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Few Self-Insured Plans Will Escape Paying Reinsurance Fees

Only self-insured plans that completely self-administer claims payments and plan operations will avoid paying onerous transitional reinsurance fees. If a self-insured health plan does no more than determine eligibility, it will have to pay, according to Jeffrey Endick, an attorney with Slevin & Hart in Washington D.C. An exception exists to the onerous fee $63 per-member-per-year fee: Self-insured […]

Right-to-work bill on the march in Wisconsin

by Tammy Binford Wisconsin is on its way to becoming a right-to-work state. A right-to-work bill passed the state senate on February 25 and is expected to pass the assembly after that body takes it up on March 5. Governor Scott Walker is expected to sign the bill as soon as it passes. The bill […]

Supreme Court Agrees to Review Massive Discrimination Case Against Wal-Mart

Today, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review what has been called the largest employment class action in U.S. history — Wal-Mart Stores v. Dukes. The class of plaintiffs is estimated to include approximately 1.5 million former and current female Wal-Mart employees seeking monetary relief that could amount to billions of dollars in back pay. […]

Severance

EEOC challenges traditional severance agreements in untraditional way

by Burton J. Fishman The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has taken a bold step to challenge standard and accepted provisions in severance agreements in a recent suit, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. CVS Pharmacy, Inc., CA no. 14-cv-863 (N.D. Ill., 2014). There are two particularly important elements in this suit.  The first is that […]

News Notes: IBM Agrees To Partly Settle Pension Lawsuit

IBM will pay $320 million to current and former employees in partial settlement of a long-running class action lawsuit charging that the company’s conversion of its traditional pension plan to a cash-balance plan illegally discriminated against older workers. Under the settlement terms, IBM’s additional liability, which is under consideration by a federal judge, will be […]

Keepin’ It Real

As I write this, I’m sitting in a hotel room in Las Vegas. I must admit that I’m not a big fan of Las Vegas. It’s nothing against the city, it’s just that I typically spend less than 72 hours in Las Vegas at any one time and never get outside the hotel. So all […]

New OSHA ‘Sheriff’ Packs Heat, But It May Backfire

By Jim Stanley, president, FDRsafety When Labor Secretary Hilda Solis warned business last year that there was ”a new sheriff in town,” she wasn’t kidding — the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is packing big new six-guns. The only problem is that it may be shooting itself in the foot. OSHA has been announcing […]

WSJ’s Top Small Workplaces—and Why They Won

What makes a great smaller company, especially from the HR point of view? The Wall Street Journal’s 15 Top Small Workplaces seem to know. Here are their secrets. Winning Workplaces, an Evanston, Illinois-based nonprofit that helps companies create better work environments, recently teamed up with The Wall Street Journal to select 15 winning small companies […]