Labor Rights
Two OSHAs: why a violation costs more in some states
More than 20 states run their own OSHA plans with their own penalty schedules. California's 2025 numbers show how wide the spread from federal maximums can be.
The current edition
Labor Rights
Labor Rights covers the rules that govern a job and what happens when they break: wage and hour enforcement, safety investigations, discrimination suits and misclassification fights. Each story is anchored to a filing, an inspection or a docket.
Wage theft, workplace safety, discrimination, misclassification and the enforcement agencies workers rely on, tracked through cases and data.
Labor Rights
The 30-day deadline for safety retaliation complaints
Section 11(c) gives safety whistleblowers 30 days to file with OSHA and no day in court: what the protection covers, how the process runs, and where it stops.
Labor Rights
The $165,514 citation: OSHA's maximums and what gets paid
Statutory penalty maximums anchor the headlines, but settlement practice and reduction policy decide what employers actually pay. A reading of the 2025 numbers.
Labor Rights
The six factors that decide contractor status, and who uses them
The 2024 economic-reality rule is on the books but unenforced by its own agency: a plain guide to the six factors and which test applies where.
Labor Rights
The contractor rule is suspended for investigators, not for courts
The Labor Department's May 2025 non-enforcement of the 2024 independent contractor rule changed who applies the economic-reality test, not what the test says.
Labor Rights
OSHA adds 15 percent penalty cut for immediate fixes
A July 14, 2025 policy change rewards employers who correct cited hazards on the spot, reshaping how federal safety penalties get discounted.
Labor Rights
Outsourcing firm to pay $250,000 in EEOC disability case
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission announced a $250,000 settlement of its disability discrimination lawsuit against The Results Companies on April 21, 2025.
Labor Rights
Wage agency reports $259 million recovered for 177,000 workers
The Labor Department's Wage and Hour Division posted its strongest back-wage recovery in five years for fiscal 2025, even as a June policy change limits double damages in administrative cases.
Labor Rights
How to file an EEOC discrimination charge, and the deadlines
The charge is the required first step for most federal discrimination claims: what it is, the 180- and 300-day clocks, and what happens after filing.
Labor Rights
How a Wage and Hour Division investigation works
From complaint to supervised payment: what the federal wage investigator does, what it can recover, and what a worker gives up by choosing the administrative route.