Client Alert
April, 2019
EEOC Collection Of Employer Pay Data On Target For September
Questions?
Contact Attorney Jim Sherman in our Minneapolis office at (952)746-1600 or by email
By: James B. Sherman, Esq.
In 2016, under the Obama administration, the EEOC significantly revised its EEO-1 report to require that covered entities - private employers with 100 or more employees, or federal contractors with at least 50 employees - begin to report how much they pay workers, broken down between sex, race and ethnicity. The stated rationale for this change was to enable the EEOC to root out pay gaps presumed to exist between genders, races, and ethnic groups. Employers and eventually, the Trump administration, opposed the measure as being overly burdensome; however, those efforts were eventually unsuccessful in court. Therefore, barring further intervention from the courts it is no longer a question of whether employers must begin to provide payroll data to the federal government's EEOC, but when and how. These questions have now been answered, at least for now. On April 25 th, a federal judge in Washington, D.C. ordered that covered employers have until September 30, 2019 to comply with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's (EEOC) revised EEO-1 reporting requirements.

Arbitration Agreements and Class Action Litigation
By Alan E. Seneczko, Esq.
It has now become almost axiomatic that any given alleged violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act - calculation of the overtime rate, rounding procedures, travel time, exempt status, etc., can, and most certainly will, become the basis for a class action lawsuit, since a violation toward the one generally involves a violation toward the many (surely there is a Latin phrase for this).

In response to such actions, and litigation in general, it is also becoming increasingly common for employers to require employees to enter into arbitration agreements as a condition of employment, under which employees agree to resolve alleged violations of employment law through arbitration and not in the courts - including claims of alleged "class" violations. Not surprisingly, such agreements themselves have, in turn, also become the source of litigation - and multiple decisions from the US Supreme Court, most recently in Lamps Plus, Inc. v. Frank Varela, Case No. 17-988 (April 24, 2019).

Seneczko, Alan
Questions?
Contact Attorney Al Seneczko in our Oconomowoc office at (262)560-9696 or by email
Indiana Supreme Court Decides Driver is an Independent Contractor
By Nancy E. Joerg, Esq.
Applying the very strict "ABC test" defining independent contractor status under Indiana's unemployment insurance law, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled that a company (Q.D.-A.) did not misclassify its driver as an independent contractor. Q.D.-A. was found not to be the employer of the driver in question. Therefore, Q.D.-A. did not owe the Indiana Department of Workforce Development any back unemployment insurance taxes
.
INDIANA SUPREME COURT FOUND THAT Q.D.-A. PROVED ALL THREE PARTS OF ABC TEST: In a unanimous decision, the Indiana Supreme Court determined that Q.D.-A. (a company that matches drivers with businesses needing large vehicles, like RVs, delivered to them) successfully proved all three parts of the ABC test to convince the Indiana Supreme Court that the driver (performing services for Q.D.-A.) was not an employee of Q.D.-A. for purposes of the Indiana Unemployment Compensation Act. Q.D.-A, Inc. v. Indiana Dep't of Workforce Dev., No. 19S-EX-43 (Jan. 23, 2019).

Questions?
Contact Attorney Nancy Joerg in our St. Charles office at (630) 377-1554 or by email at najoerg@wesselssherman.com
EEOC Charges At 12-Year Low
By Walter J. Liszka, Esq.
Workers filed 8,000 fewer charges in Fiscal Year 2018 (October 1, 2017 through September 30, 2018) when the EEOC took in 76,418 charges. This total is the lowest since Fiscal 2006 when the agency took in a little under 76,000 charges.

The "breakdown of charges" is as follows:

  • Approximately 39,000 charges alleging retaliation;
  • 24,600 charges alleging sex and/or disability and/or race-based discrimination;
  • 7,600 sexual harassment complaints;
  • 16,900 age-based complaints;
  • 7,100 National Origin Complaints
  • 3,160 Complaints of Color Discrimination; and
  • 2,859 claims of Religious Discrimination;
  • 1,066 claims of Sex-Based Pay Discrimination under the Equal Pay Act;
  • 220 claims under the Genetic Information Non-Discrimination Act (The Act blocks Employers from Discriminating against Workers Based on their own or their families Genetic Information)
Questions?
Contact Attorney Walter Liszka in our Chicago office at (312) 629-9300 or by email
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The attorneys of Wessels Sherman have the superior experience, knowledge and leadership to aggressively represent your business nationwide, including St. Charles, Chicago and Cook County, Illinois; Oconomowoc, Wisconsin; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Davenport, Iowa and the entire Quad Cities area.  

Editors:
CLIENT ALERT Editor-in-Chief........Walter J. Liszka
Minnesota.........................................James B. Sherman
Wisconsin.........................................Alan E. Seneczko
Iowa.................................................Joseph H. Laverty
Illinois...............................................Nancy E. Joerg  
The Client Alert is a complimentary newsletter published periodically for clients and friends of Wessels Sherman. We reserve the right to limit distribution of our materials to representatives of management. The materials in this newsletter have been abridged from a variety of sources and are not necessarily applicable to a particular situation. The contents of this mailing should not be construed as legal advice. State laws vary. Readers should consult with legal counsel before taking any action on matters covered by this mailing.