Tag:Employment
Is Your Fitness Tracker Violating Your Privacy Rights?
An increasing number of companies are providing fitness trackers for their employees as a part of their benefits package. The use of fitness trackers has been steadily growing over the past few years, and is predicted to hit a shipment size of 240.1 million devices by 2021. Even though the popularity of these fitness trackers has boomed, their compliancy with HIPAA has not kept up with them as quickly. A few companies that make fitness trackers have become HIPAA compliant, such as Fitbit and Apple. However, some companies have remained silent as to whether they are or plan on becoming compliant. While fitness trackers have been shown to have an overall positive effect in corporate wellness programs, corporations should remain up to date with how to keep their employees’ health information secure as well as ensure that the fitness tracker that they are providing is HIPAA compliant.
Digital Realty Trust: Implications for Whistleblowers and the Compliance Department
In a 9-0 decision, the Supreme Court on February 22, 2018 decided Digital Realty Trust, Inc. v. Paul Somers, a case challenging the definition of a whistleblower under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, commonly referred to as Dodd-Frank. The court held that “Dodd-Frank’s anti-retaliation provision does not extend to an individual, like Somers, who has not reported a violation of the securities laws to the SEC [Securities and Exchange Commission].” This is a narrowing of the definition of whistleblower and as such has a number of implications for companies and their compliance departments.
TAX TALK SERIES Understanding Notice 1036: IRS Adjusted Withholding Tables to Accommodate New Tax Plan
On December 20, 2017, Congress passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (“TCJA”) designed to decrease the taxable rate for corporations and individuals, and to limit allowable deductions. Since this change to the Tax Code was one of the largest since the Reagan era, the Internal Revenue Service will need to publish many regulations in the coming months to better clarify provisions of the TCJA. This multi-part series will explore prominent IRS regulations as they relate to the TCJA, and what these regulations mean for both individual and corporate taxpayers.
Doing the Right Thing: Labor Force Compliance
Corporate compliance professionals will often define compliance as “doing the right thing.” Indeed, both compliance professionals and scholars agree that ethics are an important aspect of effective compliance programs. This is particularly true when it comes to compliance with forced labor regulations. Using forced labor can be appealing to companies seeking to reduce their operating costs and increase profits. However, in the face of a toxic business culture that values maximizing profits, compliance professionals must convince their colleagues that forced labor is not worth the savings in operating costs.
Impaired and On the Clock: Developing Policies and Procedures to Cope with Impairment in the Workplace
Brittany Tomkies Executive Editor Loyola University Chicago School of Law, JD 2017 Drug and substance abuse has become an epidemic in the United States over the past 15 years, reaching an alarming 9.4% of Americans ages 12 and older in 2013. The human and economic costs of substance abuse are astonishing – some estimate …
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New Overtime Rules Have Employers Working Overtime
Ryan Whitney Managing Editor Loyola University Chicago School of Law, JD 2017 Beginning in December of this year, the Department of Labor will implement their final update to the rules governing overtime pay. The new income threshold will nearly double, thus encompassing 4 million workers nationwide. This update will have a large impact on …
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Compliance During the Holidays: Following Regulations on Employer Anti-Discrimination
Melody Saveall Senior Editor Loyola University Chicago School of Law, JD 2018 With Halloween already past and the holiday season just ahead, it is important to remember the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s guidances on respecting employees’ religious beliefs, and reasonably accommodating them. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 governs these policies and …
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Facing Facial Recognition Technology
In March 2019, Senator Brian Schatz and Senator Roy Blunt introduced a bill to Congress designed to provide oversight for facial recognition technology, known as the Commercial Facial Recognition Privacy Act. If passed, this law could change the way Americans deal with privacy.
#MeToo Movement and Sexual Harassment Training Requirements for Illinois Employers
By now most people are familiar with the #MeToo movement. The movement began in 2006 by women, specifically Tarana Burke and women of color from low wealth communities, to help survivors of sexual violence. Eleven years after the movement was founded, it exploded during the fall of 2017 when well-known women in the entertainment industry began to use the famous #MeToo hashtag and shared their stories of sexual, discrimination, abuse and harassment. Two and half years later, there has been some change, but not enough. The National Sexual Violence Resource Center, said the biggest impact of #MeToo is that it decreased the stigma associated with sexual abuse and harassment and increased awareness.
The Families First Coronavirus Response Act Includes Unemployment and Paid Leave Provisions
The Illinois Department of Public Health, local health departments, public health partners throughout Illinois, and federal agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (“CDC”), are responding to an outbreak of respiratory illness caused by a novel coronavirus called COVID-19 that was first identified in December 2019 during an outbreak in Wuhan, China. COVID-19 has spread throughout the world, including the United States, since it was detected and was declared a public health emergency for the U.S. on January 31, 2020 to aid the nation’s healthcare community in responding to the threat. The World Health Organization (WHO) announced March 11, 2020 that the spread of coronavirus qualified as a global pandemic.