(This is an emerging issue as of the date of this writing—April 25, 2025.  Further legislation, rulemaking, administrative interpretation, litigation, or smarter attorneys may change or improve upon the analysis below.) As we approach January 1, 2026—the date on which Minnesota’s Paid Family Leave Act (Minnesota Statutes Chapter 268B) takes effect—employers and employment attorneys are...

Editor’s Note: This article was written on March 12, 2025. The statutes at issue are currently being debated by the legislature. Future legislation and caselaw may alter the decisions discussed herein. When the Minnesota Legislature rolled out Earned Sick and Safe Time (ESST) in 2023, most employers and HR professionals focused on the benefits the...

Immediate Action Items for Employers: Recalculate “base rate” for any employee paid on anything other than a standard wage. If you presently scrutinize employees’ requests for ESST, consider approving it as a matter of course. Aling use of ESST to the increments in which you pay. Ensure your paystub includes the necessary information. Make a plan to keep pay and ESST information for 3 years. If you are offering paid leave above the ESST minimums, ensure that you are offering it on the same terms as ESST; or consider ceasing to offer excess.

I was recently asked to speak about employment law issues at a conference for human resource professionals. Registrants were polled in advance about what they’d like covered, and “DEI” was a top response. (DEI stands for “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion;” DEI means . . . well . . . the definition of DEI is part of...

“Chevron deference” and the end of Chevron deference has been all over the news since the United States Supreme Court published its June 28, 2024 decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimaondo, Secretary of Commerce.  As with most media coverage of the law, most of the reporting I’ve seen has been overly simplistic at best,...

The new rule provides details on the implementation of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) (42 USC 2000). PWFA provides employees certain rights regarding pregnancy, childbirth, and related conditions.  (§1636.1.) Like most modern statutes, when our elected legislators passed PWFA, they left many details to be filled in by unelected bureaucrats in the executive branch. The new rule provides those details.

Statutory Title: Minnesota Secure Choice Retirement Program ActStatutory Citation: Minnesota Statutes section 187.01-.08.Bill Number: House File 782Issuing Body: State of MinnesotaDate Enacted: May 19, 2023Effective Date: The statute is immediately effective, but the obligations of employers will not be operative until the program is fully established, which looks to be January 1, 2025.In Brief: The...