On February 6, Representative Natalie Manley filed House Bill 4699 with the Illinois House of Representatives. If enacted, the bill would amend the Illinois Freedom to Work Act (“IFWA”) with respect to the legality of non-compete agreements. Currently, under the IFWA, employers are prohibited from entering into non-compete agreements with low-wage employees. Low-wage employees are those whose earnings do not exceed the greater of either the minimum hourly rate or $13.00 per hour. HB4699 would…

Transparency and communication are cornerstones of a successful relationship—and the employment relationship is no exception.  The California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) came into effect on January 1, 2020, bestowing two landmark rights on California employees, applicants, contractors, emergency contacts, and dependents: (1) the right to notice about what personal information an employer collects and the purpose of collection; and (2) the right to sue with statutory damages if sensitive data is compromised.…

On January 21, 2020, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy signed Senate Bill 3170 (the “amendments” or “NJ WARN Act”) into law making New Jersey the first state in the nation to require severance pay for mass layoffs.  The law, scheduled to go into effect on July 19, 2020, will make it dramatically more expensive for companies to conduct a large scale reduction in force in New Jersey.…

As class actions brought under Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act (“BIPA”) proceed through litigation, defendants have made a variety of arguments attempting to push courts to define the limits of the somewhat vague statute. The Illinois Supreme Court’s 2019 decision in Rosenbach v. Six Flags Entertainment Corp. was the first opinion to provide interpretive guidance of BIPA, and specifically, what type of injury is required for a person to have standing to bring a private…

This article originally appeared on Law360 on January 27, 2020. The current National Labor Relations Board was extremely kind to employers during 2019, issuing a multitude of precedent-setting decisions and new rules that reversed many of the excesses of the Obama board and returned the National Labor Relations Act to its more neutral legislative intent. The board’s current composition will change this coming August when member Marvin Kaplan’s term expires. But with the Republicans in…

A new change to California’s Civil Discovery Act has all of the trappings of a burdensome and costly requirement for employer defendants litigating in California state court. In addition to a litany of new California employment laws discussed in prior blog posts, Governor Gavin Newsom also signed into law SB 370, which became effective on January 1, 2020. SB 370 now requires the producing party in a civil litigation to identify the specific…

In a case of first impression, the New Jersey Appellate Division determined that employers in the state must reimburse employees for medical cannabis following a workplace accident, despite federal prohibitions against cannabis distribution.  The January 13, 2020 decision in Hager v. M&K Construction, Case No. A-0102-18T3, is the first time a court in the state has required reimbursement for a cannabis prescription in the workers’ compensation context, and may signal a fresh judicial focus…