Labor & Employment Law Update

The U.S. Department of Labor, Employee Benefit Security Administration (EBSA) is responsible for the enforcement of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1975 (ERISA). EBSA recently announced that, in 2017, by enforcing ERISA, it restored $1.1 billion to employee benefit plans. Of this amount, about 60% was from civil investigations and 40% from informal complaint resolutions.

Of course, the flip side of $1.1 billion going to employee benefit plans is $1.1 billion paid by employers, fiduciaries and their insurers.

This announcement from EBSA appeared roughly ...

What happens when you combine Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase? Apparently, a new nonprofit health care company. That was the news last month when the three companies announced that they are forming their own health care company to increase transparency for their employees.

Anyone involved with employee benefits knows that one of the most dreaded moments annually is getting the renewal quote for the health benefit plans. The quote starts the agonizing dance of trying to get the astronomical increase to a manageable number while calming the budgeting folks ...

As most turn their thoughts to love and romance this Valentine’s Day, we remind you of the potential liability that Cupid’s arrow may unleash. In this post-Weinstein and #MeToo period, the thought of office romance may catapult an employer into sheer panic. Although a recent CareerBuilder survey indicates that office romance is at a 10-year low, the stats are still telling: 36% of workers admitted to having dated a colleague in the past year. Of workers who had an office romance, 30% dated someone in a higher position. Yikes. A soured relationship at work can result in a ...

Though hacked systems are alarming, too often, data breaches come from much more obvious sources, such as computers without passwords (or weak ones), files left sitting out on desks, and even briefcases left on airplanes (like Department of Homeland Security analysis of terrorist threats at the Super Bowl). An employer’s exposure for data breaches can be significant. At minimum fines, civil suits (including class actions), lost trust and bad publicity, and remediation costs.

In 2017 alone, some of the major headline data breaches include the Paradise Papers and Panama ...

After a decade of rapid growth which saw the international student population increase 85 percent to over a million students, the number of newly arriving international students fell 3 percent in the 2016-2017 academic year.

President Trump’s campaign rhetoric and subsequent action as President have contributed to substantial declines in international student enrollment for the current academic year. Across the country the number of new international students declined an average of 7 percent according to a study of about 500 campuses by the Institute of International ...