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The Employer Handbook Blog
Articles Posted in Wage and Hour
In the Third Circuit, willful FLSA violations are as common as spotting a unicorn sliding down a rainbow into a leprechaun’s pot of gold as pigs fly by.
If an employer violates the Fair Labor Standards Act, like by not paying overtime, the plaintiff(s) can generally recover two years of unpaid overtime for the two years preceding the lawsuit. Those plaintiffs may also recover liquidated damages equal to the unpaid overtime.
So, if an employer owes $100 in overtime, the total bill with liquidated damages would be $200.
However, if the employer willfully violates the FLSA, then the damages increase. That’s because the lookback period for a willful violation becomes three years.
But, what makes a violation willful? Yesterday, the Third Circuit helped answer that question. Continue reading
Hear that? It’s the fat lady singing about the U.S. Department of Labor’s proposed OT rules.
Yesterday, a Texas federal judge killed ’em dead. Continue reading
If you own a restaurant, and pay servers more than minimum wage, can you keep customer tips?
A few years back, some progressive (?) restaurants around the country made headlines by paying their waitstaff more than minimum wage and putting the kibosh on customer tips.
This broke with the traditional way of paying customarily-tipped employees in scratch offs and iced animal crackers. That is, most employers would pay the minimum-required cash wage of $2.13 under the Fair Labor Standards Act (unless your state requires a higher minimum wage) and use customer tips as a credit against the $7.25/hr. minimum wage obligation to the employee. This is known as, you guessed it, the tip credit. Continue reading
All I can think about is that scene from Rounders. You know the one…
I see your lawsuit and raise you a contempt motion!
(It sounded baller in my head. But, seeing it in print, not so much.)
Although that .gif…
Continue reading
Here’s how the federal overtime rules are starting to take shape for your workplace
Last week, the U.S. Department of Labor asked for public comment on how to refresh the existing overtime rules under the Fair Labor Standards Act. Since it’s Monday, your eyes are probably bleary from all that’s been written about the DOL overtime rules, and it’s Monday, allow me to spoon feed you the latest… Continue reading
Sex talk workers should get minimum wage too, say sex talk workers
Look. It’s the Friday before a four-day holiday weekend. I need all the clicks I can get.
And, somehow, I need to explain to IT how searching Google Images for “sex talk” serves a business purpose. Wait! I’ll just tell ’em it’s all for the readers. Now, if only one of you would back me up.
[insert tumbleweed]
The public gets to beat the dead horse of the DOL overtime rules together, and other wage and hour news
Want to weigh in on the U.S. Department of Labor‘s proposed overtime rules? Well, now you’ll get that chance.
Again. Continue reading
Bah Gawd! DOJ turns face and will support class-action waivers in Supreme Court battle
Consider this my attempt at “Serenity now” after chaperoning eight kids eight and younger at a Philadelphia Phillies game on Saturday. With a rain delay. And the tiny dancer featured above. Fortunately, we left the ballpark with all of the kids. I think.
Hopefully, my oldest son, Brooks, enjoyed his birthday.