DOL: Apparent Shift Toward More Employer Friendly Policy

Actions by the federal Department of Labor portend an apparent shift toward a more employer-friendly wage and hour policy.

In early June, the DOL withdrew Obama-era guidance that called for an expansive definition of joint employment relationships and stated that most workers were employees (and not independent contractors). Weeks later, the DOL announced that it would reinstate its historical practice of issuing opinion letters. Such letters are an official, written opinion by the DOL's Wage and Hour Division about how a law applies to the specific situation described by a requesting employer, employee or other inquirer. From 2010 to 2016 under the Obama administration, the DOL had replaced that practice with use of more general interpretive guidance, publishing 11 interpretations during that period. U.S. Secretary of Labor Alexander Acosta explained that the opinion letters facilitate better understanding of the Fair Labor Standards Act and other statutes and