Purpose
To assess your ability to:
Discuss the Equal Pay Act and other laws that impact wages, hours, and pay equity.
Define the elements of pay discrimination.
Discuss ERISA and how it regulates benefit plans.
Analyze ERISA rules for pension plans.
Discuss workers compensation benefits.
Analyze an employment situation in order to provide recommendations concerning the application of employment laws to employers and/or employees.
Action Items
Review the guidelines for discussions from Module 2 Discussion.
Based on the first letter of your last name, research your assigned topic.
A-E: Wages/Pay Equity. A compensation consultant recommends that a restaurant do the following. Would implementing any of the consultant’s suggestions create legal problems? Which suggestions? What problems? Should the restaurant find a new consultant?
Keep accurate wage and hour records and retain them for at least a year;
Pay table servers minimum wage and require them to share their tips with other employees;
Require employees to pay for their own uniforms and deduct the cost from their paychecks;
Increase productivity by reducing meal periods (unpaid) from one hour to 20 minutes and eliminating all other breaks;
Since it should only take half an hour to clean up after the restaurant closes, don’t pay employees for any more time than that;
Require that any non-exempt, full-time employees who work over 8 hours a day take that time off later in the same work week;
Don’t worry about paying overtime to shift supervisors because they are paid a weekly salary;
To prevent work from interfering with their studies, limit minors (under 16) to no more than 8 hours a day during the school year.
F-J: OSHA. From January 8-10, 2003, the New York Times ran a three-part series on massive occupational safety and health violations at facilities owned by McWane, Inc. The company, based in Birmingham, Alabama, is a large and profitable operator of foundries. The series tells the story of corporate indifference to a horrific record of employee injuries and deaths. Read about the McWane StoryLinks to an external site..
What does the McWane saga tell us about the limitations of each of the following as means of protecting the safety and health of employees? 1) the law and regulatory agencies; 2) labor unions; 3) the labor market; 4) the ethics and professionalism of employers.
Why wasn’t OSHA more effective in dealing with McWane? Are the penalties that OSHA can impose sufficient to deal with employers like McWane?
How did McWane deal with workers’ compensation claims?
Does investing in the safety of employees pay off for employers or not?
K-O: Health Insurance. Now that you have learned a little bit about what the new health insurance law (the PPACA) entails, are you in favor of or opposed to this law? Why?
P-S: Medical Benefits. An employer required its employees to use its physicians in their hospital. One of the employees wanted to go to an outside physician known to the family, and the employer refused the request. In the meantime, the employee got sicker and sicker. Finally, when the employee went to the company doctor, the condition was diagnosed as terminal. The employee died and the family sued the employer. The grounds of the suit were that the employee could have been saved had the employee been allowed to go to another doctor of their choice. What do you think the outcome of the suit should be and why?
T-Z: Pensioners. A town in California is broke. The city had been warned several times over the last few years that it did not have enough money to pay out future pensioners. There is a law that says the town must pay promised benefits. The town says that it cannot, no money. You be the judge. Who wins here? The town or the pensioners? Why did they win and what did you cite for the reasons?
Prepare a response to your assigned topic. Your response is to be 200-300 words in length and include at least two references.
Do T-Z Pesioners
