The Employer Handbook

Articles Posted in Pregnancy

by
people-2574169_640

Image by StockSnap from Pixabay

It’s bad enough when a federal judge refers to a plaintiff-employee’s behavior towards her manager as “harassing, stalking, disturbing, and menacing.” And, I apologize that I didn’t have enough room in the title of this blog post to mention the plaintiff’s profanity and fighting at work, or her arrests for drunk driving and drug possession.

So, you’d think that the plaintiff would cut and run after the district court dismissed her claims for pregnancy, sex, race, and religious discrimination claims. But, the plaintiff who referred to herself at work as “crazy” and “psycho” decided to appeal to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.

And how do you think that went for the plaintiff? Continue reading

by

Nursing area sign

Pete unseth [CC BY-SA]

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) requires employers with 50 or more employees to provide new moms with reasonable break time and a private place to pump breastmilk.

Well, not all new moms; just the non-exempt workers; i.e., the overtime-eligible employees. But, new bipartisan legislation proposed last week in the Senate will change all that. Continue reading

by
Tommy-Boy-Screenshot-1024x541

Image Credit: Tommy Boy (screenshot from Vimeo.com)

Last week, I wavered about whether to include a line from Tommy Boy in a brief that I was drafting:

“I tell ya what. If you don’t know how to fasten your seatbelt, just raise your hand and I’ll have Tommy Boy here come back there and hit you in the head with a tack hammer.”

Ultimately, I decided that it was bad form. One could reasonably construe my use of that quote as antagonizing and bit snarky. Moi?!?

So, I’m using it for this blog post instead. Continue reading

by
Manolo Blahnik on Whitney Port Shankbone 2009 Tribeca.jpg

By David Shankbone – Own work, CC BY 3.0, Link

Yesterday’s post was all about the breadth of the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA). We addressed a situation in which a plaintiff alleged that her employer fired her for seeking an abortion. The court concluded that, if true, the employer’s actions would have violated the PDA.

(The employer ultimately prevailed on the PDA claim because it had a non-discriminatory reason for firing the plaintiff.)

Today, let’s shift focus to accommodations under the PDA. Continue reading

by

A Louisiana woman claimed that, back in September 2017, she told her employer that she had become pregnant and that she was planning on having an abortion. The woman then alleged that, during her time off from work, the company violated the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) by firing her.

Let’s assume that the company did fire her for getting an abortion. Does that violate the PDA? Continue reading

by
pregnant-1245703_640

Image Credit: Pixabay.com

Every so often — not, “if I had a nickel” often, but every once in a while — someone hits me up for my two cents on firing an employee who is on FMLA or some other form of protected leave for [fill in the reason]. Continue reading

by
bookcase-335850_640

Image Credit: Pixabay.com (https://pixabay.com/en/bookcase-law-firm-attorney-335850/)

I don’t know how else to describe it.

So, I’m going to quote from the EEOC’s press release, but I’ll conceal the name of the law firm. The law firm that paid $30,000 to settle with the EEOC:

Continue reading

“Doing What’s Right – Not Just What’s Legal”