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Farmers Fear Immigration Raids Also

April 26, 2017 | by Nassiri Law

Since President Donald Trump has assumed office, he has followed through on his controversial plan to deport as many undocumented immigrants from the country as possible. While he stressed that it would only be criminals who would be deported, the relatively loose definition of what a criminal is in terms of undocumented immigration is causing more deportations and more worry in the immigrant community that many thought would be the case.

However, it is not only the workers and their families who fear an immigration crackdown, according to a recent news report from the Los Angeles Daily News. Farmers are very worried by the immigration raids, because they rely on immigrant workers to harvest their crops. It is not just an issue of pay. As it turns out, Americans have very little interest in picking fruit and vegetables, even when they are being paid more than minimum wage. Continue Reading ›

New Report Discusses Hotel Worker Exploitation

April 22, 2017 | by Nassiri Law

Whenever we go on a vacation and stay in a hotel, one of the benefits is that we don’t have to do any housekeeping while we are away. You can leave your room a mess and come back that evening, and everything will be neat and clean, just as when you first arrived. While we know this isn’t magic, not everyone pays all that much attention to the many hardworking housekeepers that help make the trip more pleasant.

Unfortunately, as discussed in a recent news article from the New York Times, a new report details a great deal of exploitation by unscrupulous employers against these dedicated individuals in the hotel and hospitality industry. Continue Reading ›

GM to Hire More Workers for Self-Driving Car Program

April 18, 2017 | by Nassiri Law

While we may never see a flying car, as many science fiction movies of the 80’s and 90’s liked to feature, it seems that self-driving cars are going to be on the roads in large numbers in the relatively near future. There are already some models on the road, like the ones made by Tesla, but these electric cars are technically not self-driving cars, but rely on an advanced guided cruise control system. In other words, they make driving easier, but a human driver still needs to be behind the wheel paying attention.

However, there are true self-driving cars in the works. Google seems the closest, with a system that will allow an occupant to simply program the car’s destination, and the vehicle takes over and does all of the work. They have even tested one with a blind operator sitting in the driver’s seat. This would obviously be a great help to those who are blind or unable to drive based upon a disability. Continue Reading ›

“Ban the Box” Laws Advancing Across the Country

April 13, 2017 | by Nassiri Law

For anyone who has ever been convicted of a felony, even if they have done their time or finished probation so they are not long “on papers,” they know just how difficult it can be to a get a job. This is a problem for convicted workers in need of a job, but it is also a problem for society.

The reason it has become increasingly clear that banning convicted felons from working is problematic is that a lack of employment opportunities is one of the biggest contributors to recidivism. How can we expect most of the people who are released from prison to stay on the straight and narrow and not commit any future crimes if they have no means of supporting themselves or their families? Even public assistance may not be an option, because many state and federal programs across the nation ban convicted felons. Continue Reading ›

Report: Employment Lawsuits Likely to Rise Under Trump

March 15, 2017 | by Nassiri Law

Employment lawsuits have been on the rise for the last several years, with complaints ranging from sexual harassment to wage-and-hour disputes. Some of these cases have involved massive settlement agreements. It’s likely this trend will continue, though the success could be curbed if the new U.S. Supreme Court justice swings the court toward decisions that tend to favor arbitration agreements and the prohibition of class action employment lawsuits.

As The Associated Press recently reported, the SCOTUS recently accepted review of three cases that center on the viability of arbitration agreements in workplace disputes. Such agreements require workers to use a private arbitrator to resolve grievances, rather than avail themselves of the courts.

The question is whether this deprives workers of due process. Private arbitrators tend to come down on the side of the business, and even those cases decided in favor of the worker tend to result in modest awards in comparison to what they might receive if they had prevailed in court. Plus, arbitrators don’t have to follow the law and proceedings aren’t public, which can strip the employer of any real incentive to change the underlying offensive action in the future. Continue Reading ›

Court: California Doesn’t Require Companies to List PTO on Regular Paychecks

November 17, 2016 | by Nassiri Law

Businesses in California don’t have keep a running tally of paid time off or vacation hours accrued on worker paychecks or wage statements, according to a new state appeals court ruling.

In Soto v. Motel 6 Operating, L.P., plaintiff alleged employer violated California Labor Code section 226, subdivision (a), by not including the monetary amount of vacation pay/ PTO on employees’ wage statements. A three-judge panel for California’s Fourth Appellate District disagreed, affirming the lower court’s ruling in favor of the company after it was sued by a former worker in 2015.

Plaintiff worked for the hotel chain for almost three years, from 2012 to 2015. A few months after she left the company, she brought a representative Private Attorney General Act of 2004 (PAGA) action for a violation of the aforementioned statute. The law says, in part, that every employer shall on a semimonthly basis at the time of payment of wages give each employee an accurate, itemized statement that shows in writing:

Gross wages earned;
Total hours worked (except those based on salary who are exempt from overtime);
Number of piece-rate units earned;
All deductions;
Net wages earned;
Inclusive dates of the period for which employee is paid;
The name of employee and last four digits of his/her social security number with wage statements that set forth “all vacation and PTO wages accrued during the applicable pay period.”

Lawsuit Against Yahoo for Employment Discrimination

October 18, 2016 | by Nassiri Law

According to a recent news article from the Silicon Valley Business Journal, a former media executive for tech giant Yahoo has filed an employment lawsuit in federal court claiming that he was wrongfully terminated and discriminated against by the company’s policies put in place by their CEO.

Specifically, this employee claims that after he was employed for three years as an editorial director at the company’s California location, he was wrongfully terminated in 2015. He said his termination was the result of a company-wide employee review policy that was consisted of intentional gender discrimination as well as a desire to save money by reducing the amount of money it spent on employee wages and salaries. After the current CEO was hired, she created a new quarterly review process to evaluate the performance of all key employees and make necessary changes in personnel based upon the result of these reviews. It was after one of the reviews that the employee who filed this was lawsuit was terminated. Continue Reading ›

Great Falls Clinic LLP v. Eighth Judicial Dist. Court: Employment Discrimination Cases

October 12, 2016 | by Nassiri Law

In Great Falls Clinic LLP v. Eighth Judicial Dist. Court, plaintiff was offered a position by the defendant and she accepted her offer of employment. After accepting the employment offer but before starting work, the employer rescinded their offer of employment and said they were no longer interested in employing plaintiff. This was not an oral offer and acceptance as employee had signed a written contract agreeing to work for employer.

Following their refusal to employ plaintiff, she filed a lawsuit claiming wrongful termination and a violation of the Wrongful Discharge of Employment Act, which is a local law applicable in this particular jurisdiction in which plaintiff and defendant were situated. This was a case based upon the theory of promissory estoppel, breach of contract, and breach of the relevant labor law. Continue Reading ›

Lord v. High Voltage Software, Inc.: Sexual Harassment at the Workplace

October 9, 2016 | by Nassiri Law

Lord v. High Voltage Software, Inc., a case from the Untied States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit involved an employee who claimed he was terminated after he filed a complaint for sexual harassment by a co-worker, which if true would be illegal retaliation. He also claimed his employer created a hostile work environment which is also violation of local and federal labor regulations.

In this case, employee worked for a software firm that designed video games. He began working there in 2006 and was assigned to what was known as the “Omni team” since all employees were assigned to a team when hired and them moved around from time to time based upon the employee’s relative skill and the needs of the company. In his complaint, claimant asserted that the year after he was employed, other male employees began to tease him by discussing the fact that they believed he was attracted to a particular female employee. Continue Reading ›

California State Legislature to Bar Prospective Employers from Running Applicant’s Juvenile Record

October 3, 2016 | by Nassiri Law

There is no question that having a criminal record can make it hard to get a job. Even if it is not an outright bar to employment, you will often find that when two similarly qualified people apply for a single position, and one of the applicants has a criminal record, and the other does not, the prospective employee with a clean record tends to get hired over the other.

With a felony conviction it can be extremely difficult to get a job, and this makes things even tougher for someone who is making an honest effort to rehabilitate him or herself. With a misdemeanor conviction, it easier to get a job, but not if the misdemeanor conviction is related to theft or a misdemeanor sex offense which is often seen as particularly bad by prospective employers who are constantly worried about being sued for creating a hostile work environment. Continue Reading ›