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What I've Been Reading This Week


Employers Should Reevaluate Their Intern Programs

This is a helpful reminder for employers to reevaluate their intern programs to ensure that there are not any potential legal issues that could arise over the interns claiming they are actually employees and are therefore entitled to compensation.  The article provides a few points that employers should review in order to ensure they are in compliance with unpaid internship laws.  

Should Employers Monitor the Social Media Posts of Its Employees?

This Wall Street Journal article has a mini debate over whether employers should monitor the social media posts of its employees.  Given the increasing number of employees who use FaceBook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest, etc., concerns can arise over what these employees are actually posting.  Employer likely have a reason to be concerned about what the employees are posting, especially if it could impact the company's reputation, finances, etc.  However, it is important that employers do not go on a fishing expedition, combing through its employees' social media posts in the hopes of finding something offensive or that would warrant the employee being fired.


Are Employer Mandated "Anger Management" Sessions Compensable Time?

Bryan Symes has a good note on whether employers are required to compensate employees for time spent at mandatory anger management sessions.  In short, based upon a 2005 case that impacts employers in Wisconsin, Symes states that these mandatory counseling sessions are indeed compensable time for which employees are entitled to be paid.  This is a relatively short, but important note that employers and employees alike should take a few minutes to review.

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NLRB: Discussion Among Employees About Tip Pooling is Protected Concerted Activity

  This Advice Memorandum from the National Labor Relations Board’s Associate General Counsel, Jayme Sophir, addressed whether employees which discussed and complained about tip pooling at work constituted protected concerted activity. In relevant part, an employer in New York operated a chain of steakhouses.  While tip pooling was in place at these steakhouses, some of the employees objected to it on the grounds that it was not transparent and improperly divided tips among the workers.  Employees were told not to complain or talk to each other about the tip pool and were told that doing so would endanger their jobs.  Despite the employer later attempting to provide some clarity as to how the tips were being divided, rancor still existed among some employees.  At one point, the employees were told by a general manager that some employees that had been talking about the tip pool were “cleared out” and the employer would continue to do so. In the Advice Memorandum, it was noted that emplo
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What I’ve Been Reading This Week

A few years ago, I remember when the “Fight for $15” movement was taking off around the country.  Lo and behold, it appears that a $15/hour minimum wage is not the stopping point, which should be no surprise.  As the below article notes, New York is aggressively moving to ramp up hourly wage rates even higher.  While all the  below articles are worth a read, I called particular attention to that one. As always, below are a couple article that caught my eye this week. Disney World Workers Reject Latest Contract Offer Late last week, it was announced that workers at Disney World had rejected the most recent contract offer from the company, calling on their employer to do better.  As Brooks Barnes at The New York Times writes, the unions that represent about 32,000 workers at Disney World reported their members resoundingly rejected the 5 year contract offer which would have seen workers receive a 10% raise and retroactive increased back pay.  While Disney’s offer would have increased pa
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Utah Non-Compete Bill Falters in House

Last month, a non-compete bill sponsored by Representative Brian Greene (Republican from Pleasant Grove) & up for vote in the Utah House failed to make it through the Legislature.  The bill sought to ban enforcement of non-competes if they came after a worker was already employed, given no compensation (such as a bonus or promotion) for signing the non-compete, and laid off within six months.  However, by a 22 - 49 vote, the bill was resoundingly defeated after some business groups lobbied to kill the non-compete bill.  One group in particular, The Free Enterprise Utah coalition, argued that the Utah State Legislature should hold off on any changes to non compete laws in the state until a survey about non competes was done among Utah businesses.  Representative Greene had countered this claim and argued that a survey was not needed to show that the current non compete laws in the states allowed many businesses, including some small high tech companies in the state, to per
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