Try our Advanced Search for more refined results
Benefits
-
January 15, 2025
Davis Wright Atty Says Firm Is Trying To Push Him Out
An attorney employed by Davis Wright has launched a pro se employment discrimination lawsuit in Washington state court, accusing the firm of trying to "strong-arm" him into leaving after he reported what he described as misconduct by a partner and banishing him from its Seattle office when he threatened legal action.
-
January 15, 2025
9th Circ. Eyes Undoing Trans Patients' Win In ACA Bias Suit
The Ninth Circuit seemed inclined Wednesday to strike down a trial court win for patients who challenged Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois' administration of their employer-provided health plans containing gender-affirming care exclusions, with two judges questioning why those employers weren't part of the case.
-
January 15, 2025
Symetra Life Policyholders Seek $32.5M Settlement Approval
A proposed class of Symetra policyholders asked a Washington federal court to preliminarily approve a $32.5 million deal to resolve a suit alleging that the insurer overcharged them for life insurance, saying the 11-state settlement would cover the owners of 43,000 policies.
-
January 15, 2025
Duke Settles Retiree's Mortality Data Suit At 4th Circ.
Duke University told the Fourth Circuit it has agreed to settle a retiree's proposed class action claiming the school used outdated mortality data to calculate retirement benefits and underpaid former employees by millions of dollars, ending the university's attempt to send the case to arbitration.
-
January 15, 2025
Maine Chamber, Shipyard Challenge State Paid Leave Rule
The Maine State Chamber of Commerce and U.S. shipyard Bath Iron Works told a state court that certain provisions of the rule for the state medical leave program are illegal, arguing that employers will shell out conspicuous amounts into a fund they won't use.
-
January 15, 2025
Banks Must Face Pension Funds' Mexican Bond-Rigging Suit
A Manhattan federal judge refused Wednesday to throw out a case brought by U.S. pension funds that accused a group of banks of conspiring to rig Mexican government bond prices, saying chatroom transcripts between traders showed evidence of collusion.
-
January 15, 2025
IRS Issues Corp. Bond Monthly Yield Curve For Jan.
The Internal Revenue Service on Wednesday published the corporate bond monthly yield curve for January for use in calculations for defined benefit plans, as well as corresponding segment rates and other related provisions.
-
January 14, 2025
Conn. City Hits PBMs And Pharma Cos. With Insulin Pricing Suit
A city partway between New Haven and Hartford took pharmacy benefit managers and drug makers including CVS Health Corp., Eli Lilly and Co. and Novo Nordisk Inc. to Connecticut federal court on Monday, alleging that they conspired to keep diabetes medications and insulin at needlessly high prices.
-
January 14, 2025
TikTok Moderation Co.'s $5.5M Investor Deal Gets Initial OK
A Florida federal judge on Tuesday gave the first green light to a $5.5 million deal between TikTok content moderation company Teleperformance and a pension fund, resolving claims that investors were harmed after investigative reports were published claiming that Teleperformance was working its staff into the ground and forcing them to watch harmful content with no support.
-
January 14, 2025
8th Circ. Says Arb. Board Must Decide Worker Vacation Issue
A Missouri federal judge should have let an arbitration board decide whether a wrongfully fired railroad conductor qualified for paid vacation time after his reinstatement, the Eighth Circuit said Tuesday, reversing the judge's decision that the worker qualified and remanding the issue to the arbitration board.
-
January 14, 2025
DXC Says Investor Suit Shows Integration Problems, Not Fraud
DXC Technology has asked a Virginia federal court to toss a shareholder suit alleging the information technology giant overhyped efforts to reduce restructuring and integration costs after acquiring several companies, arguing hindsight critiques from the current CEO do not establish securities fraud.
-
January 14, 2025
Airline Workers' Attys Get $4.2M From ESOP Deal
A Delaware federal judge Tuesday awarded over $4.2 million in fees to class counsel in a suit over alleged mismanagement of the employee stock ownership plan at bankrupt cargo hauler Western Global Airlines that was settled in September for $14.5 million.
-
January 14, 2025
FTC Issues Second Report On PBMs, Expanding Study Scope
The Federal Trade Commission released a second "interim" report on pharmacy benefit managers and their effects on specialty drug prices Tuesday, claiming that the companies have driven up prices well over acquisition costs and continue to squeeze independent pharmacies out of the market through low reimbursement rates.
-
January 14, 2025
NFL Plan On Hook For Atty Fees Despite 5th Circ. Win
The NFL retirement plan must cover up to $1.86 million in attorney fees and expenses for a former running back who said the plan mishandled his disability benefits application, a Texas federal judge ruled, saying the Fifth Circuit's reversal of his bench trial win didn't discredit his exposure of the plan's systemic issues.
-
January 14, 2025
Mass. AG Says Insulin Makers, Middlemen Colluded On Costs
Insulin makers Eli Lilly, Sanofi and Novo Nordisk conspired with pharmacy benefit managers OptumRX, Express Scripts and CVS Caremark to jack up prices by as much as 1,000%, the Massachusetts attorney general alleged in a suit.
-
January 14, 2025
Feds Ask 2 Years For Ex-Pol On Tax, Pandemic Aid Charges
A former Massachusetts state senator should spend two years in prison after being convicted of illegally obtaining unemployment assistance and filing a false tax return, the federal government argued, citing the "greed" at the heart of the politician's conduct.
-
January 14, 2025
DOL Finalizes ERISA Voluntary Correction Program Changes
The U.S. Department of Labor's employee benefits arm has finalized changes to a program allowing retirement plan managers to voluntarily self-correct when they fail to forward employee contributions on time or make other transaction errors, according to a notice the agency posted online Tuesday.
-
January 13, 2025
Justices Lean Toward Narrow Ruling In Retiree's ADA Fight
Several U.S. Supreme Court justices seemed wary Monday of issuing a sweeping decree in a disabled retiree's Americans with Disabilities Act lawsuit, hinting at plans to issue a narrower decision tailored to the specifics of the case.
-
January 13, 2025
IRS Eases Process Of Insurance Co. Alternate Tax Revocation
The Internal Revenue Service laid out a streamlined process Monday by which certain insurance companies that took an elective application of an alternative tax may obtain automatic consent to revoke that election.
-
January 13, 2025
$13.4M Suit Against Insurer For Conn. Death Verdict Paused
A Connecticut state court judge has rejected Hanover Insurance Co.'s bid to dismiss a mother's lawsuit seeking to partially enforce a $13.4 million trial judgment over her son's death in a group home, but agreed to pause the matter while the group home appeals the verdict.
-
January 13, 2025
Bechtel Escapes 401(k) Suit Alleging Shoddy Default Fund
A Virginia federal judge dismissed a retiree's suit claiming Bechtel Global Corp. tapped a pricey and underperforming fund for its retirement plan's default investment option, tossing the suit a second time for failing to show that a comparable fund was a better option.
-
January 13, 2025
Feds Say NC Medical Biz Owner Overbilled For Nutrient Drinks
A North Carolina businessman who ran a durable medical equipment business under multiple names overbilled the state's Medicaid program $1.85 million for special enteral nutritional formulas used to treat inherited metabolic disorders when he was actually just providing people common nutritional shakes like Ensure, the federal government said.
-
January 13, 2025
Justices Won't Hear Auto Parts Co.'s ERISA Arbitration Push
The U.S. Supreme Court declined Monday to review the Sixth Circuit's refusal to force arbitration of a suit accusing an auto parts company of packing its employee retirement plan with subpar investment options.
-
January 10, 2025
Up Next At High Court: Porn ID Check & Retiree Discrimination
The U.S. Supreme Court will return to the bench Monday for a full argument session, in which the justices will debate whether a Texas law requiring pornography websites to verify their visitors aren't minors violates the First Amendment and if retirees have the right to sue former employers for benefits discrimination.
-
January 10, 2025
X Fights Finding Severance Row Contract Claims Can Survive
X Corp. and Elon Musk squared off with ex-Twitter workers in Delaware federal court, filing dueling briefs that took opposing stances over whether a district judge should adopt a recommendation to keep alive some breach-of-contract allegations in the workers' proposed class action claiming they were cheated out of severance benefits.
Expert Analysis
-
Plan Sponsors Must Prep For New Mental Health, Drug Rules
To comply with newly published health insurance rules requiring parity between access to mental health and substance use services compared to medical and surgical services, employers with self-insured plans will need to update third-party administrator agreements and collect data, among other compliance steps, say attorneys at Kilpatrick.
-
How Cos. Can Protect Supply Chains During The Port Strike
With dock workers at ports along the East and Gulf Coasts launching a strike that will likely cause severe supply chain disruptions, there are several steps exporters and importers can take to protect their businesses and mitigate increased costs, say attorneys at Thompson Hine.
-
Litigation Inspiration: Honoring Your Learned Profession
About 30,000 people who took the bar exam in July will learn they passed this fall, marking a fitting time for all attorneys to remember that they are members in a specialty club of learned professionals — and the more they can keep this in mind, the more benefits they will see, says Bennett Rawicki at Hilgers Graben.
-
FTC Focus: How Scrutiny Of PBMs And Insulin May Play Out
Should Express Scripts' recent judicial challenge to the Federal Trade Commission succeed, any new targets could add litigation and choice of forum to their playbooks, and potential FTC court action on insulin could be forced to parallel venues as the issues between the commission and PBMs evolve, say attorneys at Proskauer.
-
Opinion
AI May Limit Key Learning Opportunities For Young Attorneys
The thing that’s so powerful about artificial intelligence is also what’s most scary about it — its ability to detect patterns may curtail young attorneys’ chance to practice the lower-level work of managing cases, preventing them from ever honing the pattern recognition skills that undergird creative lawyering, says Sarah Murray at Trialcraft.
-
Series
Round-Canopy Parachuting Makes Me A Better Lawyer
Similar to the practice of law, jumping from an in-flight airplane with nothing but training and a few yards of parachute silk is a demanding and stressful endeavor, and the experience has bolstered my legal practice by enhancing my focus, teamwork skills and sense of perspective, says Thomas Salerno at Stinson.
-
SEC Settlement Holds Important Pay-To-Play Lessons
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s recent fine of an investment adviser, whose new hire made a campaign contribution within a crucial lookback period, is a seasonable reminder for public fund managers to ensure their processes thoroughly screen all associates for even minor violations of the SEC’s strict pay-to-play rule, say attorneys at Lowenstein Sandler.
-
Why Now Is The Time For Law Firms To Hire Lateral Partners
Partner and associate mobility data from the second quarter of this year suggest that there's never been a better time in recent years for law firms to hire lateral candidates, particularly experienced partners — though this necessitates an understanding of potential red flags, say Julie Henson and Greg Hamman at Decipher Investigative Intelligence.
-
Considering Possible PR Risks Of Certain Legal Tactics
Disney and American Airlines recently abandoned certain litigation tactics in two lawsuits after fierce public backlash, illustrating why corporate counsel should consider the reputational implications of any legal strategy and partner with their communications teams to preempt public relations concerns, says Chris Gidez at G7 Reputation Advisory.
-
It's No Longer Enough For Firms To Be Trusted Advisers
Amid fierce competition for business, the transactional “trusted adviser” paradigm from which most firms operate is no longer sufficient — they should instead aim to become trusted partners with their most valuable clients, says Stuart Maister at Strategic Narrative.
-
Basics Of Collective Bargaining Law In Principle And Practice
Excerpt from Practical Guidance
Rebecca Bernhard and Jennifer Service at Barnes & Thornburg discuss the nuts and bolts of what the National Labor Relations Act requires of employers during collective bargaining, and translate these obligations into practical steps that will help companies prepare for, and succeed during, the negotiation process.
-
Missouri Injunction A Setback For State Anti-ESG Rules
A Missouri federal court’s recent order enjoining the state’s anti-ESG rules comes amid actions by state legislatures to revise or invalidate similar legislation imposing disclosure and consent requirements around environmental, social and governance investing, and could be a blueprint for future challenges, say attorneys at Paul Hastings.
-
How Methods Are Evolving In Textualist Interpretations
Textualists at the U.S. Supreme Court are increasingly considering new methods such as corpus linguistics and surveys to evaluate what a statute's text communicates to an ordinary reader, while lower courts even mull large language models like ChatGPT as supplements, says Kevin Tobia at Georgetown Law.
-
Employers Should Not Neglect Paid Military Leave Compliance
An August decision from the Ninth Circuit and the settlement of a long-running class action, both examining paid leave requirements under the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, are part of a nationwide trend that should prompt employers to review their military leave policies to avoid potential litigation and reputational damage, says Bradford Kelley at Littler.
-
Opinion
Congress Must Do More To Bolster ERISA Protections
As the Employee Retirement Income Security Act turns 50 this month, we applaud Congress for championing a statute that protects worker and retiree rights, but further action is needed to ban arbitration clauses in plan provisions and codify regulations imperiled by the U.S. Supreme Court’s Chevron ruling, say Michelle Yau and Eleanor Frisch at Cohen Milstein.