Woodruff Sawyer: Softer D&O Market Still Offers Concerns for Underwriters

“While concerns about a “tsunami of pandemic-related litigation” never quite materialized, according to Woodruff Sawyer in its latest D&O Looking Ahead Guide for 2023, those fears have been replaced with a number of others among D&O insurers. Economic challenges such as inflation and higher interest rates, as well as the threat of a recession, combined with the war in Ukraine, limited supply chains and a volatile stock market are creating a difficult environment for management teams and boards.”  Full Article

– Insurance Journal

Viewpoint: IT Asset Disposition Is Growing Cyber Security Threat for All Organizations

“Cyber risk headlines are dominated by rising ransomware activity and soaring global data breach costs. The increased ransomware activity, driven largely by threat actor financial motives, has indiscriminately affected all industry segments – from large corporate clients to small to midsize enterprises alike. As a consequence, the cyber insurance market has witnessed notable changes. Both from a direct and reinsurer viewpoint, we have experienced pared-back coverage, increased pricing per million dollars of cover and limited capacity. While these developments top headlines, it is not the sole exposure point for corporations.”  Full Article

– Insurance Journal

Pajamas, Pennies and Time Rounding

“Submitted for your consideration are two court decisions, decided less than a year apart, and involving the same practice of rounding time entries up or down to the nearest quarter hour. The legal principles applicable to both decisions were identical, but their outcomes (so far) were very different.”  Full Article

– Constangy Brooks

The EEOC’s Strategic Plan Provides Insight Into its Priorities, Including Systemic Discrimination

“The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has released its Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2022-2026, effective immediately. This document provides employers with an overview of the EEOC’s particular areas of focus.”  Full Article

– Shawe Rosenthal

Labor Department Proposes Increasing Salary Threshold for Overtime Pay

“On Aug. 30, 2023, the WHD of the DOL released a NPRM that proposes to revise the “white collar” overtime exemption regulations applicable to executive, administrative, and professional employees. Most notably, the highly anticipated proposal seeks to raise the salary threshold under which employees are eligible for overtime pay under federal labor law to $1,059 per week ($55,068 annualized).”  Full Article

– Greenberg Traurig LLP

State Pay Transparency Laws: What’s Required Now and What’s Next?

“As the summer winds down, multistate employers must remain apprised of an ever
-increasing number of obligations in the area of pay transparency … We highlight recent developments to existing pay transparency laws, summarize new pay transparency laws enacted over the summer and offer compliance tips for multistate employers grappling with this growing nationwide trend.”  Full Article

– Cooley LLP

DOL’s Conflicting Versions of Independent Contractor Standard Under FLSA

“In January 2021, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) under the Trump administration issued a final rule defining the standard for when a worker is an independent contractor for the purposes of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). This standard remains in effect, although the DOL under the Biden administration issued a new proposed rule redefining the standard in October 2022.”  Full Article

– Hall Benefits Law, LLC

Expanding Existing Bereavement Leave Policies to Account for Fertility Related Losses

“Bereavement leave policies generally aim to provide employees with paid leave following the death of a family member. These policies, however, often fail to acknowledge the grief that employees experience upon a fertility related loss, such as a miscarriage. Fertility related losses are very common (with more than 1 in 4 pregnancies resulting in miscarriage) and frequently result in post-traumatic stress disorder (with almost 1 in 3 women developing PTSD after a miscarriage), and yet they remain largely unaddressed in the workplace.”  Full Article

– Mintz, Levin Cohn Ferris Glovsky and Popeo P.C.

California Lawmakers Approve Nation’s Most Sweeping Emissions Disclosure Rules for Big Business

“Major corporations from oil and gas companies to retail giants would have to disclose their direct greenhouse gas emissions as well as those that come from activities like employee business travel under legislation passed by California lawmakers, the most sweeping mandate of its kind in the nation. The legislation would require thousands of public and private businesses that operate in California and make more than $1 billion annually to report their direct and indirect emissions. The goal is to increase transparency and nudge companies to evaluate how they can cut their emissions.”  Full Article

– Insurance Journal

Google’s Search Dominance Challenged in Biggest Antitrust Trial in Decades

“Google has exploited its dominance of the internet search market to lock out competitors and smother innovation, the Department of Justice charged Tuesday at the opening of the biggest U.S. antitrust trial in a quarter century. “This case is about the future of the internet and whether Google’s search engine will ever face meaningful competition,” said Kenneth Dintzer, the Justice Department’s lead litigator. Over the next 10 weeks, federal lawyers and state attorneys general will try to prove Google rigged the market in its favor by locking its search engine in as the default choice in a plethora of places and devices. U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta likely won’t issue a ruling until early next year. If he decides Google broke the law, another trial will decide what steps should be taken to rein in the Mountain View, California-based company.”  Full Article

– Insurance Journal

Illinois Enacts Pre-Tax Commuter Benefits Requirement

“Beginning January 1, 2024, certain employers located within designated Illinois counties and townships will be required to provide employees a ‘pre-tax commuter benefit.’ Employers must allow covered employees to use pre-tax dollars for the purchase of a transit pass through payroll deduction. A transit pass is any pass, token, care card, and the like entitling the employee to take public transit.”  Full Article

– Jackson Lewis P.C.

You May Need to Lower Employees’ Premiums to Keep Plans Affordable Under the ACA

“The authors are seeing an increased focus on ACA compliance and expect to see a ramp up in employer penalty notification. A failure to consider whether your plan is affordable when passing through any premium increases could result in an unintended penalty for each employee who enrolls in exchange coverage and qualifies for financial assistance.”  Full Article

– Bricker Graydon

New Federal Rules Seek to Strengthen Mental Health Parity

“Although MHPAEA has been in effect for more than a decade now, regulators enforcing the law have often struggled to narrow the many gaps in access between MHSUD and medical/surgical benefits …This proposed rule makes the NQTL standard more prescriptive and incorporates outcomes data, and if finalized would represent a significant step forward in MHPAEA enforcement.”  Full Article

– Health Affairs Forefront

District Court Dismisses Employees’ COBRA Notice Claims, Save One (Involving COVID-19)

“In litigation involving an employer’s alleged notice violations under COBRA, a district court rejected almost all of the employees’ claims for why the notices were deficient. In the one claim that survived dismissal, an employee who was terminated in June 2020 alleged that the employer’s COBRA election notice failed to state an enrollment deadline that accurately reflected COVID-19-related time extensions.”  Full Article

– Thomson Reuters Practical Law

5 Things to Know About the New Drug Pricing Negotiations

“The long-term consequences of the new policy are unknown. One theory is that reducing the prices drug companies can charge in Medicare will lead them to increase prices for the privately insured. Another theory is that Medicare price negotiations will equip private health plans to drive a harder bargain. Even though negotiated prices won’t take effect until 2026, drug companies haven’t wasted time turning to the courts to try to stop the new program in its tracks.”  Full Article

– KFF Health News

Circuit Court Holds ERISA Preempts State PBM Regulation

“The court’s opinion distinguished the case from Rutledge v. Pharmaceutical Care Management Association (PCMA), in which the Supreme Court held that an Arkansas law requiring PBMs to tie their reimbursement rates to pharmacies’ costs was not preempted by ERISA because it did not dictate plan choices. The 10th Circuit reasoned that, whereas the Arkansas law at issue in Rutledge merely resulted in an increase of costs for the PBM, the Act goes further by potentially having a direct effect on a plan’s network design, and therefore ‘governs a central matter of plan administration.’”  Full Article

– Slevin & Hart, P.C.

New Study Says Autonomous Vehicles Significantly Reduce BI/PD Claims

“A new study has revealed that autonomous-vehicle technology reduced bodily injury claims frequency by 100% and property damage claims frequency by 76%. Global reinsurer Swiss Re and automated driving company Waymo partnered on the study. The two compared Waymo’s third-party liability claims data with mileage and ZIP-code-calibrated, human-driven private passenger vehicle baselines established by the insurer for the period of 2016-2021, from over 600,000 claims and over 125 billion miles of exposure.”  Full Article

– Insurance Journal

Return-to-Office Is $1.3 Trillion Problem Few Have Figured Out

“In the emerging post-pandemic era, most aspects of life have returned to normal. Moviegoers are flocking to cinemas, vacationers jammed airports for summer travel and kids are returning to classrooms. The one thing that has remained stubbornly fraught: the world of work. Three and a half years after millions of office-goers were sent home en masse, companies, employees and governments are still figuring out how to adapt to lasting changes to corporate life. But stark differences have emerged across continents and cultures, with Asian and European workers largely returning to offices at a faster pace than their counterparts in the Americas.”  Full Article

– Insurance Journal

Fifth Circuit Makes it Easier for Employees to Assert Title VII Claims Against Employers

“The full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit recently broadened the scope of actionable adverse employment actions that can serve as the basis for a discrimination lawsuit.”  Full Article

– Phelps Dunbar LLP

National Labor Relations Board Significantly Alters Union Election Process

“On Aug. 24 and 25, 2003, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued new regulations and a decision, which together overturn decades of precedent and represent a sea change in the union election process.”  Full Article

– McGuire Woods LLP

OSHA Says Workplace Violence Injuries are Work-Related, Even When Sustained Outside the Workplace

“To increase enforcement concerning workplace violence incidents, OSHA published a Standard Interpretation Letter concluding injuries resulting from workplace violence are recordable, even if the incident occurs outside of the workplace.”  Full Article

– Seyfarth Shaw LLP

EEOC Releases 2022-26 Strategic Plan Highlighting Agency Priorities Regarding Employment Discrimination

“On August 22, 2023, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (‘EEOC’) unveiled its four- year Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2022-2026 that it will use as a framework to advance its goals of preventing and remedying employment discrimination.”  Full Article

– Proskauer Rose LLP

Arizona Federal Court Latest to Hold Judicial Approval of Individual FLSA Settlements is Not Required

“A federal district court in Arizona held this week that courts are not required – or even authorized – to grant judicial approval of settlement agreements resolving individual claims brought under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), joining a growing number of courts calling into question the notion that private FLSA settlements require review and approval by either a court or the
U.S. Department of Labor (DOL).”  Full Article

– Jackson Lewis P.C.

Right to Reef? The Growing Number of State and Local Laws Addressing Off-Duty Marijuana Use by Employees

“Few areas of the law have evolved more quickly than the quagmire of federal, state, and local laws governing employee use of marijuana. Although cannabis remains a Schedule I drug under the federal Controlled Substances Act, more than two-thirds of all states have legalized medical marijuana. More than 20 states permit adults who are 21 or older to purchase and consume cannabis products recreationally.”  Full Article

– Venable LLP