most COVID-19 prevention regulations, a mandatory whistleblower notice posting, and an updated state withholding allowance certificate—here’s what you need to know. 1. OSHA’s COVID-19 Prevention Non-Emergency Regulations Have (Mostly) Ended. The days of notifying employees they were a...
Free-lancing or Fee-lancing? How to Keep Penalty-Free With Your Freelancers Under New California Law
The Freelance Worker Protection Act , which takes effect on January 1, 2025, sets minimum requirements for hiring independent contractors in California. Under the Act, a hiring party engaging a freelance worker for services totaling $250 or more (either at one time or over an aggregated 120-day lookback) must...
Summer Brings A Rise in Minimum Wages Along With Rising Temperatures
On July 1, 2024, a number of local governments throughout California will raise their minimum wage. In the City of Los Angeles, the minimum wage will rise from $16.78/hour to $17.28/hour ($20.32/hour for hotel employees at hotels with 60 or more guest rooms). The new rate for employees in...
Has the New FTC Non-Compete Ban Been Banned? Employers Consider Options After Legal Challenges to FTC Rule
As was widely published last week, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) issued its long-awaited Final Rule which prohibits employers from entering into non-compete agreements with employees with limited exceptions. The next day, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, along with several smaller Texas-based organizations, filed a lawsuit in the 5...
California Relaxes COVID-19 Isolation and Testing Guidelines
Acknowledging that we are now at “a different point in time with reduced impacts from COVID-19 compared to previous years,” the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) has updated its COVID-19 isolation guidelines in an effort to minimize workplace disruption when a person tests positive for the virus. Under...
Valentine’s Day Reminder – California Employer Edition
Yes, this is a reminder that Valentine’s Day is coming up. In addition to making dinner reservations and buying loved ones flowers, California employers have the added responsibility of complying with the newly enacted Business & Professions Code Section 16600.1 which says, among other things: For current employees, and for...
New Year, New Form for Non-Exempt Employees
We hope that your new year is off to a wonderful start! If one of your resolutions is to make sure your employment forms are up to date, our first Laboring Oar newsletter of 2024 will help you achieve that goal. (If only all our resolutions were so easy.) As we...
Protected Paid Sick Leave Increases to Five Days Per Year Under California State Law
With the stated purpose of encouraging sick employees to stay home to stop the spread of COVID and other contagious diseases in the workplace, California Governor Newsom signed SB 616, expanding the state’s Healthy Workplaces, Healthy Families Act of 2016 to increase the guaranteed number of paid sick days...
California Employers Prohibited from Discriminating Against Applicants and Employees for Off-Duty Cannabis Use
Governor Newsom signed AB 2188, which amends the state’s Fair Employment and Housing Act (“FEHA”) to prohibit discrimination based on off-the-job cannabis use. AB 2188 prohibits most employers from discriminating against a person in hiring, termination, or setting conditions of employment if the discrimination is based on either: Cannabis...
Employee bonuses in California: An essential guide for HR professionals
Offering bonuses to California employees is more complex than one might think. I presented on the topic of employee bonuses during my August HR Bites series of employment law-related discussions, during which I touched on the role and implementation of signing bonuses, relocation bonuses, retention bonuses, and incentive pay...
Local Minimum Wage Increases Along With Summer Temperatures
Local Minimum Wage Increases Go Into Effect on July 1, 2023 On July 1, 2023, a number of local governments throughout California will raise their minimum wage. In the City of Los Angeles, the new rate is $16.78/hour ($19.73/hour for hotel employees at hotels with 60 or more guest...
Employer Resources for Workplace Mental Health Issues
Both during the height of the Covid pandemic and now in the aftermath, employers are increasingly reaching out to our Employment Group about employees who are demonstrating or reporting mental health problems. While some of these reports come with medically certified diagnoses, many do not, but all require a...
The DHS Presses “Pause” on I-9 Remote Controls: How Employers Should Navigate the End of the Road for Remote Verification of Employee Eligibility
Historically, employers were legally required to conduct an in-person inspection of I-9 Section 2 documents (e.g., an employee’s passport, driver’s license, and/or social security card) to verify an employee’s identity and eligibility to work in the United States. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its shelter-in-place mandate, on March...
Changes to COVID Isolation Requirements
For several years, California’s COVID isolation guidelines have played a key role in “stopping the spread” in the workplace by requiring contagious employees to isolate at home. As of March 13, 2023, the California Department of Public Health has revised those guidelines . In alignment with CDC Recommendations for Isolation and...
One Step Forward For Arbitration Agreements, Two Steps Back For Non-Disparagement Provisions
Mandatory Arbitration Agreements for Employees Are “On” Again...for Now. Once upon a time, before a certain virus captured all of our attention, the California legislature enacted Assembly Bill 51 (AB 51), which prohibits employers from requiring employees to consent to mandatory arbitration agreements as a condition of employment. Many employers...
Processing employees' Data Access Requests ("DARs") under the CCPA
Brief Background On January 1, 2023 , the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 ("CCPA") became applicable to the personal information of employees, job applicants, subcontractors, contractors, and others in work roles who are California residents ("Employee Personal Information"). Since it went into effect on January 1, 2020, the...
Should Interns be Paid or Unpaid?
I recently shared commentary with SHRM regarding unpaid internships, including the legal considerations that employers should keep in mind. When are internships allowed to be unpaid and when they must be paid? The short answer is that so long as an intern is properly classified under the law as...
Out With the Old, In With the New: Employment Law Updates in 2023
With 2023 here, it’s time for employers to comply with new California labor laws. Below is a highlight reel of these changes. What’s in a Name? Turns Out, Not Much: The Department of Fair Employment and Housing is Renamed the Civil Rights Department Effective July 1, 2022, the California...
Employers Feel the Heat from Summer Legal Updates — Minimum Wage Increases, Arbitration Enforcement, and New COVID Safety Definitions
Local Minimum Wage Increases Go Into Effect on July 1, 2022 On July 1, 2022, a number of local governments throughout California will raise their minimum wage. In the City of Los Angeles, the new rate is $16.04/hour ($18.17/hour for hotel employees at hotels with 150 or more guest...
DIR Issues FAQ’s to Give Employers the ABC’s Re: the ETS
If you are trying to fight off the effects of COVID-19 variants in the workplace, the Department of Industrial Relations (“DIR”) has offered up a bit of alphabet soup in the form of updated ETS FAQ’s, more formally known as Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s) regarding Revised COVID-19 Prevention Emergency...
“Can I Keep Working from Home?” – Handling Increased Employee Requests to Telework in the Post-Pandemic Return to the Workplace
As mask mandates have been lifted and COVID-19 infection rates go down, many businesses are using this as an opportunity to welcome employees back to their workplaces. It is expected, and we have already seen, that there will be pushback from employees who would like to continue a hybrid...
Cal/OSHA Revises and Readopts the COVID-19 Emergency Temporary Standards for the Third Time
The California Occupational Safety & Health Standards (Cal/OSHA) Board recently voted to revise and readopt the COVID-19 emergency temporary standards (ETS) for the third time. The third revised ETS is expected to take effect the first week of May and will remain in place until December 31, 2022. The changes...
Reminder: CalSavers Compliance Deadline on June 30, 2022 for Employers with 5-50 Employees
The deadline for California employers with between 5-50 employees to either register for, or opt out of, the CalSavers Retirement Savings Program is quickly approaching. As we explained in a previous blog post , CalSavers is a new, automatic enrollment payroll deduction IRA program, designed to expand access to...
The Feds Say Me Too! In Limiting the Use of Employment Arbitration Agreements
California courts and legislature have been pummeling employers’ ability to require comprehensive arbitration agreements. Well, the federal government has now joined in. In an astounding rare example of legislative bipartisanship, both Congress and the Senate approved the passing of the federal Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment...
Vaxxed and Unmasked in Los Angeles County
In light of the decreasing rates of COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations, Los Angeles County is relaxing its current mask mandate. Pursuant to the revised Los Angeles County Department of Public Health Order (the “Revised Order”), effective at 12:01 am on Friday, February 25, 2022, businesses may elect to allow workers...
A New Variant of California COVID-19 Supplemental Paid Sick Leave Law Emerges — What Employers Need to Know
On February 9, 2022, Governor Newsom signed Senate Bill No. 114, California’s 2022 COVID-19 supplemental paid sick leave law. Under the new law, employers with 26 or more employees are obligated to provide up to 80 hours of supplemental paid sick leave for qualifying COVID-19 related reasons (“2022 SPSL&rdquo...
New COVID Guidelines Unmasked, But Employers Are Still Subject to Cal/OSHA and Local Orders
Yesterday, the California Department of Public Health (“CDPH”) issued a new “ Guidance for the Use of Face Masks .” The new Guidance, which goes into effect at the state level on February 16, 2022, limits the settings in which universal masking will be required and also relaxes mask requirements...
Employers’ Struggles with Religious & Disability Accommodations from COVID-related Policies
The science, guidance, and regulations related to workplace safety policies for the COVID-19 pandemic are constantly changing (goodbye federal vaccine mandate!). As employers struggle to keep up, they are confronted with the decision of what safety policies to adopt, including, for many, whether to require their employees be vaccinated against...
SCOTUS Blocks OSHA ETS
On January 13, 2022, the Supreme Court of the United States blocked the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) from taking effect for the foreseeable future. The ETS required employers with 100 or more employees to implement a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination or weekly testing policy...
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