The full US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine has led to vaccine mandates by both governments and businesses. More companies will implement their own vaccine requirements in light of the FDA approval, according to McDermott partner Michelle Strowhiro in this The Hill article.
“What employers are trying to balance right now is implementing the right safety standards for their workforce while also being cognizant of the fact that the labor market is so difficult and many employers are already struggling with having the right number of people on staff,” Strowhiro said.
How should corporate boards respond to the Delta variant?
In this Forbes article, McDermott’s Michael Peregrine argues that the way in which a board responds to the challenge may “well define its future credibility on workforce culture concerns.”
“The new, Delta-prompted potential for intra-organizational clash is the latest and potentially one of the most significant of these concerns,” Peregrine writes.
Employers are facing a myriad of decisions as they consider vaccination requirements for their workforces.
Mandatory vaccine policies, for example, should include rationale for why they are required, McDermott partner Carole A. Spink said in this Society for Human Resource Management article. The scope of any policy should be clearly identified and explain which employees it applies to.
As the Delta variant continues to spread across the United States, companies are once again having to make tough decisions. In this Forbes article, McDermott partner Michael Peregrine says corporate boards should ask their CEOs how they will respond to the pandemic’s latest development.
“At a time when most businesses were aggressively moving forward with long-stalled resiliency measures, they are countered by the equally aggressive Delta variant,” Peregrine writes.
What should employers do if a job applicant voluntarily discloses a disability during an interview?
In most cases, employers cannot ask disability-related questions until after an applicant receives a conditional job offer, according to McDermott’s Laurie A. Baddon in this Society for Human Resource Management article. Once the employer makes a conditional offer, the employer can ask disability-related questions and require medical examinations for any applicant. Employers can ask applicants about their ability to perform essential job duties with or without accommodation.
On July 26, 2021, the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) issued a new Order that impacts healthcare and state employers in California. According to McDermott’s Michelle S. Strowhiro, Ellen M. Bronchetti and Ludia Kwon, the CDPH Order requires that almost all healthcare employers verify the vaccination status of all of their workers.
The Order also requires workers who are not fully vaccinated to go through regular COVID-19 testing at specified intervals. These facilities also must have a plan in place for tracking verified worker vaccination statuses.
Multiple business groups have sided with the Biden administration in a plea to a US appeals court to uphold the federal government’s practice of providing work permits to student visa holders.
According to aReuters article, the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers (Washtech) is requesting that the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit revive its lawsuit that argues that the Optimal Practical Training (OPT) program is beyond the federal government’s authority.
“If Washtech’s broad claims were to succeed, scores of other immigration programs—including, for example, work authorization for H-4 spouses[—]would crumble too,” McDermott partner Paul Hughes wrote in a brief on behalf of the groups’ leaders.
Can employers offer incentives for employees to get a COVID-19 vaccine? In short, yes. Incentives may take many forms, such as a one-time bonus, a gift card or a few extra vacation hours. Employers can get creative.
According to McDermott’s Michelle S. Strowhiro, Judith Wethall and Ludia Kwon, there are two issues to consider when implementing a vaccine incentive program for purposes of complying with employment and benefits laws: the concepts of coercion and reasonable accommodation.
How should the federal and state governments approach remote work taxation? In this Law360 article, McDermott partner Kathleen Quinn says the growing complexity of remote work highlights the need for guidance.
“What’s becoming even more problematic is now, we don’t just have people that work in a New York office and they traditionally work from home from New Jersey,” Quinn said. “Now, people are saying, ‘Well, I’m going to work from New Jersey, then in the winter I’m going to work from Florida…and then maybe for a month I’ll go to Europe.’ It really becomes sort of a withholding mess.”
Recent US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission guidance, for example, confirmed what employment lawyers had already been counseling businesses to do, according to McDermott partner Carole A. Spink in a recent Law360 article.
“The guidance was important because it did clarify that employers can provide incentives for voluntary programs. [There] was a big open question about, ‘Am I going to get into trouble because I’m trying to incentivize people to be vaccinated?'”
Subscribe
