As employees, it can be very important to be aware of your rights and some of the more basic laws granting such laws. The problem can be, however, that such laws may provide critical and fundamental rights, but they can be awfully complex and convoluted. How are employees supposed to untangle the...
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Types of Workplace Retaliation
Do you know there are laws in place to protect employees from discrimination and harassment in the workplace? While many people may be aware of such laws, many are not as familiar with laws that protect employees from retaliation by an employer for engaging in a legally protected activity. We...
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Attorney Thomas A. McKinney featured in northjersery.com, Former chef sues ‘knucklehead’ restaurant, saying he was fired for reporting safety lapses
Former Executive Chef Daniel Schreiber filed a complaint against Portobello Restaurant on Tuesday, saying his complaints about health conditions at the Ramapo Valley Road restaurant were ignored and eventually led to his firing after a month's employment in March.
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Can Employers Require the Covid-19 Vaccine?
The Covid-19 pandemic and its persistence have forced many of us to confront some complexities you can only face in such an unprecedented time. The world shut down and then vaccines came and things started to reopen. Those who had been working remotely slowly started coming back into the office. Employers...
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Attorney Thomas A. McKinney featured in The NY Times, An Unmarried Catholic Schoolteacher Got Pregnant, She Was Fired.
When a Catholic school art teacher was asked to take on extra responsibilities, she requested a raise, explaining she was about to have a baby.
Weeks later, she was fired from her New Jersey elementary school. The principal, a Roman Catholic nun, told her she was being terminated "because...
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Independent Contractor or Employee? New Rule Coming Soon
The Department of Labor (DOL or Department) issued a final rule on January 6, 2021, clarifying who is an independent contractor versus an employee under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA or Act). Why does it matter, anyway? It matters because employers are required to pay their employees at least the federal minimum wage...
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When Marijuana is Legal Can I Fired For Getting High?
As New Jersey moves toward the legalization of marijuana and decriminalizing possession charges or marijuana, many employees may be wondering if they can get fired for being high at work and the truth is, the answer is complicated.
In November 2020, New Jersey lawmakers passed a...
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Employee Case Reinstated in Retaliation Lawsuit
Emiliano Rios, a paramedic for the Meadowlands Hospital Center in Secaucus, NJ, has alleged he was fired from his job for refusing to help his employer retaliate against a fellow employee who had filed a sexual harassment suit against the company.
He claims he was...
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New Jersey Passes Laws to Protect Workers from Illegal Misclassification as Contractors
On January 20, 2020, New Jersey passed several new laws aimed at protecting workers from being denied the benefits of employment through misclassification as independent contractors. The laws were passed to rectify the problem of employers treating workers who work 40 hours a week for them as independent contractors. Right now, employers...
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New Jersey Clarifies Used of Paid Sick Leave
Through new regulations, New Jersey clarified the New Jersey Earned Sick Leave Law (NJESLL).
To comply with the law, an employer’s paid time off (PTO) policy must allow an employee to use all PTO for reasons covered by the ESLL, permit employees to use the time off as required by the NJESLL, pay...
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