01 Aug H&L Quarterly – August 2024
Let the Competition Begin!
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued a rule in April banning most employment-based noncompetition agreements. Very shortly thereafter, the FTC was sued throughout the country in an attempt to block this rule from being enforced. In July, two federal courts issued opinions regarding the new FTC rule, and they came to differing conclusions. A federal district court in Texas granted an injunction against enforcement of the FTC rule, and held that the FTC Act doesn’t give the FTC power to issue rules preventing unfair methods of competition. Less that three weeks later, a federal district court in Pennsylvania denied the request for an injunction against enforcement of the FTC rule. The Pennsylvania court found that the FTC did have the power to issue both procedural and substantive rules to prevent unfair methods of competition. These conflicting decisions, and other similar litigation that remains ongoing, cast doubt on the future of the FTC’s new noncompetition rule, which will become effective on September 4, 2024.
Sources:
https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/courts-split-on-ftc-s-authority-to-8969605/
https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/noncompete-rule.pdf
Stepping up
In April, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued a new rule that will result in higher wages for several different types of employees who currently do not qualify to receive overtime pay. Normally, workers who fall under the Fair Labor Standard Act’s (FLSA) definition of “white-collar” executive, administrative, and professional exemptions are not eligible for overtime pay. However, in order to qualify for those overtime exemption categories, an employee must be paid a salary equal to the threshold amount. The new rule enacted by the DOL (as part of their ability to modify the terms of the FLSA) will raise the salary threshold for exempt employees twice over the next six months. As of July 1, 2024, the annual salary-level threshold for white-collar exemptions to overtime requirements rose to $43,888. In exactly five months, on January 1, 2025, the annual salary threshold will rise again to $58,656. The final salary level reached in January of 2025 will be an constitute an increase of almost 65%. For practical purposes, the terms of the DOL’s new rule mean that workers who are not paid at or above the required salary level will immediately become eligible for overtime pay of 1.5 times their regular hourly rate whenever they work more than 40 hours in a week.
Sources: https://www.shrm.org/topics-tools/employment-law-compliance/overtime-rule-raised-threshold
https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/whd/whd20240423-0
Michigan Online Interpreter System
Occasionally, the plaintiff in a workers’ compensation case (or any party to a legal proceeding for that matter) may require the help of a specialized interpreter because they are blind, deaf, hard of hearing, or have some form of both vision and hearing loss (sometimes referred to as Deaf-Blind or DeafBlind). In fact, the State of Michigan requires that interpretation services, from a licensed provider, be utilized in legal proceedings where one of the parties is in need of them. In order to make this process easier and more effective, the state has established a portal, known as the Michigan Online Interpreter System, where all state-authorized interpreters can be located and vetted as to their qualifications.
The goal of this system is to provide all parties with “equal communication access.” Further, the state believes that “determining an individual’s needs should be an interactive process” that involves both parties. Practically, the defendant in a workers’ compensation case would do well to remember that if a plaintiff is deaf, blind, hard of hearing, or deaf-blind, the defendant will need to ensure that interpretation services are available as often as is needed. A link to the Michigan Online Interpreter System is included below.
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