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Pay Equity Laws are a Growing Trend Among States Generally, in the United States, your employer must pay the same compensation — including wages/salary, benefits and bonuses — for the same work regardless of gender, race, age, religion, sexual orientation, national origin, marital status, veteran status, disability or other protected characteristics. These general protections for equal pay are provided by federal law. In order to strengthen protection for workers, most states have enacted “equal pay”…
Illegal Wage Theft: Four Common Schemes Illegal wage theft happens when employees do not get ALL of their earned wages. As reported in Teen Vogue and GQ Magazine, studies have shown that millions of workers suffer some form of wage theft every year. A 2017 study estimated the number to be 2.4 million workers for a total loss of $8 billion in worker wages every year, and that study evaluated wage theft in only…
Wage theft by employers is illegal. Wage theft is prohibited by federal law and several states have enacted additional state laws that are designed to further prevent and stop wage theft. Employers can and are punished for engaging in wage theft, even if the wage theft is “accidental.” Wage theft is illegal in all 50 states under federal law. Illinois Wage Law Increases Punishment for Wage Theft Recently, various states across the country (Virginia…
Overtime Pay is Generally Required Under federal labor laws, most employees are entitled to be paid the federal minimum wage (which is currently $7.25 an hour). Furthermore, most employees are entitled to be paid overtime when they work more than 40 hours in a week (your employer cannot avoid paying overtime by merely paying workers a salary). The overtime rate is equal to time and one-half the regular rate of pay. Most state and…
Calculating Overtime Pay If you received any sort of bonus payment from your employer, it is possible that your employer failed to pay you the correct amount of overtime. It is common for employers to incorrectly calculate an employee’s rate of pay for purposes of calculating overtime pay. When calculating an employee’s overtime rate, all compensation (e.g. bonuses, commission payments, reimbursements, inventive payments, pier diems, and any other type of compensation) generally must…
What is a Private Right of Action? A “private right of action” is a legal term meaning that an individual rather than a governmental agency has the right to bring a lawsuit to prosecute and punish violation of rights conferred by a statute. Having a private right of action is important to workers. It means that an employee can sue his or her employer directly for wage and hour violations. For example, if your employer…
Calculating Overtime Pay – “Reimbursements” Under federal labor laws, workers are entitled to receive overtime pay of “time-and-a-half” for any overtime hours they work (i.e. hours over 40 in a week). Calculating overtime pay is based on the employee’s regular rate of pay. Sometimes, the overtime rate calculation is straightforward. For example, if an employee is paid $10 an hour, then the employee must be paid overtime at $15 per hour for all hours after…
Calculating Overtime Pay The federal Department of Labor (“DOL”) recently issued a letter providing guidance for employers with respect to calculating overtime payments. Generally, federal law requires time-and-a-half for any hours worked beyond 40 hours in a seven-day workweek. But calculating what is owed for overtime pay can be complicated because an employee might have different pay rates for the hours worked and tips, service charges, automatic gratuities, and reimbursements might need to be included.…
Gig Workers Employees Win Again Gig workers won another major victory, this time in the United Kingdom. As discussed in a prior post, courts across the United States are finding that gig workers are “employees” and are not independent contractors. Similar to these recent rulings from courts across the United States, the UK Supreme Court recently issued a ruling holding that gig workers—Uber drivers—are “workers,” and are not “contract workers,” under UK labor laws.…
“Good Faith” Defense to Wage and Overtime Claims All employees have a right to be paid for the work they do and are entitled to the protections of all state and federal labor laws. For example, employers must pay the prevailing minimum wage, must pay overtime when required and must pay the correct overtime rate. If you think that your employer is violating your rights as an employee, you should contact a worker’s rights…