Employee Retirement Income Security Act class action lawsuits filed earlier this year against the group health plans of two large US employers underscore the importance of implementing formal welfare benefit plan governance structures that include fiduciary committees comparable to the governance structures employer sponsors of retirement plans routinely adopt.
This recent article, published by the Society for Human Resource Management, offers plan sponsors a list of practical action items to consider to help protect themselves from risks related to the fiduciary governance of their health and welfare plans.
US employers are taking steps to provide abortion access to workers despite threats from anti-abortion activists and conservative lawmakers. In this Law360 article, McDermott’s Sarah Raaii said that “we’re certainly continuing to monitor” threats against employers.
“And we’re now in the position — really an unprecedented position for employers — of having to potentially look at 50 different states’ very specifically written laws regarding reproductive health care,” Raaii said. “Some states require some type of coverage, some states prohibit it. So it’s become a lot more burdensome for employers.”
What should employers be telling workers about monkeypox? In this Fortune article, McDermott Partner Michelle Strowhiro said the first thing is to make sure workers properly understand the signs and symptoms of the viral disease.
“Now’s the time to evolve [your] COVID-19 policy into a greater safety policy that includes monkeypox, and covers the symptoms of monkeypox and protocols of what to do if you have symptoms or test positive,” Strowhiro said.
On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court of the United States issued its decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (Dobbs), overturning Roe v. Wade (Roe) and upending 50 years of precedent protecting a woman’s right to privacy in choosing to abort a pregnancy prior to the point of viability.
The effect of this decision on US companies cannot be understated. Any organization whose operations touch family planning services in any way (e.g., providers, those that facilitate operations, investors, payors, employers that provide family planning benefits and health plan service providers) should immediately examine their precise services, geographic footprint, corporate structure and organizational priorities.
The SECURE Act—the most significant piece of retirement plan legislation in more than a decade—is now law. Plan sponsors should immediately start considering how changes included in the SECURE Act could impact their retirement and health and welfare plans in 2020 and beyond.
The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) adopted changes to the required financial statement disclosures of employee benefit plans with investments in master trusts. The changes will standardize the content and presentation of information reported in plans’ financial statements. Learn about the six significant items the FASB guidance addresses.
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) recently issued Notice 2015-86, which provides some additional clarification, in the form of questions and answers, on the treatment of same-sex spouses under tax-qualified retirement plans and health and welfare plans, including cafeteria plans, as a result of the June 26, 2015, decision from the Supreme Court of the United States in Obergefell v. Hodges.
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