Labor & Employment Law Blog

As we previously reported here, on January 28, 2010, the California Court of Appeal issued its decision in Pellegrino v. Robert Half International, Inc., ("Pellegrino II") holding that employment agreements shortening to six months the deadline for employees to bring claims arising out of their employment violate public policy and are therefore unenforceable. The court held also that the staffing agency's account executives did not qualify as exempt administrative employees.

On April 26, 2010, in Dukes v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., a divided Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decided 6-5 en banc to affirm the decision of the trial court to grant class certification in a discrimination lawsuit alleging Wal-Mart Stores discriminates against its women employees. The nationwide class is reputed by the Los Angeles Daily Journal to number upward of 1.6 million women employees, which would make the class the largest class in United States history.

Ordinarily, a decision by an arbitrator is not subject to being reversed by a court based on a legal error by the arbitrator.  Moncharsh v. Heily & Blase (1992) 3 Cal.4th 1, 1, 25.  In other words, unlike a decision by a court, a decision by an arbitrator generally cannot be "appealed."

In Chamber of Commerce vs.. Brown (2008), the United States Supreme Court struck down a California statute that sought to indirectly regulate the labor relations policy of employers who received state funds by either prohibiting their use of those monies in their response union to organizing drives or, in the alternative, require proof that they were not so used, holding that such regulation violated free ...

The National Labor Relations Board is a five member body of presidential appointees. However, for approximately the past 26 months, the NLRB has operated with just two sitting board members, Republican Peter Schaumber and Democrat Wilma Liebman. This has resulted in a backlog of unresolved cases pending before the NLRB and in a case pending before the United States Supreme Court calling for the Supreme Court to decide whether the National Labor Relations Act permits the NLRB to act when there are only two sitting members of the NLRB, New Process Steel v. National Labor Relations Board, in which the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on March 23, 2010.

Today, the California Court of Appeal certified for publication its decision in Arenas v. El Torito Restaurants, et al., holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it denied class certification of the plaintiff restaurant managers' claims that they and other managers were improperly classified as exempt employees.