In May of this year, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reached a $100,000 settlement agreement in a gender discrimination case against a Florida insurance broker. Why? The company revoked a woman’s job offer “20 minutes after she asked her would-be supervisor about its maternity policy.” Citing an “urgent” need to have someone in the position “long term,” the company…
NEW YORK, July 5, 2017 /PRNewswire/ —Continued collaboration between lawyers at the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), and Legal Services of Central New York (LSCNY) resulted in a significant victory for youth incarcerated in Syracuse, New York’s Justice Center jail. A settlement with the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office and Syracuse City School District put an end to the Center’s use of 23-hour-per-day solitary confinement for juveniles. The settlement is…
New York City workers and employee advocates cheered as the city last week passed legislation designed to protect some of its most vulnerable workers. After being approved by the City Council on May 24, Mayor Bill de Blasio signed the Fair Work Week legislative package into law on May 30, 2017, stating that “thousands of people are going to gain…
America’s population is aging. As people age, their mental faculties can diminish. They can become isolated, dependent, and frightened. Seniors who accumulated wealth over their lifetimes become attractive targets for unscrupulous people who prey on their vulnerabilities. It generally begins rather simply. A senior citizen with limited investment knowledge and/or limited English skills opens a brokerage account and deposits some…
The fact that women, and black and Hispanic employees of all genders, continue to be paid less for the same work is gaining increasing national attention and is the focus of a variety of new laws, regulations, and lawsuits.[1] Evidence of Continuing Pay Disparities Data from the census show that large racial and gender pay disparities remain in the U.S.…
On May 15, 2017, the Freelance Isn’t Free Act went into effect in New York City, providing freelance workers with a statutory basis to recover in court for late or unpaid wages, retaliation, or other violations of the Act. Subject to a few exceptions, the Act applies to any individual (regardless of immigration status) who is hired as an independent…
Finance professionals, executives, salespeople, pharmaceutical professionals, information technology professionals, and others today face an increased number of employer-issued restrictions on their right to continue working after they leave their job. For employees, these provisions, often called “non-competes” can have devastating consequences. Read to the letter, these provisions may purport to stop employees from working in the same field or with…
The Supreme Court handed a major victory to voting rights plaintiffs on May 22, with a decision that struck down the boundaries of two congressional districts in North Carolina as impermissibly effecting race discrimination. Cooper v. Harris, with a majority decision written by Justice Kagan, takes aim at the practice of diluting the power of minority voters by “packing” them into concentrated voting districts.…
The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Bank of America v. City of Miami (decided the same day as a companion case, Wells Fargo & Co. et al. v. City of Miami, Florida) has been declared a mixed bag by many legal commentators. While the Court confirmed years of precedence in finding that cities, like Miami, have standing to sue under the Fair…
Medicare Advantage, or Medicare Part C, is a government-funded healthcare program that contracts with private health insurers in order to provide Medicare benefits to Americans over the age of 65. The program covers about 18 million seniors. The private insurance companies, or Medicare Advantage Organizations, submit bids to CMS offering to insure members at a specified rate. The Government pays…