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Wages & Hours

Snapshot: Low-wage workers worry more about job loss

12/30/2013
More than half of those earning less than $35,000 per year worry that a poor economy will cost them their jobs, according to a Washington Post poll. Better-paid workers aren’t as concerned.

Slay the wage-and-hour dragon before it breathes class-action fire

12/24/2013
Employers increasingly understand the financial burden of defending wage-and-hour class-action lawsuits—not to mention possible settlement payments or damages following un­­suc­­cessful attempts to defend those suits. There are some practical steps you can take to dodge the threat of a costly class-action lawsuit.

Northstate restaurants face $1.8 million in W&H citations

12/24/2013
State Labor officials have fined two Ukiah restaurants more than $1.8 million for wage-and-hour violations involving 47 workers over a three-year period. The complaint alleged the workers were not paid minimum wage or proper overtime.

Ensure bosses understand break obligations

12/24/2013
Ignorance of the law—and labor regulations—is no excuse. If your supervisors don’t understand that they need to give employees regular breaks and an uninterrupted meal period, they’re likely to trigger a class-action lawsuit.

CEO pay-ratio reporting requirement opposed by compensation group

12/24/2013
The nonprofit HR organization WorldatWork has urged the Securities and Exchange Commission to reject proposed regulations that would require corporations to report the ratio of CEO pay to that of median employee pay.

Market pricing is No. 1 method for setting pay rates

12/24/2013
Market pricing continues to ­outpace all other methods em­­ployers use to determine management and executive compensation levels, according to a new report by the nonprofit HR organization WorldatWork.

They just can’t make beautiful music together

12/23/2013
Long-running negotiations in the Minnesota Orchestra lockout broke down in November after musicians’ representatives walked out of negotiations to resolve disputes about staffing, pay and artistic differences.

IRS to begin enforcing tip vs. service charge rule in 2014

12/18/2013
Regardless of what you call it, tips are amounts customers willingly determine and leave of their own accord; service charges, sometimes called automatic tips, are added to the bill. Tips are taxable when employees report them to their employers; service charges are immediately taxable. The IRS will begin enforcing this rule on Jan. 1, 2014.

In the wake of the recession, where wages grew the most

12/06/2013
Washington, D.C., and Seattle top the list of metropolitan areas experiencing the highest annual wage growth since the recession ended. (The national average was $2,330.)

Strike down the hidden tyranny of pay for performance

12/05/2013
Rewarding your company’s star employees with the heftiest pay raises might not be enough to keep them from looking to jump ship if you expect them to take up the slack of associates who do the bare minimum.