President Donald J. Trump recently issued an Executive Order, followed by a proposed bill and other guidance, which would drastically change the current immigration system. Based on these developments, employers should be prepared for immigration hiring changes and may want to consider applying now for immigrant status for affected key employees.
The Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Labor relaxed some deadlines for eligible employee benefit plans and expanded the availability of withdrawals and loans for eligible defined contribution plan participants in the disaster area. However, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation announced that some of its required filings will not be extended automatically.
In October 2016, the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) sued the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in the US District Court for the District of Columbia seeking an injunction against the latest iteration of wellness program regulations. The final EEOC regulations issued last year offer employers a roadmap for offering employee wellness programs that pass muster as “voluntary” examinations under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 (GINA). In response, AARP argued that the EEOC failed to adequately justify the new rules and abused its regulatory power by reversing course on its long-standing position against wellness programs.
Pay equity, the concept that gender differences should not affect compensation, is a concept easy to support, yet has been stubbornly hard to achieve. Federal law has become calcified in addressing the stubborn pay gap between men and women. State and local initiatives, along with private actors, have increasingly taken steps in the past year to address pay equity.
A significant judgment delivered on July 26, 2017, by the UK Supreme Court increases the likelihood of employment claims being brought in the future and is of significance to all organizations employing staff in the United Kingdom.
A unanimous panel of the NLRB, including Chairman Philip A. Miscimarra, held that ACA mandates do not relieve an employer of its duty to bargain with a union representing its employees regarding certain health insurance benefit plan changes.
A US District Court recently dismissed a claim that an insider’s election to satisfy an income tax obligation by having shares withheld from the delivery of an award constituted a non-exempt sale of shares back to the issuer for purposes of Section 16(b) of the Exchange Act, unless the share withholding was required, rather than merely permitted.
While an encouraging development, this decision is now on appeal to the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and there are similar unresolved complaints in other jurisdictions. Until this matter is resolved, public companies should continue to consider what steps are appropriate to avoid Section 16 exposure and to review this situation with their executive officers.
On Thursday, May 4, 2017, the US House of Representatives passed the American Health Care Act by the slimmest of margins with no Democrats voting in favor of the bill. Amendments to the original bill attracted more support from both moderate and conservative Republicans by the introduction of two amendments: one that gives more leeway to the states to request waivers from the more onerous provisions of the ACA that cannot be changed through the budget reconciliation process, and a second one that adds $8 billion of funding to the bill to help improve the “high-risk pools” that could be set up by states to provide coverage to individuals with pre-existing conditions who cannot find affordable insurance in the open market.
McDermott will be holding its annual Employee Benefits Innovators Roundtable Series this month. The roundtables offer experienced benefits professionals an opportunity to discuss cutting-edge, topical employer-driven benefit programs with their peers and members of McDermott’s employee benefits team. We are meeting in four locations this year. Join us in one of the following cities:
May 9 | Silicon Valley, California
May 11 | Los Angeles, California
May 22 | Chicago, Illinois
May 24 | New York, New York
The topics for our roundtable series sessions will include:
For more information about how to register for one of our roundtables, please contact Erin Nelson.
Join members of the McDermott Employee Benefits team in May at one of these programs covering a variety of employee benefits topics.
The John Marshall Law School The Center for Tax Law & Employee Benefits 14th Annual Employee Benefits Symposium | May 1, 2017 | Chicago, Illinois | Speaker, Joseph S. Adams
Proposed 457(f) Regulations: Opportunities and Challenges | May 3, 2017 | Webinar presented by Mary K. Samsa, Joseph K. Urwitz, Ruth Wimer
M&A Workshop: New Developments and Key Legal and Tax Issues Throughout the Life Cycle of a Deal | May 4, 2017 | Chicago, Illinois | Speaker, Joseph S. Adams
Benefits Emerging Leaders Working Group | May 10, 2017 | Chicago, Illinois | Speakers, Lisa K. Loesel, Lisa Schmitz Mazur, Jacob M. Mattinson, Jeffrey Arnold, Sarah Raaii
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