No. Whether you are entitled to overtime depends on whether you are an exempt or nonexempt employee, not whether you are paid a salary. It is not true that salaried employees are always exempt from overtime and other Industrial Welfare Commission rules. In fact, most...
Employment Law
What actually constitutes harassment in the workplace?
When people think about harassment, it can seem hard to guess what is actually prohibited. Take sexual harassment, for example. Many people fear that asking a co-worker out on a date could constitute sexual harassment. But as long as you accept it if the answer is no,...
AAPI workers and all Asians are protected by state and federal law
In light of recent events and the uptick in anti-Asian bias due to the pandemic, you may wonder what protections the Asian-American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community and others of Asian descent really have. Both California and federal law protect AAPI individuals...
Is discrimination illegal based on any immutable characteristic?
No. It is not true that employers cannot discriminate against people because of any immutable characteristic. In California, the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) lays out a limited number of characteristics that are protected by the law. Federal laws also apply,...
CA Supreme Court: 2018 independent contractor rule is retroactive
In California, it has been hard to tell who is legally considered an independent contractor vs. an employee. The distinction is significant. Independent contractors are not eligible for many workplace protections that employees take for granted, such as: Workers’...
EEOC finds evidence of systemic age discrimination at IBM
It wouldn’t be the first time a big tech company thought it would have a better image if it hired younger workers. It wouldn’t be the first time a company tried to save money by shedding expensive older workers and replacing them with younger, cheaper ones....
Can men be fired for taking paternity leave?
Generally, the answer would seem to be no. However, a recent case cast some doubt on that. Earlier this year, Steven van Soeren, a product designer for Disney, was fired shortly after he took two weeks of paternity leave. Citing examples of anti-parent bias, van...
What are some signs of national origin discrimination?
People from other nations are welcome to work legally in the United States. Nevertheless, some people face job discrimination or harassment based on their national origin or ethnic group. This is illegal. What does national origin discrimination look like? There are...
California gig economy worker? You may be an employee
If you drive with Uber, Lyft or another “gig economy” company, you may not be an independent contractor. Instead, you may legally be an employee of the company you’ve been working with. A California superior court judge has ruled that the contract drivers for Uber and...
More California employee classification challenges for Uber, Lyft
The state of California has been working for several years to ensure that people who drive for Uber, Lyft and other ride-hailing companies are properly classified. There had long been an argument that these drivers, and other workers in the “gig economy,” who pick up...