Law Commons^™

Time’S Up: Against Shortening Statutes Of Limitation By Employment Contract, Meredith R. Miller

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Employers are increasingly adding clauses to contracts with employees that purport to shorten the statutes of limitation for employees to pursue claims against their employers (“SOL Clauses”). SOL Clauses are being imposed on employees in various stages of the contracting process. They have turned up in job applications, offer letters, arbitration clauses, employment agreements and employee handbooks. Where they have been enforced by the courts, the justification has been a prioritization of “freedom of contract” over any other policy concerns. This Article argues that, in the employment context, “freedom of contract” should not be prioritized over other competing concerns, which …

Challenging Gender Discrimination In Closely Held Firms: The Hope And Hazards Of Corporate Oppression Doctrine, Meredith R. Miller

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The #MeToo Movement has ushered sexual harassment out of the shadows and thrown a spotlight on the gender pay gap in the workplace. Harassment and unfair treatment have, however, been difficult to extinguish. This has been true for all workers, including partners – those women who are owners in their firms and claim that they have suffered harassment or unfair treatment based on gender. That is because a partner’s lawsuit for discrimination often will suffer an insurmountable hurdle: plaintiff’s status as a partner in the firm means that they may not be considered an “employee” under the relevant employment discrimination …

Using The Nfl As A Model? Considering Zero Tolerance In The Workplace For Batterers, Deseriee A. Kennedy

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The impact of domestic violence can increasingly be felt in the workplace, and it can adversely affect the safety and productivity of employees. Legislators and employers have begun to recognize the effect of domestic violence on employment, and many have adopted policies to protect the interests of domestic violence survivors. This article suggests that wider adoption of domestic violence policies are needed and these policies should be broadened to directly address batterers in the workplace. The article argues that employer based sanctions would increase batterer accountability and workplace safety. It uses the newly revised NFL Personal Conduct Policy as a …

Getting Paid In The Naked Economy, Meredith R. Miller

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“It’s the end of work as we know it,” reports consulting firm Accenture in a paper about the “rise of the extended workforce.” (Gartside, Silverstone, Farley & Cantrell, Trends Reshaping the Future of HR: The Rise of the Extended Workforce, at 3 (Accenture 2013). The report predicts that, “[i]n the future, organizations’ competitive success will hinge on...workers who aren’t employees at all.” The legal nature of employment is changing and has been changing for quite some time; fewer and fewer workers are “employees.”

It is not new or novel to recognize that, from a legal perspective, there are many benefits …

Overvaluing Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance, Lauren R. Roth

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Although positive and negative assessments of tying health insurance to employment abound, most scholars and policymakers have acknowledged that our long history in this area predicts our future. What they have largely ignored, however, is the extent to which individual attachment to employment-based insurance is at the root of our inability to make broader health reforms. The attachment (1) harms exchange-based insurance and (2) denies employers the ability to use Health Reimbursement Arrangements (“HRAs”) to subsidize the purchase of insurance by their employees on the exchanges.

This Article advocates reducing or eliminating workers’ overvaluation of their health insurance and increasing …

A Failure To Supervise: How The Bureaucracy And The Courts Abandoned Their Intended Roles Under Erisa, Lauren R. Roth

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This Article addresses how courts failed to adequately supervise employers administering pension plans before ERISA. Relying on a number of different legal theories — from an initial theory that pensions were gratuities offered by employers to the recognition that pension promises could create contractual rights — the courts repeatedly found ways to allow employers to promise much and provide little to workers expecting retirement security. In Section III, this Article addresses how Congress failed to create an effective structure for strong bureaucratic enforcement and the bureaucratic agencies with enforcement responsibilities failed to fulfill those functions. Finally, in Section IV, this …

Do Law Schools Mistreat Women Faculty? Or, Who’S Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?, Dan Subotnik

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No abstract provided.

Civil Rights And Related Decisions, Eileen Kaufman

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This article analyzes two cases from the October 2006 Supreme Court Term, Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. and Gonzales v. Carhart. The cases have much in common, even though Ledbetter concerns pay disparity claims based on gender and Gonzales concerns second trimester abortions. Both are five-four decisions which demonstrate how profoundly the appointment of Justice Samuel Alito to occupy Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's seat has affected the balance of power on the Court. The net result of this shift has been a devastating setback for women's rights. Both decisions prompted Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to uncharacteristically read aloud …

The Limitation On Undocumented Workers’ Lost Earnings After Balbuena And Sanango: Crafting A Fair And Principled Balance Of Immigration Policy And New York State Labor Law § 240 Safety Goals, Meredith R. Miller

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In December 2004, in a pair of cases, the Appellate

Division, First Department, held that under state labor

and tort laws, injured workers who are not legally permitted

to be present or employed in the United States

are only entitled to receive lost earnings reflecting what

they could have earned in their country of origin. This

article explores these First Department decisions by first

discussing the federal statutory and decisional backdrop

against which the cases arose. This article then

provides a discussion of the First Department cases and

the competing economic incentives they implicate.

Finally, this article posits that a …

Employer Beware? Enforcing Transnational Labor Standards In The United States Under The Alien Tort Claims Act, Sarah J. Adams-Schoen

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The Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA) arguably allows non-U.S. citizens to bring claims for violations of customary international law (CIL). Although CIL litigation typically embraces only egregious human rights violations, the scope of CIL actually encompasses all universally recognized rights, including some labor rights. This Comment explores the possibility that the ATCA may be used to litigate claims by non-U.S. citizens alleging violations of international labor rights. It concludes that the Act likely provides a vehicle for aggrieved employees to bring suit in U.S. court for violations of international labor standards. Finally, this Comment recognizes that the impact of ATCA …

Good Faith: Balancing The Right To Manage With The Right To Represent, Suzanne Darrow-Kleinhaus

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No abstract provided.

Discrimination Cases In The 2000 Term, Eileen Kaufman

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No abstract provided.

The Employment Law Decisions Of The October 2000 Term Of The Supreme Court: A Review And Analysis, Ann C. Hodges, Douglas D. Scherer

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During the October 2000 Term, the Supreme Court delivered major setbacks for employees in Circuit City Stores, Inc. v. Adams,' which upheld mandatory and binding arbitration of federal and state employment discrimination claims through arbitration clauses forced upon employees as a condition of employment, and in Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama v. Garrett, which shielded state employers from federal court law suits brought under the Americans with Disabilities Act by victims of disability discrimination in employment. Employees escaped harm in Pollard v. E.I du Pont de Nemours & Co., in which the Court followed nearly unanimous circuit …

Discrimination Cases In The Supreme Court’S 1998 Term, Eileen Kaufman

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In the Supreme Court's 1997 Term, the Supreme Court had decided a record number of statutory discrimination cases. However, that record was exceeded in the Supreme Court's 1998 Term with the Court addressing issues arising under Title VII, which covers discrimination in employment; Title IX, which covers discrimination in schools; and most significantly, the Americans with Disabilities Act, which prohibits discrimination based on disability. Overall, the term scored significant victories for employers who were given considerable latitude to set their own physical characteristic standards and who were, to a large extent, immunized from liability for punitive damages. There was an …

Proceedings Of The 1999 Annual Meeting, Association Of American Law Schools Section On Employment Discrimination Law: Is There A Disconnect Between Eeo Law And The Workplace?, Douglas D. Scherer, James C. Sharf, Richard T. Seymour, Maria O'Brien Hylton, Paulette Caldwell

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No abstract provided.

Employment Discrimination: Recent Developments In The Supreme Court (Symposium: The Supreme Court And Local Government Law: The 1992-93 Term), Eileen Kaufman

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At a symposium entitled, “The Supreme Court and Local Government Law; The 1992/93 Term”, Professor Eileen Kaufman spoke about the cases involving employment discrimination that were decided during that particular Term, Hazen Paper Company v. Biggins and St. Mary's Honor Center v. Hicks. While Hazen is an age discrimination case and St. Mary's is a Title VII case, they can be viewed as companion cases which serve to explain what an employment discrimination plaintiff must now establish when attempting to prove disparate treatment by indirect evidence. By way of preview, suffice it to say that plaintiff's task has been made …

The Continuing Availability Of Retaliatory Discharge And Other State Tort Causes Of Action To Employees Covered By Collective Bargaining Agreements, Peter Zablotsky

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No abstract provided.

The New Labor Law: A Very Limited Management Victory, Howard Glickstein, Bernard D. Gold

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No abstract provided.