Effective March 13, 2024, the salary threshold for certain exemptions under Article 6 of the New York Labor Law (NYLL) will increase from $900 to $1,300 per week. By way of background, Article 6 of the NYLL sets forth employer obligations with respect to pay practices in New York, many of which afford certain wage
Wage and Hour
New York makes wage theft a crime
Over the past decade-plus, New York lawmakers have passed several laws intended to combat perceived wage theft across the Empire State. On September 6, 2023, lawmakers in Albany continued this trend by passing a bill that codifies wage theft as criminal larceny.
Specifically, the bill adds a new subsection to the New York Penal Law’s…
U.S. Department of Labor’s prevailing wage rate rule impacts over one million workers and $200 billion in projects
On August 8, 2023, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) announced a final rule that will change the prevailing wage rate landscape for employers on construction projects backed by federal funds (the Rule). The Rule updates regulations to the Davis-Bacon Act and related acts (the Acts) to change the way that prevailing wage rates are…
U.S. Department of Labor clarifies how to calculate FMLA leave over holidays
In an opinion letter published this week, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (“DOL”) clarified how employers should calculate an employee’s Family and Medical Leave Act (“FMLA”) leave entitlement when the leave is taken during a week that includes a holiday.
The FMLA regulations are clear that when an employee takes a…
Reminder to New York City employers: The city’s wage transparency law goes into effect November 1, 2022
As we previously reported, effective tomorrow (November 1, 2022), New York City law will require that virtually all internal and external job postings include the minimum and maximum salary/wage rate that the employer in “good faith” believes it is willing to pay for the advertised job, promotion, or transfer opportunity. The New…
Pennsylvania on the path to increase threshold for tipped employees (part 2)
In our original post, we reviewed the Pennsylvania Independent Regulatory Review Commission (IRRC) approval of proposed new regulations by Governor Tom Wolf’s administration concerning tipped employees.
Since then, the Pennsylvania Attorney General completed its review and approved the regulation. The regulation will go into effect on August 5, 2022. Below is a review of…
Pennsylvania on the path to increase threshold for tipped employees
In November 2021, Governor Tom Wolf’s administration proposed a new regulation that will require tipped employees to earn at least $135 a month in tips before an employer is permitted to pay the $2.83 per hour tipped rate, rather than state’s minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Currently, in Pennsylvania, employers can pay tipped employees…
U.S. Department of Labor finalizes rule creating a new “reality” for classifying independent contractors
As we previously reported, this past September the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) proposed a new rule that would create a uniform approach to the way companies classify workers as independent contractors or employees under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). More specifically, in the proposed rule, the DOL adopted the “economic reality” test,…
COVID-19 FAQs for California employers
The worldwide COVID-19 pandemic has had, and will continue to have, a substantial impact on the U.S. workplace. We have prepared a series of FAQs compiled based on some of the more common questions that clients with California-based employees have posed to us over roughly the past six weeks.
These FAQs are general and high-level…
California leads the way in passing landmark legislation to classify gig workers as employees
As we have previously reported here, California Assembly Bill 5 (the bill) is slated to codify the California Supreme Court’s 2018 landmark decision in Dynamex Operations West v. Superior Court of Los Angeles, requiring companies to apply the “ABC” test in classifying their workers. The ABC test requires that workers be considered “employees” instead of “independent contractors” if their work is part of the employer’s regular business, or if the employer exercises control over how its workers complete their jobs.
Yesterday, the California Senate approved the bill as currently drafted and returned it to the State Assembly, as a matter of formality, where it is expected to be approved. The bill received much opposition from various gig-economy companies despite Governor Gavin Newsom’s endorsement. Once the Assembly passes the bill, Governor Newsom is expected to sign it into law, with an effective date of January 1, 2020. The bill will apply to many workers previously classified as independent contractors, and will apply to app-based companies operating in the gig-economy space, which will notably transform the gig economy in California.
In recent months, the bill was amended to include various carveouts for approximately 50 industries, including salon workers, insurance agents, doctors, lawyers, accountants, and securities brokers.
Notably absent from the current form of the bill is an exclusion for gig-economy workers. App-based companies have traditionally operated on a business model that touts the flexibility of the independent contractor model, which has been embraced by many gig workers, notwithstanding the lack of legal protections afforded to employees in the areas of earnings and benefits. However, if the bill is signed into law in its current form, gig-economy workers will be considered employees entitled to labor protections, which will likely increase the amount of wages and benefits such workers currently earn.
It is anticipated that the bill will have far-reaching consequences in California, affecting approximately 1 million workers previously classified as independent contractors and companies whose business models are based on utilizing independent contractors, who tend to be less expensive than employees. Once the bill is signed into law, most workers will likely need to be classified as employees entitled to minimum wage, overtime, and unemployment benefits. These newly classified employees may also gain the right to join a labor union.
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