There are many aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact that are unprecedented in modern history. One thing that isn’t so new is the tendency for people to seek a scapegoat. During the Black Plague of the 1300s, many blamed Jews. When cholera broke out in the U.S. during the 1800s,…
Claims for pregnancy discrimination are spiking across the country, according to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Last year, the agency filed 3,000 claims of pregnancy discrimination nationally. More than $22 million in payouts for those claims were ultimately paid, which is a more than 30 percent increase in the…
California staffing agencies can be held liable for workplace discrimination. However, in a recent decision of Duckworth et al. v. Tri-Modal Distribution Services Inc., a state appellate court ruled the staffing agency was not liable for alleged racial discrimination of two black employees who weren’t promoted. The court held that…
As employers throughout California are tackling unprecedented challenges brought about by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, it’s inevitable that mistakes will be made. However, employers would do well not to exacerbate their financial woes by erring when it comes to employee pay, sick leave and wrongful termination. Outlined here are…
The COVID-19 pandemic has raised a host of questions for employees and employers about what the wage and hour rules are for things like paid sick leave, reporting time pay, predictive scheduling and reimbursement for reasonable business expenditures. The pandemic has left the California and U.S. economies in a free…
Freelance journalists may soon be exempted from the controversial Assembly Bill 5, which went into effect Jan. 1st. The new law codified the California Supreme Court’s ruling in the Dynamex case, which established an “ABC test” for ascertaining whether workers are misclassified as independent contractors when in fact they should…
The 1963 Equal Pay Act mandates that employers must provide equal pay for equal work. The express purpose was to eliminate the practice of paying women less simply because of their gender. The law does allow employers to offer an affirmative defense to the law if they can show that…
A number of civil rights and employment lawsuits filed over the last handful of years have accused fashion industry powerhouses of discriminating against workers on the basis of race. Among them, two employees at high-end retail shops in California say they were treated poorly by management because of their race, and…
A recently-filed California workplace discrimination lawsuit alleges a former supervisor at Amazon ordered an employee to scour the social media platforms of job applicants, looking for information on their gender, ethnicity and race. When the employee raised concern about this (as well as the fact that she reportedly earned significantly…
Discrimination in the hiring process has long been problematic in California workplaces. Allowing personal biases of employers and supervisors to play a role in who gets the job and who doesn’t is extremely problematic when the effect is systematic discrimination against applicants on the basis of their race, religion, age,…