labor lawAdivision of labor law center

With the most recent hike in the federal minimum wage from $6.55 to $7.25 per hour, there are now 28 states with the same minimum wage. All of these states share the $7.25 minimum wage rate:  Alaska, Arizona, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Iowa, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

Some of these states, like Hawaii and Kentucky, had already implemented a minimum wage of $7.25. Others, such as Texas, Utah, Maryland and Indiana, adopt the federal minimum wage automatically. In some of those states, the July 2009 increase was relatively minor. The Florida minimum wage, for example, increased from $7.21 to $7.25 per hour while New York and New Jersey increased from $7.15 to $7.25 per hour.

Even such insignificant increases require employers to update their federal and state minimum wage posters, of course.

Four states have minimum wages lower than the federal rate. Kansas has the dubious honor of being the state with the lowest minimum wage at $2.65 per hour – although that rate will change later this year. The others are:

Arkansas                   $6.25

Minnesota                 $6.15

Wyoming                   $5.15

However, those states do not offer the lowest wages. Five states have never passed a minimum wage law: South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and Tennessee. In those states, wages are a private matter between the employer and the employee. Unless the employee is covered by the federal minimum wage law (and most are), the employer can pay any hourly wage he or she likes.

Thirteen states plus the District of Columbia have minimum wages that are higher than the federal rate. The are, in alphabetical order:

California                              $8.00

Colorado                               $7.28

Connecticut                          $8.00

District of Columbia             $8.25

Illinois                                    $8.00

Massachusetts                     $8.00

Michigan                               $7.40

Nevada                                  $7.55

New Mexico                          $7.50 

Ohio                                       $7.30

Oregon                                  $8.40

Rhode Island                        $7.40

Vermont                                $8.06

Washington                          $8.55 

The highest state minimum wage is in Washington, at $8.55 per hour. Oregon is second at $8.40 per hour while Vermont is third with a minimum wage of $8.06 per hour. Those states are likely to remain in the top 3, since each of them implements an annual cost-of-living increase

Illinois, Massachusetts, Connecticut and California are tied in fourth place (more…)

One new 2009 FMLA regulation clarifies the issue of overtime under FMLA. Under the new regulation, when overtime is mandatory, an employee can use their FMLA leave to work only 40 hours per week, provided the FMLA has been approved and all the required paperwork is in place.

However, when overtime is voluntary, if the employee declines, the time does not count as FMLA leave under the 2009 U.S. Department of Labor regulations.

Suppose Susan works in a retail clothing store. She is pregnant, and has been approved for intermittent FMLA leave. During most of the year, overtime is voluntary in the store. In October, Susan’s boss requests that she work 7 hours of overtime during the week. Susan declines. Since the overtime is voluntary, the 7 hours are  not counted towards Susan’s total 12 weeks of FMLA leave.

However, in November and December, overtime is mandatory at the store where Susan works, due to the busy holiday shopping season. All employees are expected to (more…)

A significant change to the FMLA regulations affects how employers must track FMLA leave. This is the fourth in a continuing series of articles on the new FMLA regulations issued by the U.S. Department of Labor, which go into effect  on January 16, 2009.

Under the old regulations, an employer had to track FMLA leave using the shortest period of time that their payroll system could track. If the payroll system rounded to the quarter-hour, the employer was required to permit the employee to use 45 minutes of FMLA leave, or 2.25 hours of FMLA leave, on a particular day.

The new FMLA regulations in their entirety can be found in the 201 pages of the November Federal Register.

Under the 2009 regulations, employers may track FMLA leave using the shortest increment that the employer uses to track other forms of leave, such as (more…)

By some estimates, at least 2 million Americans will become “disabled” – without any change in their medical condition – on January 1, 2009. That’s because many more people are included in the new 2009 EEOC definition of disability than in the past.

According to the EEOC, a number of conditions that have not been considered disabilities in the past, will be disabilities under the law in 2009.

That is important news for employers, who must make reasonable accommodations for disabled workers.

In the past, under old EEOC guidelines, an employee was not considered disabled if they could complete all “major life functions” like grooming and dressing themselves, using a phone book, and using public transportation. If the employee had a condition that “substantially limited” one or more of those major life functions, he or she met the EEOC definition (more…)

On January 16, 2009 the new FMLA regulations issued by the U.S. Department of Labor go into effect. This is the third in a series of articles profiling the most important changes in these regulations.

As every Human Resources pro knows, the FMLA or Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 permits employees to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for a variety of reasons, including baby bonding and the employee’s serious health condition.

One important change affects an employee’s eligibility for FMLA under section 825.110 of the regulations.

Under the FMLA regulations, an employee must work for the employer for 12 continuous months before the employee is eligible for FMLA leave, according to SHRM, the Society of Human Resource Management. However, the period of service does not have to occur immediately before the employee takes FMLA leave. However, under the 2009 regulations, employers are not required to  go back more than 7 years in most cases, (more…)