WHD Issues Another Momentous Interpretation, Mapping Joint Employer Status On Horizontal And Vertical Planes

As we predicted, the federal Wage and Hour Division has issued another edict that will have far-ranging effects on businesses across the U.S. economy, specifically those sharing employees with related operations or relying on third parties to perform or staff services that their own employees would otherwise carry out. On Wednesday, the WHD issued a new Administrator's Interpretation that enunciates what its author, Dr. David Weil, describes as clear guidance regarding the standards for determining whether a business can be held jointly responsible with one or more other businesses for violating the pay and labor provisions of the FLSA and the Migrant Worker Protection Act. Here, we focus here on the FLSA.