Worst Employer(s) of 2020: The Winners

It brings me tremendous joy to announce the Worst Employer(s) of 2020.

Coronavirus Update 12-21-2020: Ensuring compliance with your Covid safety protocols shouldn’t be a mission impossible

British newspaper The Sun published leaked audio capturing Tom Cruise angrily addressing two crew members who he believed had breached Covid-19 protocols while filming "Mission Impossible 7."

The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear

In his semi-eponymous movie, Buddy the Elf famously explained, "The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear." 

Today, I'm choosing to use my valuable internet space to spread some Christmas cheer of my own. Please don't worry, it's not me singing, which would spread whatever the opposite of cheer is. Instead, it's my resident songstress, Norah Marie, who used her iPhone to self-record and mix this lovely (IMHO) cover of "Jingle Bell Rock."

norah marie · jingle bell rock

Coronavirus Update 12-17-2020, part 2: The COVID-19 vaccine and race discrimination

One issue the EEOC omitted from its technical guidance on the COVID-19 vaccine is the issue of race discrimination. 

According to one recent study, 57% of African Americans say that they definitely or probably will not get the COVID-19 vaccine. Many point to their distrust of the federal government fueled by decades of medical studies on Black people, including the Tuskegee Experiment, which left hundreds of Black men untreated for syphilis between 1932 and 1972.

If you are going to adopt a mandatory vaccination policy for your workplace (which the EEOC says you can do, subject to reasonable accommodation exceptions under the ADA for medical issues and Title VII for sincerely held religious beliefs or observances), then you must account for the possibility of that policy having a disparate impact based on race. Otherwise, you might be setting yourself up for a potential race discrimination lawsuit.

* Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

Coronavirus Update 12-17-2020: EEOC releases guidance on the COVID-19 vaccine

Yesterday, the EEOC published its guidance on the COVID-19 vaccine under the ADA and GINA, in the form of nine Q & As. You can read them in their totality here. 

The TL;DR: yes, you can force employees to receive the COVID-19 vaccine as a condition of employment (although the should is an entirely different issue), subject to limits on reasonable accommodations for employees' disabilities and sincerely held religious practices or beliefs and subject to limits on pre-vaccination medical questions.

My one work rule to rule them all

George Carlin was a genius. He just had a way of breaking down language into its most simple parts. Whether it was The 7 Dirty Words or The 10 Commandments, Carlin was just brilliant with language. For example, he dismantled each of the 10 Commandments into just two:

First:

• Thou shalt always be honest and faithful, especially to the provider of thy nookie.

And second:

• Thou shalt try real hard not to kill anyone, unless, of course, they pray to a different invisible man than the one you pray to.

I thought of this yesterday after stumbling upon a tweetstorm authored by Kate Bischoff reacting to this New York Times article suggesting that Jeffrey Toobin's long and esteemed career justifies that he should get his job back despite his Zoom full monty faux pas. 

Coronavirus Update 12-15-2020: Don’t be this a-hole

According to Cleveland.com, a pair of Ohio parents are facing possible criminal charges after piling 60 maskless teenagers into a party bus to celebrate their son's 14th birthday.

Police learned a parent had arranged for the party bus, which originated in Cincinnati…. The parent had posted an open invitation on social media, police say.