Labor & Employment

The New Jersey Law Against Discrimination protects people from discrimination in employment, housing, and places of public accommodation, based on their:

1. Disability,

2. Race or color,

3. Religion or creed,

4. National origin, nationality, or ancestry,

5. Sex, pregnancy, or breastfeeding,

6. Sexual orientation,

7. Gender identity or expression,

8. Marital status or domestic partnership/civil union status,

9. Liability for military service,

10. In housing: familial status and source of lawful income used for rental or mortgage payments;

11. In employment: age, atypical hereditary cellular or blood trait, genetic information, and the refusal to submit to a genetic test or make available to an employer the results of a genetic test.

Federal laws, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, also offer protections and remedies to those who have been discriminated against. Similarly, Pennsylvania and New York have enacted laws similar to New Jersey’s which offer protections employees based on a wide range of protected classes. The experienced employment law attorneys at Malamut & Associates litigate employment discrimination claims to and through trial, or settlement, and fight zealously on behalf of all of their clients.

State and federal laws require employers to create and maintain a safe work environment for its employees, free of sexual harassment and sexual assault, and prohibit employees from being discriminated against based on their sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity or expression. Unfortunately, far too many employers do not take this responsibility seriously and fail to take measures to prevent sexual harassment and sexual assault that was foreseeable and entirely avoidable in their workplaces.

The experienced employment law attorneys at Malamut & Associates hold employers accountable for failing to train their employees, failing to prevent, and failing to intervene in sexual harassment or sexual assault suffered by their employees, and will zealously litigate these claims to and through trial, or settlement, on behalf of all of their clients.

The law grants employers a wide range of latitude to hire, promote, and terminate employees as they choose. However, state and federal laws do carve out some reasons for which an employer may not terminate an employee, or otherwise inflict an adverse employment action (demotion, decrease in pay, etc.) against the employee, including:

1. Discrimination based on: (A) disability, (B) race or color, (C) religion or creed, (D) national origin, nationality, or ancestry, (E) sex, pregnancy, or breastfeeding, (F) sexual orientation, (G) gender identity or expression, (H) disability, (I) marital status or domestic partnership/civil union status, (J) Liability for military service, (K) in housing: familial status and source of lawful income used for rental or mortgage payments, (L) in employment: age, atypical hereditary cellular or blood trait, genetic information, and the refusal to submit to a genetic test or make available to an employer the results of a genetic test.

2. Retaliation for reporting or complaining of discrimination based on any of the categories above.

3. Retaliation for filing a workers’ compensation claim.

4. Retaliation for reporting or complaining about a violation of a state or federal law, rule, or regulation, or a violation of public policy, committed by the employer. This includes complaints/reports made to your managers or supervisors, as well as to any law enforcement or government agencies.

New Jersey law protects employees who report or complain of violations of state or federal laws, rules, or regulations, or violations of public policy, committed by their employers. This includes complaints/reports made to your managers or supervisors, as well as to any law enforcement or government agencies.

If your employer retaliated against you after you reported or complained of a violation of law or public policy, you may have a claim against your employer under the Conscientious Employee Protection Act (CEPA), or several other state and federal laws that protect whistleblowers.

Under state and federal law, you are entitled to the minimum wage for the first 40 hours you work in any week. After the first 40 hours, you are entitled to overtime wages at a rate of time-and-a-half your normal hourly rate, with few exceptions. Even if you are salaried or commission-based, state and federal laws entitle you to be paid all monies you are owe in a timely manner.

If you are owed unpaid or underpaid hourly wages, commissions, or salary, you may have a legal claim against your employer. In cases in which numerous employees are owed unpaid or underpaid wages, it may be possible to take action against your employer on a class action or collective action basis.

Hourly wage workers are entitled to be paid overtime rates for time worked in excess of 40 hours in any given week, with few exceptions. In addition, some commission-based employees are also entitled to the minimum wage and overtime wages if their annual income does not rise to a certain threshold.

If you are owed overtime wages, you may have a legal claim against your employer. In cases in which numerous employees are owed unpaid overtime wages, it may be possible to take action against your employer on a class action or collective action basis.

Public works projects and public contracts often require workers on those projects to be paid the prevailing wage. All too often, government contractors commit wage theft against their employees by withholding, or skimming, some of their employees’ hard-earned hourly wages.

If your employer is not paying you and/or your co-workers the prevailing wage on a public project, you may have a claim for those unpaid wages, as well as an action under the state or federal False Claims Act (sometimes referred to as a qui tam action).

An unscrupulous employer’s greed is rarely limited to one victim. If you and many other co-workers are suffering from unpaid or underpaid regular or overtime wages, you may be able to bring a unified claim against your employer in the form of a class action or a collective action.

The law grants employers a wide range of latitude to hire, promote, and terminate employees as they choose. However, an employer may never terminate, demote, or decrease the salary of an employee in retaliation for that employee filing a workers’ compensation claim after suffering a workplace injury.

Does your “employment agreement” allegedly contain a “mandatory” or “enforceable” arbitration “agreement”?

Why all the quotation marks? Often, these alleged “agreements” are not enforceable, not mandatory, or not supported by the law. In fact, the law on the enforceability of these agreements is often evolving or changing. You should never assume that one of these agreements is enforceable simply because your employer, or former employer, tells you so. Remember, their goal is to prevent you from having your day in court before a jury of your peers, which is not something you should ever give up without a fight.