labor lawAdivision of labor law center

With the current economic crisis, many employers are considering giving workers additional unpaid time off during the holidays. This includes giving workers Friday, November 28 (the day after Thanksgiving) and/or Friday, December 26 (the day after Christmas) off without pay.

Other employers are considering closing for an entire week between Christmas and New Years.

However, these tactics raise issues around the payment of exempt salaried employees that every employer needs to be aware of. (more…)

Employers should be aware of new regulations imposed by the US Department of Labor affecting permanent labor certification applications by certain employers.

The Labor Department announced in late July that it has begun stricter control of all pending permanent labor certification applications filed by (more…)

Like many states that tie their minimum wage to the federal minimum wage, the Texas minimum wage rose to $6.55 per hour on July 24, 2008. This increase is directly related to the increase in the federal minimum wage as set forth in the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007. This act introduced a series of three increases, each of 70 cents over three years. The third and last increase will occur on July 24, 2009.

The Texas state minimum wage law is tied to the federal minimum. In fact, according to the US Department of Labor, the Texas law doesn’t even mention a dollar amount. Instead, it references the federal minimum wage amount and adopts that wage as its own.

In Texas, employers covered by the primary federal minimum wage statute, the FLSA or Fair Labor Standards Act, are exempt from the Texas state minimum. Companies included under FLSA are those which earn $500,000 or more annually, or which engage in interstate commerce.

The Texas Workforce Commission provides the business publication Texas Business Today. A recent issue of this publication states that in the age of the Internet, it’s nearly impossible for a company not to conduct business across states. Any company that uses the Internet, accepts credit cards or corresponds via email is engaged in interstate commerce, thereby qualifying it as an employer under FLSA.

Texas Payday Law requires employers to pay salaried workers at least twice per month. Other employees must also be paid at least twice a month, and at regular intervals. Employers are also required to display labor law posters informing workers what day they will be paid, and how often.

No overtime law exists on the Texas law books. Employers are required to follow the federal standard of 1.5 times the usual hourly rate for all time over 40 hours worked in one week.

The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs or OFCCP has updated the “Equal Employment Opportunity is The Law” poster required for nearly every employer in the US.

What are the major differences between the new poster and the older version? There are several. But the most important difference is that the EEOC and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs will no longer accept the old version of the poster. Having an old version posted is the same as having no poster on display, to these federal regulatory agencies. So each employer should update his or her poster immediately.

The new EEO or Equal Employment Opportunity poster reflects a number of changes to the law in the past year. These include changes to (more…)

The federal Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs recently updated its regulations regarding veterans. In addition, the agency has created new posting regulations for all employers under the JVA.

The new regulations are a result of the JVA, the Jobs for Veterans Act of 2002, which amended section 4212 of the Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance Act of 1994 or VEVRAA.

The newest JVA regulations apply to employers with 50 or more employees if the employer also has either: (more…)