When the Department of Labor can’t even figure out the FLSA…

According to Employment Law 360, the U.S. Department of Labor has agreed to pay $7 million to settle claims that it failed to pay overtime to thousands of its employees:

“This is the agency that goes around fining all the private employers for doing the same thing that it just ended up paying $7 million to make go away,” said the union’s attorney.…

AFGE’s collective action-type grievance had accused the DOL of violating the Fair Labor Standards Act by failing to compensate employees eligible under the statute for suffer or permit overtime. Amid the 10-year legal fight, workers who were classified as FLSA exempt were moved back to FLSA-eligible, the union said.

ABA amends model professional conduct rules to prohibit discrimination. What took it so long?

Last week, during its annual meeting, the American Bar Association amended its model rules of professional conduct to incorporate employment discrimination into attorneys’ ethical mandates.

Model Rule 8.4 now reads as follows:

(g) It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to engage in conduct that the lawyer knows or reasonably should know is harassment or discrimination on the basis of race, sex, religion, national origin, ethnicity, disability, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status or socioeconomic status in conduct related to the practice of law. This paragraph does not limit the ability of a lawyer to accept, decline or withdraw from a representation in accordance with Rule 1.16. This paragraph does not preclude legitimate advice or advocacy consistent with these Rules.

WIRTW #425 (the “tschüss” edition)

The Hymans did not take a vacation this summer. Instead, our vacation came to us.

Three years ago we hosted a foreign exchange student from Germany. Zarah entered our house as a stranger, and 10 months later left as our German daughter. Three weeks ago she and her sister, Alexa (German daughter number two) came for a visit. Today, they leave.

“Tschüss” is the German equivalent of “bye.” It’s light and informal. And, so, today, I say “tschüss” to Zarah and Alexa, because we know we will see them again soon (and even sooner on Skype), and danke to their parents (and our good friends), Michael and Karen, for sharing them with us for a few wonderful weeks.

Being accident free is important for a truck driver, says Ohio court

I love common sense legal decisions. Hartman v. Ohio Department of Transportation is one such case. It's holding—four preventable accidents in nine months disqualifies a truck driver from further employment.

Are your DOL posters up to date?

Are your Department of Labor posters up to date? Unless you’ve updated them in the past 9 days, then the answer is likely “no”.

WIRTW #424 (the “parking lot” edition)

If you are looking for a fun Sunday afternoon of music and food truck, look no further than the Strongsville School of Rock.

On Sunday, August 21, it will hold it’s annual parking lot show, aka, Rock the Lot. It will feature a preview of the school’s upcoming fall shows, including Norah Hyman singing and strumming her way through The Many Faces of Jack White, and Donovan Hyman keyboarding, dancing, and making his singing debut (god help us) with Rock 101. It will also have the Smokin’ Rock n’ Roll Food Truck on hand. There’s no better way to spend an otherwise lazy late-summer Sunday afternoon than watching some cool kids make great music.

The event runs 4 – 6 pm on Sunday, August 21, at 16888 Pearl Rd, Strongsville, Ohio.

Details are here.

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I’m taking a much needed long weekend. New content Wednesday.

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Here’s the rest of what I read this week.

A humane approach of layoffs

In addition to this blog, I also pen a monthly column for Workforce magazine. Today, I thought I’d share my most recent column, entitled A Humane Approach to Layoffs. Enjoy.

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A Humane Approach to Layoffs