Dive Brief:
- Writing at the Mintz Levin blog, Jennifer Rubin, a member with the firm's Employment, Labor & Benefits Practice in New York City, says one especially difficult hurdle for employers is how to make employment policies uniform across the different states where their employees work.
- Levin explains that as the economy grows increasingly national (and international) through technological advances, with the mobile workforce and the “gig” worker, the days of a single brick and mortar headquarters and employees in one state are fading fast.
- In addition, she says there is the very necessary (and smart) business practice of publishing, applying and administering consistent employment policies in a very-heavily regulated employment world. So what can a multi-state employer do?
Dive Insight:
To overcome this hurdle, Rubin writes that there is an appeal to employing a uniform “most favored nation” -- setting one state's (or even city's) rules as the floor for your company's rules -- approach to wage and hour and other employment laws because it is administratively streamlined. The chance for a mistake, even an innocent one, is lessened if all personnel are fully trained and familiar with the applicable policies.
While it may not be feasible for wages (since that varies so much from state to state), Rubin notes that for some laws – such as the various forms of paid and unpaid leave and protected categories of discrimination – a unified policy would be much easier to administer than a 50-policy patchwork.
Unfortunately, that's not a reality right now. Rubin says what keeps her multi-jurisdictional clients up at night is how quickly laws are changing due to judicial patina or federal, state or local legislative activism, making keeping up with the law a daunting task. Her advice? Find a good blog to stay current with any changes, and also keep in touch with employment counsel.
