Federal Labor Laws 2026: A Complete Guide for HR & Employer Compliance

Accurate as of May 1, 2026. This guide is informational and not legal advice. For specific situations, consult licensed U.S. employment counsel.

Federal employment law is the floor every state builds on. It sets the baseline minimum wage, the rules for overtime, the discrimination protections that follow workers across state lines, the leave rights that travel with serious illness or a new baby, the safety obligations every employer owes, and the post-employment guardrails on retaliation, benefits, and final pay. State and local laws can layer extra protections on top, but they cannot drop below the federal floor.

That floor moved in real, observable ways during 2025 and into 2026. The Trump administration rescinded the Biden-era federal contractor minimum wage. The FTC abandoned its appeal of the vacated non-compete rule. The EEOC voted to rescind its 2024 harassment guidance. Courts upheld the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act after a wave of state challenges. The 2024 DOL salary threshold rule remained vacated, leaving the white-collar exemption stuck at the 2019 level. Each shift changes the practical compliance posture for HR teams without changing the underlying statutes.

This guide walks through the federal employment law landscape an HR team needs to operate safely across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories. It covers wages and hours, leave, discrimination and harassment, hiring and verification, benefits, safety, layoffs, retaliation, and federal whistleblower regimes, with effective dates and statute citations grounded in current government and primary sources. For state-specific rules that go beyond the federal baseline, the California compliance guide and the rest of the state pillars are the right next stop.

The 2026 Federal Employment Law Updates HR Teams Should Know First

Several federal-level changes in the past 18 months reshape how compliance work gets prioritized. None of these rewrote a statute, but each of them moved the practical line on what HR teams need to watch.

• Federal contractor minimum wage rescinded. Executive Order 14236 (March 14, 2025) revoked Executive Order 14026, which had set the federal contractor minimum wage at $17.75 effective January 1, 2025. The Department of Labor stopped enforcing EO 14026 and announced it would rescind the implementing rule at 29 CFR Part 23.
• EO 13658 contractor wage continues. The older Executive Order 13658 contractor minimum wage rises to $13.65 per hour on May 11, 2026 for non-tipped workers on covered contracts. EO 13658 covers contracts entered into between January 1, 2015 and January 30, 2022.
• FTC non-compete rule officially abandoned. The FTC voted 3-1 on September 5, 2025 to drop its appeal of Ryan, LLC v. FTC, which had vacated the rule. Non-compete enforcement returns to state law plus case-by-case FTC challenges under existing antitrust authority.
• EEOC rescinded its 2024 harassment guidance. The Commission voted 2-1 in January 2026 to rescind the Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace, citing the prior rule's gender-identity provisions. Title VII still prohibits harassment based on every protected class. Only the guidance interpreting the standards is gone.
• PWFA upheld on appeal. The Fifth Circuit reversed a district court decision in August 2025, holding that Congress lawfully enacted the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act and that workers nationwide remain protected.
• FLSA salary threshold remains $684 per week. The 2024 DOL rule that would have raised the EAP minimum to $1,128 per week was vacated by the Eastern District of Texas on November 15, 2024. The DOL is enforcing the 2019 threshold of $684 per week ($35,568 annualized) and the highly compensated employee threshold of $107,432.
• I-9 enforcement surged. ICE issued more than 1,800 Notices of Inspection between January and June 2025, a tenfold increase over the prior year. The current Form I-9 carries an edition date of January 20, 2025.
• NLRB heading toward a new majority. The President's April 2026 nomination of James Macy positions the Board for a Republican majority. Stericycle, Cemex, and other Biden-era decisions are likely to be revisited but remain binding precedent until that happens.

The detail on each item, plus the rest of the federal framework, follows below.

The Fair Labor Standards Act and the Federal Minimum Wage

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) sets the federal floor for minimum wage, overtime pay, recordkeeping, and child labor. It applies to most private employers and to most public agencies, and it is enforced by the U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division.

The FLSA's federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour, and it has been since July 24, 2009. Where state or local minimum wages are higher, employees are entitled to the higher rate.

When does federal minimum wage actually apply?

The federal floor still matters even where state law is higher. Common scenarios: employees in states without their own minimum wage law (Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, South Carolina), employees of federal-only enterprises that aren't subject to state wage laws, and any case where state law is silent on a wage and hour question.

For HR teams running multistate operations, the practical rule is straightforward:

• Pay the higher of: the federal $7.25 minimum, the state minimum, or any applicable local minimum (city or county).
• Track all three. Federal updates rarely. State minimums update annually in many states. Local minimums (Seattle, San Francisco, NYC, Denver, Minneapolis) often have their own annual indexing.
• Apply the rate that produces the highest wage for that location. Mixing minimums across employees in the same role across states is normal and required.

Who is covered by the FLSA?

Two coverage tests reach virtually every U.S. workplace. Enterprise coverage applies to businesses with at least $500,000 in annual gross sales or that operate as hospitals, schools, or government agencies. Individual coverage applies to employees engaged in interstate commerce or in the production of goods for interstate commerce, even at smaller employers.

In practice, most employees are covered by one test or the other. The few exceptions tend to be small, locally-focused businesses serving customers exclusively within a single state, with no goods crossing state lines.

White-Collar Exemption Salary Threshold

FLSA exempts certain executive, administrative, professional, outside sales, and computer employees from minimum wage and overtime if they meet a duties test and earn above a salary threshold.

The 2024 DOL final rule would have raised the standard salary level to $1,128 per week ($58,656 annualized) and the highly compensated employee total annual compensation threshold to $151,164. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas vacated that rule on November 15, 2024.

The DOL is currently enforcing the 2019 thresholds. As of 2026, the operative numbers are:

• Standard salary level: $684 per week ($35,568 annualized).
• Highly compensated employee total compensation: $107,432 per year.
• Computer employees alternate threshold: $27.63 per hour (the FLSA hourly minimum for the computer exemption).

What does the duties test require?

Salary alone is not enough. Each exemption category has its own duties requirement: executives must manage at least two full-time employees and have authority over hiring/firing decisions, administrative employees must perform office work directly related to management or business operations and exercise independent judgment, learned professionals must apply advanced knowledge in a field of science or learning, and outside sales employees must work primarily away from the employer's place of business making sales.

Misclassification is one of the costliest single errors HR can make and a frequent finding in HR compliance audits. An employee misclassified as exempt is owed:

• Unpaid overtime at 1.5x regular rate for hours beyond 40 in a workweek, often two years back (three years if the violation was willful).
• Liquidated damages equal to the unpaid wages, doubling the employer's exposure.
• Plaintiffs' attorneys' fees if the employee prevails.
• Potential collective action if other workers in the same job classification share the misclassification.

Overtime Pay Under the FLSA

Non-exempt employees must receive overtime pay at one and one-half times their regular rate for all hours worked over 40 in a workweek. The FLSA does not require daily overtime, double time, or premium pay for weekend or holiday work. Those are state-law features (California has the most aggressive daily overtime rules) or contractual benefits.

The "regular rate" calculation matters more than most HR teams realize. It includes most forms of compensation, not just base hourly wage. Bonuses tied to production, commissions, shift differentials, and longevity pay all flow into the regular rate and pull the overtime rate up. Discretionary bonuses, gifts, and certain reimbursements are excluded.

Common overtime errors

A handful of pattern errors account for most overtime liability:

• Failing to include non-discretionary bonuses in the regular rate. A weekly production bonus paid to non-exempt employees raises every overtime hour worked during the bonus period.
• Misclassifying an employee as exempt when they fail the duties test or fall below the salary threshold.
• Treating salary alone as sufficient for exemption. A salaried employee can still be non-exempt if their duties don't qualify.
• Off-the-clock work: pre-shift prep, post-shift cleanup, work email outside scheduled hours, mandatory training, and travel between job sites all count as compensable time.
• Comp time in the private sector. Private employers cannot give compensatory time off in lieu of overtime pay; only public sector employers can.

Independent Contractor Classification

Whether a worker is an employee or an independent contractor under the FLSA determines whether minimum wage, overtime, FMLA, and the rest of the federal employment law framework apply at all.

The DOL issued a final rule in January 2024 returning to the longstanding "economic reality" test, applying six factors with no single factor predominant: opportunity for profit or loss, investments by the worker and employer, degree of permanence, nature and degree of control, whether the work is integral to the employer's business, and the worker's skill and initiative.

The 2024 rule remains the operative federal standard but is the subject of pending litigation, and the DOL under the new administration has signaled it may revisit the rule. State tests are often stricter. California's ABC test (codified in AB 5) is the most restrictive of the major state tests and applies presumptively to most workers, with limited statutory exceptions.

What changes when a worker is reclassified as an employee?

Reclassification triggers a stack of obligations:

• Federal income tax withholding and FICA/Medicare withholding plus the employer match.
• Federal and state unemployment insurance contributions.
• Workers' compensation coverage.
• Eligibility for FMLA, FLSA overtime, and benefit-plan participation.
• Coverage by anti-discrimination statutes the worker may not have been protected by as a contractor.
• Back wage exposure for unpaid minimum wage and overtime, often retroactive two to three years.

Federal Contractor Wages

Federal contractor wage rules sit on top of the FLSA for businesses doing work under federal contracts.

The status of the two relevant executive orders changed materially in 2025:

• EO 14026 rescinded. President Trump's Executive Order 14236, signed March 14, 2025, revoked EO 14026, which had set a $17.75 contractor minimum wage as of January 1, 2025. The DOL stopped enforcing EO 14026 and is rescinding 29 CFR Part 23.
• EO 13658 still in effect. Executive Order 13658 covers contracts entered into between January 1, 2015 and January 30, 2022. Its rate increases annually. Effective May 11, 2026, the EO 13658 minimum wage is $13.65 per hour for non-tipped workers performing on covered contracts, and the tipped minimum is $9.95 per hour.
• Davis-Bacon Act sets prevailing wage requirements for federal construction contracts above $2,000.
• Service Contract Act sets prevailing wage and benefit requirements for federal service contracts above $2,500.

Federal contractors should verify which executive order applies to each individual contract. The applicable wage is determined at contract formation, not by employer headcount.

The Equal Pay Act

The Equal Pay Act of 1963 (29 U.S.C. § 206(d)), enforced by the EEOC, prohibits sex-based wage discrimination between men and women performing substantially equal work in the same establishment.

"Substantially equal" looks at job content, not job title. Two roles can be substantially equal even with different titles if the actual duties, skill, effort, and responsibility are comparable. Pay differences are lawful only if they're based on:

• A seniority system
• A merit system
• A system measuring earnings by quantity or quality of production
• Any factor other than sex (and the employer must show this is genuinely the reason)

Equal Pay Act vs. Title VII pay claims

Equal Pay Act and Title VII pay-discrimination claims overlap, but the two statutes are not the same. The Equal Pay Act doesn't require proof of intent to discriminate. Title VII covers pay discrimination based on race, religion, national origin, sex, and (after Bostock) sexual orientation and gender identity, and reaches more situations but requires intentional discrimination.

For pay equity work, the EEOC has been active: the 2026 cycle for EEO-1 Component 2 pay data collection is back under discussion at the agency. HR teams running pay audits should preserve documentation showing the legitimate factors driving compensation differences. The EEOC pay data collection background covers what an EEO-1 Component 2 reinstatement would mean for employer reporting.

Tipped Employees and Tip Pooling

Federal law allows employers to pay a cash wage of $2.13 per hour to tipped employees, with tips making up the difference to reach $7.25. If tips fall short, the employer must make up the gap.

• Tipped employee: a worker who customarily and regularly receives more than $30 per month in tips.
• Tip credit notice: employers must inform tipped employees in advance of taking the tip credit, including the cash wage paid, the credit claimed, and that all tips are retained by the employee except for valid tip pools.
• Tip pooling: permitted among employees who customarily and regularly receive tips. Managers and supervisors cannot keep tips received from a tip pool, even if they perform service work.
• Service charges distributed to employees are wages, not tips, and count toward minimum wage but cannot satisfy the tip credit.

Many states, including California, Washington, Oregon, Minnesota, Montana, Alaska, and Nevada, prohibit the tip credit entirely. Tipped employees in those states must receive the full state minimum wage from the employer in cash before tips.

Child Labor Under the FLSA

The FLSA's child labor provisions limit the work that minors under 18 can perform. The framework is age-based:

• Under 14: generally cannot be employed, with limited exceptions (newspaper delivery, family farm work, some entertainment).
• Ages 14-15: may work limited hours in non-manufacturing, non-mining, non-hazardous jobs. School-day limits apply: maximum 3 hours on a school day, 18 hours in a school week, 8 hours on a non-school day, 40 hours in a non-school week. No work before 7 a.m. or after 7 p.m. (9 p.m. June 1 through Labor Day).
• Ages 16-17: may work unlimited hours, but cannot perform any of the 17 hazardous occupations the DOL has designated (operating most power-driven equipment, roofing, excavation, certain meat processing).
• Age 18: all FLSA child labor restrictions end.

Civil money penalties for child labor violations are adjusted for inflation each year and can exceed $15,000 per violation, with substantially higher penalties when a violation results in serious injury or death. Several states have moved to relax their child labor rules in recent years; federal limits remain a hard ceiling.

PUMP Act: Lactation Accommodation

The Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers Act (PUMP Act), signed into law December 29, 2022, expanded the FLSA's break time for nursing mothers provision to cover most workers excluded under the original 2010 law.

PUMP Act requirements:

• Reasonable break time to express breast milk for up to one year after the child's birth, each time the employee needs to express milk.
• A private space that is shielded from view, free from intrusion, and is not a bathroom.
• Compensation rules: if an employee is not completely relieved from duty during the break, that time is paid. If pumping during an existing paid break (e.g., a paid 15-minute rest break), the employee continues to be paid.
• Employer coverage: all FLSA-covered employers, with a narrow undue hardship exemption available only to employers with fewer than 50 employees.

What changed for previously excluded workers?

The PUMP Act extended coverage to roughly 9 million more workers of childbearing age, including:

• Salaried exempt employees
• Teachers
• Registered nurses and other healthcare workers
• Agricultural workers
• Many transportation workers (with certain limited exceptions for airline crews and railroad employees)

An employee whose employer denies break time or space can file an FLSA enforcement action and, in many cases, sue directly after first putting the employer on written notice and giving 10 days to comply.

The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA)

The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 entitles eligible employees to up to 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave per 12-month period for specified family and medical reasons, with continuation of group health insurance coverage during the leave.

Who is covered?

FMLA covers private-sector employers who employ 50 or more employees in 20 or more workweeks in the current or preceding calendar year. Public agencies and public/private elementary and secondary schools are covered without the 50-employee minimum.

For employees, eligibility requires three things:

• 12 months of employment with the employer (does not need to be consecutive).
• 1,250 hours of service during the 12 months immediately preceding leave.
• Employment at a worksite where the employer has at least 50 employees within a 75-mile radius.

Qualifying reasons for leave

FMLA leave can be taken for:

• Birth of a child and bonding within 12 months of birth
• Placement of a child for adoption or foster care within 12 months
• A serious health condition that makes the employee unable to perform essential job functions
• Care for a spouse, child, or parent with a serious health condition
• Qualifying exigency arising from a covered family member's military deployment
• Military caregiver leave: up to 26 weeks in a single 12-month period to care for a covered servicemember with a serious injury or illness

Serious health condition

A "serious health condition" is an illness, injury, impairment, or physical or mental condition that involves either inpatient care or continuing treatment by a healthcare provider. Continuing treatment means more than three consecutive days of incapacity plus two visits to a healthcare provider, or one visit plus a regimen of continuing treatment.

FMLA also covers chronic conditions (asthma, diabetes, epilepsy) and pregnancy or prenatal care, even when the condition does not result in three days of incapacity.

Notice and certification

Employers may require:

• 30 days' advance notice for foreseeable leave; as soon as practicable for unforeseeable leave.
• Medical certification from a healthcare provider supporting the need for leave.
• Periodic recertification during long absences (no more often than every 30 days in most circumstances).
• Fitness-for-duty certification before return to work, if applied uniformly to all returning employees.

Interference with FMLA rights and retaliation against employees who take FMLA leave are independently actionable. The DOL's Wage and Hour Division enforces FMLA, and employees can also bring private suits.

Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA)

The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act took effect June 27, 2023. The EEOC issued the final regulation on April 15, 2024, published it in the Federal Register on April 19, 2024, and the regulation went into effect June 18, 2024.

PWFA requires employers with 15 or more employees to provide reasonable accommodations to a worker's known limitations related to pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions, unless the accommodation would impose an undue hardship.

What counts as a covered limitation?

The final rule's interpretation of "known limitation" is broad:

• Conditions caused by pregnancy such as gestational diabetes, preeclampsia, and hyperemesis
• Pregnancy-related conditions like morning sickness, edema, lactation, and lifting restrictions
• Postpartum conditions including recovery from cesarean section and postpartum depression
• Pregnancy loss including miscarriage, stillbirth, and termination
• Episodic conditions related to pregnancy, even if they don't rise to the ADA's definition of a disability

Examples of accommodations

Common PWFA accommodations include modified work schedules, additional bathroom breaks, food and water at the workstation, seating, lifting restrictions, light duty, time off for prenatal appointments, and temporary reassignment to different duties. The standard is reasonableness, mirroring the ADA's framework but explicitly broader: PWFA accommodations cover normal pregnancy events that the ADA might not.

Litigation status

Nineteen states challenged the EEOC's final regulation. In August 2025, the Fifth Circuit reversed a district court decision holding parts of PWFA unconstitutional, holding that Congress lawfully enacted the statute. PWFA remains fully enforceable nationwide.

Pregnancy discrimination in hiring, firing, and other terms of employment remains separately prohibited by Title VII and the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978. PWFA adds the affirmative accommodation duty on top of those baseline non-discrimination protections. The pregnancy discrimination playbook walks through how the two regimes interact.

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964

Title VII prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. It applies to private employers, state and local governments, and educational institutions with 15 or more employees for at least 20 weeks in the current or preceding calendar year. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission enforces it.

What "sex" includes after Bostock

In Bostock v. Clayton County, 590 U.S. 644 (2020), the Supreme Court held 6-3 (Justice Gorsuch writing) that Title VII's prohibition on discrimination "because of sex" extends to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and transgender status. The Court reasoned that it is impossible to discriminate against an employee for being gay or transgender without taking the employee's sex into account.

Bostock applies to every employer covered by Title VII (15 or more employees) in every state. State law often adds explicit protections at lower headcount thresholds and broader categories.

Pregnancy under Title VII

The Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 amended Title VII to make discrimination based on pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions a form of sex discrimination. PWFA built on this foundation by adding the affirmative accommodation duty.

National origin and citizenship

Title VII prohibits national origin discrimination. The Immigration and Nationality Act separately prohibits citizenship-status discrimination by employers with 4 or more employees, enforced by the DOJ's Immigrant and Employee Rights Section.

Religious accommodation

Title VII requires employers to reasonably accommodate an employee's religious observance, practice, and belief unless doing so would cause undue hardship to the business. The Supreme Court's decision in Groff v. DeJoy, 600 U.S. 447 (2023), raised the undue hardship bar from the long-applied "more than de minimis cost" standard to a "substantial" cost or burden in the conduct of the business.

Common religious accommodations include schedule adjustments (Sabbath observance), dress and grooming exceptions, prayer breaks, and excused attendance at religious holidays. Employers must engage in an interactive process and document the analysis if they conclude an accommodation creates undue hardship.

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA)

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 prohibits employment discrimination against persons 40 years of age or older. ADEA applies to private employers with 20 or more employees, state and local governments, employment agencies, labor organizations, and the federal government.

What ADEA covers

ADEA reaches every term, condition, or privilege of employment:

• Hiring and firing decisions
• Compensation, benefits, and bonuses
• Job assignments and promotions
• Training opportunities
• Layoff selection criteria
• Harassment based on age

It does not protect workers under 40. Younger workers facing age-based discrimination need to look to state law (some states protect workers of any age) or to other federal protections that may apply.

Older Workers Benefit Protection Act

The Older Workers Benefit Protection Act of 1990 amended ADEA to govern releases of age claims in severance agreements. To be valid, an ADEA waiver must:

• Be in writing and clearly understood
• Specifically reference ADEA rights
• Provide consideration beyond what the employee is already entitled to
• Advise the employee in writing to consult an attorney
• Give 21 days to consider (45 days for group layoffs) and 7 days to revoke after signing
• For group layoffs, include disclosure of the ages and job titles of those selected and not selected

A waiver that fails any of these elements is unenforceable as to the ADEA claim. The 7-day revocation right cannot be waived. The reduction in force compliance overview walks through the OWBPA disclosure rules in more depth.

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, as amended by the ADA Amendments Act of 2008, prohibits employment discrimination against qualified individuals with disabilities and requires reasonable accommodation. Title I applies to private employers with 15 or more employees, state and local governments, employment agencies, and labor organizations.

Who qualifies as having a disability?

The ADAAA broadened the definition substantially. A person has a disability if they have:

• A physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities
• A record of such an impairment
• Are regarded as having such an impairment

"Major life activities" include the obvious (walking, seeing, hearing, breathing) and the less obvious (concentrating, learning, reading, communicating, sleeping, working) and major bodily functions (immune system, normal cell growth, neurological, brain, respiratory, circulatory, endocrine, reproductive functions). The ADAAA explicitly directs courts to interpret disability broadly.

Reasonable accommodation

Employers must provide reasonable accommodations to qualified employees and applicants with disabilities unless doing so would cause undue hardship. Common accommodations include:

• Modified work schedules or remote work arrangements
• Adjustments to physical workspace (ergonomic equipment, accessibility features)
• Modified job duties or reassignment to a vacant position
• Adjustments to policies (allowing service animals, modified attendance policies)
• Auxiliary aids and services (interpreters, screen readers, captioning)
• Leave beyond what FMLA provides, when leave is the accommodation

The interactive process is mandatory. When an employee requests an accommodation, the employer must engage in good-faith dialogue to identify what limitations exist, what accommodations would address them, and whether any would cause undue hardship.

Pre-employment medical inquiries

ADA limits when employers can ask about medical conditions:

• Pre-offer: no medical inquiries or examinations of any kind. Limited exceptions for asking whether the applicant can perform essential job functions with or without accommodation.
• Post-offer, pre-employment: medical exams and inquiries permitted only if required of all applicants in the same job category and results are kept in a separate confidential file.
• During employment: medical inquiries must be job-related and consistent with business necessity.

Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA)

Title II of the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008, enforced by the EEOC, prohibits employment discrimination based on genetic information and limits employer acquisition and disclosure of genetic information. It applies to employers with 15 or more employees.

"Genetic information" includes:

• Information about an individual's genetic tests
• Information about genetic tests of family members
• Information about the manifestation of a disease or disorder in family members (family medical history)
• Requests for or receipt of genetic services
• Genetic information of a fetus carried by an individual or family member

GINA generally prohibits employers from requesting, requiring, or purchasing genetic information about applicants or employees. Six narrow exceptions exist (inadvertent acquisition, voluntary wellness programs with strict requirements, FMLA certifications, commercially available documents, monitoring for toxic substances under specific conditions, DNA analysis for law enforcement). Wellness programs in particular need to be designed carefully to avoid GINA pitfalls around family medical history collection.

42 U.S.C. § 1981: Race in Contracts

Section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 (42 U.S.C. § 1981) guarantees the same right to make and enforce contracts regardless of race. It is one of the most powerful tools available to employees of color because:

• No employer headcount threshold. Section 1981 applies to every employer, including a one-person shop. Title VII's 15-employee minimum is not a defense.
• Four-year statute of limitations rather than Title VII's 180/300-day EEOC charge window.
• No EEOC charge required. An employee can go straight to federal court.
• No statutory damages cap. Title VII caps compensatory and punitive damages by employer size; § 1981 does not.
• Individual liability available against decision-makers, not just the employer entity.

Section 1981 covers race-based discrimination in hiring, firing, promotion, compensation, terms and conditions of employment, and harassment. The Supreme Court's 2020 decision in Comcast Corp. v. National Association of African American-Owned Media raised the causation standard to "but-for" causation, slightly higher than Title VII's motivating-factor standard.

Workplace Harassment Standards

Federal law prohibits workplace harassment based on every protected class under Title VII (race, color, religion, sex including pregnancy, sexual orientation, and gender identity, national origin), the ADA, the ADEA, and GINA.

The Supreme Court's foundational harassment cases established the framework that still controls:

• Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson (1986): created hostile work environment as a recognized cause of action.
• Faragher v. City of Boca Raton (1998) and Burlington Industries v. Ellerth (1998): established the affirmative defense for non-tangible-employment-action harassment by supervisors.
• Vance v. Ball State University (2013): defined "supervisor" for harassment purposes as one who can take tangible employment actions.

The two harassment categories

Federal harassment law (covered in depth across recent major employment law cases) breaks into two basic patterns:

• Quid pro quo: a supervisor conditions employment terms on submission to or rejection of harassment. Vicarious liability is automatic for tangible employment actions.
• Hostile work environment: harassment severe or pervasive enough to alter the terms and conditions of employment from a reasonable person's perspective. The hostile work environment standard turns on whether a tangible action occurred and what the employer did once it knew or should have known.

The Faragher/Ellerth defense

When a supervisor creates a hostile environment but takes no tangible employment action, the employer can avoid vicarious liability by proving:

1. The employer exercised reasonable care to prevent and promptly correct any harassing behavior.
2. The employee unreasonably failed to take advantage of preventive or corrective opportunities or to otherwise avoid harm.

Practically, this requires a real anti-harassment policy with multiple reporting channels, training, prompt and thorough workplace investigations using a structured set of interview questions, and documented corrective action when complaints are substantiated.

2024 EEOC harassment guidance and 2026 rescission

The EEOC issued comprehensive Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace on April 29, 2024, the first new agency-wide harassment guidance since 1999. It included over 70 examples covering virtual harassment, harassment based on pregnancy and lactation, sexual orientation and gender identity harassment under Bostock, and the interplay with religious accommodation.

In January 2026, the EEOC voted 2-1 to rescind the 2024 guidance, citing concerns that portions exceeded Title VII authority and conflicted with executive branch policy on gender identity. The rescission does not change the underlying law. Title VII still prohibits harassment in every protected category. Federal courts continue to apply Bostock. Employers should still maintain anti-harassment policies, training, and investigation procedures consistent with the case law that the rescinded guidance summarized.

For an unpacking of harassment categories at the level HR leaders need for policy work, the EEOC harassment definitions and the quid pro quo harassment guide walk through the standard examples.

Retaliation

Title VII, ADEA, ADA, FMLA, FLSA, ERISA, OSHA, NLRA, and effectively every federal employment statute include anti-retaliation provisions. Retaliation claims are now the single most common charge category at the EEOC, often filed in conjunction with an underlying discrimination charge.

A federal retaliation claim has three elements: protected activity, adverse action, and a causal connection. "Protected activity" is broad and includes:

• Filing a complaint with the EEOC, OSHA, NLRB, or DOL
• Filing or participating in a lawsuit
• Internal complaints to HR or management about suspected violations
• Refusing to follow an order that would violate the law
• Participating in an investigation as a witness
• Requesting an accommodation under the ADA, PWFA, or Title VII (religious)
• Discussing wages with coworkers (NLRA Section 7)

"Adverse action" under Burlington Northern v. White (2006) is anything that would dissuade a reasonable worker from engaging in protected activity. It need not be a formal employment action. Schedule changes, exclusion from meetings, and assignment changes can all qualify.

For prevention, the strongest defense is process: documented investigations, separation of complaint-handling from the manager's chain of command where possible, consistent treatment of similarly situated employees, and a paper trail showing performance concerns existed before the protected activity. The retaliation prevention checklist covers practical workflow steps.

Pay Transparency and EEO-1 Reporting

There is no federal pay transparency statute requiring employers to disclose salary ranges in job postings. That obligation, where it exists, comes from state and local law (California, Colorado, Washington, New York, Illinois, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Vermont, and a growing list of cities).

Federal pay-related obligations come through:

• EEO-1 Component 1 reporting. Private employers with 100 or more employees and federal contractors with 50 or more employees must file annual demographic data on workforce composition by race, ethnicity, sex, and EEO-1 job category.
• EEO-1 Component 2 (pay data). Briefly required for 2017 and 2018 reporting before the OMB stay. The EEOC has signaled interest in reinstatement, but no current rule requires Component 2 reporting in 2026.
• OFCCP audits for federal contractors, which routinely include pay equity analysis using contractor-supplied data.
• Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, which restarts the limitations clock with each discriminatory paycheck for Title VII, ADEA, ADA, and Rehabilitation Act pay claims.

Background Checks and the Fair Credit Reporting Act

When an employer uses a third-party consumer reporting agency to perform background checks, the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) imposes a strict procedural framework. Failure to follow it is an independent statutory violation regardless of what the underlying check found.

FCRA's core procedural steps:

• Standalone disclosure: a clear, conspicuous, written notice that a consumer report may be obtained for employment purposes. The disclosure must be in a document that consists "solely" of that disclosure.
• Written authorization from the applicant or employee.
• Pre-adverse action notice: if the employer intends to take adverse action based in whole or in part on the report, it must first provide the applicant a copy of the report and a "Summary of Your Rights" notice.
• Reasonable opportunity to dispute before final action (the FTC has indicated five business days as a working baseline).
• Adverse action notice after the decision, including notice of the consumer reporting agency, the right to obtain a free copy within 60 days, and the right to dispute accuracy.

Class-action exposure for procedural FCRA violations has been significant. Common errors include disclosure forms that combine FCRA notice with a release of liability, missing pre-adverse action notices, and skipping the Summary of Rights document. Many states layer additional restrictions on what types of background information can be considered (ban-the-box laws, salary history bans, restrictions on credit checks).

Employment Eligibility Verification (I-9, IRCA, E-Verify)

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 requires employers to verify that every employee is authorized to work in the United States. The mechanism is Form I-9, completed within three business days of hire.

Current Form I-9 status

The current Form I-9 has an edition date of January 20, 2025 and a stated expiration date of May 31, 2027. Older editions remain acceptable for a transition period announced by USCIS, but employers should move to the current edition.

Section-by-section requirements

• Section 1: employee completes by first day of employment, attests to citizenship/work authorization status.
• Section 2: employer reviews acceptable documents (List A, or one each from List B and List C) within three business days of hire and records document information.
• Reverification: required when work authorization expires (not for permanent residents on green cards).
• Retention: three years after hire date or one year after termination, whichever is later.

E-Verify

E-Verify is voluntary federal program that compares I-9 information against DHS and SSA records. Federal contractors with covered contracts must use it. Several states (Arizona, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Georgia, North Carolina, and others) require E-Verify for some or all private employers, often phased in by employer size. Florida's mandate covers all private employers with 25 or more employees.

Penalties and 2025 enforcement surge

Civil penalties for I-9 paperwork violations range from $288 to $2,861 per violation (2025 amounts, indexed). Knowing violations of hiring/employing unauthorized workers carry substantially higher penalties, plus potential criminal exposure for pattern-and-practice violations.

ICE issued more than 1,800 Notices of Inspection between January and June 2025, a tenfold increase over the comparable 2024 period. Employers should audit I-9 compliance now: confirm all I-9s are on file, check for the most common technical errors (missing dates, missing signatures, incorrect document selection), and have remediation procedures ready before an audit notice arrives.

The National Labor Relations Act

The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 protects most private-sector employees regardless of union status. Section 7 grants the right to "self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection."

Concerted activity, even without a union

Section 7 protections reach non-union workplaces. Common examples of protected concerted activity:

• Two or more employees discussing wages, hours, or working conditions
• Group complaints about safety, scheduling, or management decisions
• Posting on social media about working conditions when one employee speaks for or with others
• Walking off the job over an unsafe condition
• Petitioning the employer or a government agency about working conditions

Employer policies that "chill" Section 7 activity are unlawful, even when written in neutral terms, which is why every handbook touching investigation confidentiality should be reviewed alongside investigation best practices for the protected-activity carve-out. The NLRB's 2023 decision in Stericycle, Inc., 372 NLRB No. 113, set the current test: a workplace rule is presumptively unlawful if a reasonable employee, viewed through the lens of economic dependence on the employer, could interpret the rule as restricting Section 7 rights. The employer can rebut by proving the rule advances a legitimate, substantial business interest and cannot be replaced with a more narrowly tailored alternative.

2026 outlook

The Stericycle standard remains binding precedent. The President's April 2026 nomination of James Macy positions the Board for a Republican majority once confirmed. Employers should expect Stericycle and several other Biden-era decisions (Cemex, Atlanta Opera, Tesla, Lion Elastomers) to be candidates for revisitation. Until that happens, employers should continue auditing handbooks against the Stericycle framework.

Common handbook landmines

Policies that have drawn NLRB scrutiny under Stericycle:

• Confidentiality of investigations (broad blanket prohibitions face presumption of unlawfulness)
• Civility and professionalism rules with vague enforcement standards
• Social media policies restricting discussion of the company or coworkers
• Non-disparagement clauses in severance or employment agreements (see McLaren Macomb, 2023)
• Recording prohibitions that don't carve out protected activity

Workplace Safety: OSHA

The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 imposes a baseline duty on every covered employer through Section 5(a)(1), the General Duty Clause: "Each employer shall furnish to each of his employees employment and a place of employment which is free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm to his employees."

OSHA enforces specific standards across industries plus the General Duty Clause for hazards no specific standard addresses. Recognized hazards in past General Duty Clause citations have included workplace violence, heat illness, ergonomic injuries, and infectious disease exposure.

Core OSHA obligations

Every covered employer must:

• Comply with all applicable specific OSHA standards for the industry
• Maintain a workplace free from recognized hazards (General Duty Clause)
• Display the OSHA Job Safety and Health "It's the Law" poster
• Provide required training in a language workers understand
• Maintain OSHA 300 logs of recordable injuries and illnesses (employers with 11+ employees, with industry exemptions)
• Report fatalities within 8 hours and severe injuries (hospitalization, amputation, eye loss) within 24 hours
• Permit OSHA inspections consistent with the Fourth Amendment framework
• Refrain from retaliating against employees who report safety concerns or refuse to perform imminently dangerous work

Penalties

OSHA civil penalties (2025 amounts, adjusted annually) are roughly:

• Serious or other-than-serious: up to $16,131 per violation
• Willful or repeated: up to $161,323 per violation
• Failure to abate: up to $16,131 per day past abatement date

Twenty-eight states operate their own OSHA-approved State Plans (Cal/OSHA, Washington's DOSH, Oregon OSHA, etc.) with rules that are at least as effective as federal OSHA, often stricter. The 10 most common OSHA violations and the OSHA enforcement primer cover the standards most likely to surface in inspections.

The WARN Act

The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act of 1988 requires employers with 100 or more employees (or 100+ employees who in the aggregate work at least 4,000 hours per week, exclusive of overtime) to provide 60 calendar days' advance written notice of plant closings and mass layoffs.

When WARN notice is required

• Plant closing: a permanent or temporary shutdown of a single site of employment, or one or more facilities or operating units within a single site, that results in employment loss for 50 or more employees during any 30-day period.
• Mass layoff (smaller version): employment loss at a single site of 50 or more employees who constitute at least 33% of the employer's active workforce at that site.
• Mass layoff (larger version): employment loss at a single site of 500 or more employees, regardless of percentage of workforce.

"Employment loss" includes terminations, layoffs exceeding six months, and reductions in hours of more than 50% during each month of any six-month period.

Who gets notice

Notice must go to:

• Affected employees or their representatives
• The state's dislocated worker unit (typically a state workforce agency)
• The chief elected official of the local government where the affected site is located

Penalties

Failure to provide required WARN notice exposes the employer to back pay and benefits for each affected employee for up to 60 days plus civil penalties of up to $500 per day to the local government, capped at $30,000.

Mini-WARN states

Several states have mini-WARN laws with lower thresholds and longer notice periods, including California (75 days), New York (90 days), New Jersey (90 days plus mandatory severance for covered employers), and Illinois. Multistate layoffs need to be analyzed under the federal floor and each applicable state law.

Employee Benefits: ERISA, COBRA, and the ACA

Employer-sponsored benefit plans are governed primarily by ERISA, COBRA, HIPAA, the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act, and the Affordable Care Act. Each has its own enforcement regime.

ERISA basics

The Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) governs employee welfare and pension benefit plans. It imposes:

• Fiduciary duties on plan administrators and trustees: duty of loyalty, prudence, diversification, adherence to plan documents
• Reporting and disclosure: Form 5500 annual reports, Summary Plan Descriptions, summaries of material modifications, plan documents available on request
• Vesting and benefit accrual minimums for pension plans
• Claims procedures with administrative review rights before litigation
• Civil enforcement by participants, beneficiaries, and the DOL
• Preemption of state laws that "relate to" employee benefit plans, with some exceptions

COBRA continuation coverage

The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1986 requires employers with 20 or more employees sponsoring group health plans to offer continuation coverage when coverage would otherwise end due to a qualifying event.

Coverage period depends on the qualifying event:

• 18 months: termination (other than for gross misconduct) or reduction in hours
• 29 months: 18-month period extended for disability that begins within the first 60 days of COBRA coverage
• 36 months: for spouses and dependents on death of covered employee, divorce or legal separation, dependent child losing dependent status, or covered employee becoming entitled to Medicare

Premiums are paid by the qualified beneficiary at up to 102% of the full premium (150% during the disability extension). Notice errors are the most common COBRA violation: failure to send the initial COBRA notice within 90 days of plan enrollment, or the qualifying event notice within 14 days (or 44 days if the employer is also the plan administrator).

ACA employer mandate

The Affordable Care Act's employer shared responsibility provisions apply to applicable large employers (ALEs): organizations with 50 or more full-time equivalent employees averaged over the prior calendar year. ALEs must offer minimum essential coverage to at least 95% of full-time employees and their dependents that meets minimum value and affordability requirements.

2026 penalty amounts:

• Section 4980H(a) penalty: $3,340 per full-time employee (minus the first 30) per year, or $278.33 per month, if the employer fails to offer minimum essential coverage to 95% of full-time employees.
• Section 4980H(b) penalty: $5,010 per affected employee per year, or $417.50 per month, for each full-time employee who receives a premium tax credit on a public Marketplace because the employer's coverage was unaffordable or did not meet minimum value.
• 2026 affordability threshold: the required employee contribution for the lowest-cost employee-only minimum value plan cannot exceed 9.96% of household income (or one of three available safe harbors using federal poverty line, rate of pay, or W-2 wages).

Mental Health Parity

The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008 (MHPAEA) requires group health plans that cover mental health and substance use disorder benefits to do so on terms no more restrictive than medical/surgical benefits. The 2024 final rule (effective for plan years beginning on or after January 1, 2025) added new requirements around non-quantitative treatment limits (NQTLs), including written comparative analyses.

Whistleblower Protections

Federal whistleblower protections operate through dozens of statutes, but the most-litigated employment-side regimes are:

• Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Section 806: protects employees of publicly traded companies (and certain contractors) who report suspected violations of federal securities laws, mail/wire fraud, or shareholder fraud. 180-day filing deadline with OSHA.
• Dodd-Frank Section 922: protects employees who report securities violations to the SEC (and includes a financial bounty program). Six-year statute of limitations.
• OSHA Section 11(c): protects employees who report workplace safety violations or refuse imminent-danger work. 30-day filing deadline.
• FLSA Section 15(a)(3): protects employees who file complaints about wage and hour violations.
• NLRA Section 8(a)(4): protects employees who file charges with the NLRB.
• False Claims Act qui tam: protects employees who report federal contractor fraud and entitles them to a share of any recovery.
• Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989: protects federal government employees who report waste, fraud, abuse, or violations of law to the Office of Special Counsel or other authorities.

The procedural rules vary widely. SOX claims start with an OSHA complaint within 180 days, with administrative adjudication and "kick-out" rights to federal court if not resolved within 180 days. Dodd-Frank claims can be brought directly in federal court. State whistleblower statutes often provide additional protection on top of these federal regimes. The whistleblower retaliation overview and the Whistleblower Protection Act primer cover the patterns that show up most often in litigation, and the limits of anonymous hotlines walk through why structured intake matters more than the channel itself.

Non-Compete Agreements

Non-compete enforceability is overwhelmingly a question of state law. The federal landscape changed substantially during 2024 and 2025:

• FTC final rule (April 2024) would have prohibited most post-employment non-competes nationwide as unfair methods of competition.
• Ryan, LLC v. FTC (N.D. Tex. Aug. 20, 2024) vacated the rule on a nationwide basis, holding that the FTC exceeded its rulemaking authority.
• FTC appeal abandoned September 5, 2025. The Commission voted 3-1 to drop its appeal in the Fifth Circuit and accede to the vacatur.

Federal antitrust law still allows the FTC and DOJ to challenge non-competes case-by-case as unfair competition or restraints of trade. State law sets the operative framework: California, Minnesota, North Dakota, and Oklahoma broadly prohibit non-competes, while many other states have moved to limit non-competes for low-wage workers, healthcare workers, or below specified income thresholds.

USERRA: Military Leave

The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act of 1994 protects civilian employment for service members in the U.S. military, including the National Guard, Reserves, and most uniformed services. USERRA applies to virtually every U.S. employer regardless of size.

Core USERRA protections:

• Cumulative five-year limit on absences for military service that retain reemployment rights, with significant exceptions (initial enlistments, mandatory training, involuntary recalls, national emergency periods).
• Reemployment rights: returning service members go back to the position they would have attained ("escalator principle") with the same seniority, status, and pay.
• Continuation of group health coverage for up to 24 months during military leave, with the service member paying up to 102% of premium.
• Continuation of pension benefit accrual as if the service member had remained employed.
• Anti-discrimination and anti-retaliation protections covering past, present, and future service members.

USERRA reemployment is conditioned on advance notice (when feasible), service of five years or less with the employer, honorable discharge, and timely application for reemployment. Application timing depends on length of service: same day for absences under 31 days, 14 days for 31-180 day absences, 90 days for absences exceeding 180 days.

Filing Charges: The EEOC and Other Federal Agencies

Federal employment claims start with administrative agencies before they can typically reach court.

EEOC charges

For Title VII, ADEA, ADA, GINA, and PWFA claims, employees must file a charge with the EEOC within:

• 180 days of the alleged discriminatory act, in jurisdictions without a state or local fair employment practices agency
• 300 days in jurisdictions where a state or local agency enforces a parallel law (most states)

The EEOC and most state Fair Employment Practices Agencies (FEPAs) operate under work-sharing agreements: filing with one agency automatically dual-files with the other.

Other federal forums

• FLSA / FMLA / PUMP Act: DOL Wage and Hour Division complaint, two-year statute of limitations (three years for willful violations). Private right of action available without exhausting administrative remedies.
• OSHA Section 11(c): 30 days from retaliatory action to file with OSHA.
• Sarbanes-Oxley: 180 days to file with OSHA.
• NLRA: 6 months from violation to file an unfair labor practice charge with the NLRB.
• USERRA: no statute of limitations for filing a complaint with the DOL Veterans' Employment and Training Service.
• Section 1981: 4-year statute of limitations, no agency exhaustion required, suit filed directly in federal court.

Knowing the filing window matters in real time. A retaliation complaint that's been sitting in HR for months can blow past the 30-day OSHA window or the 180-day SOX window before the underlying investigation is even complete. Strong intake and triage workflows for complaints help preserve options for both the employee and the employer. The 12 elements of a workplace investigation report covers the documentation standards that hold up against agency review.

Recordkeeping Requirements

Federal employment laws each impose their own recordkeeping requirements, with retention periods that overlap and conflict. The longest applicable period controls.

Common federal retention periods:

• FLSA payroll records: 3 years for payroll records, 2 years for time cards and other supplementary records
• Title VII / ADA / ADEA personnel records: 1 year from creation or personnel action (whichever is later); longer if a charge is pending
• EEO-1 reports: indefinitely (most employers retain a complete history)
• FMLA records: 3 years
• I-9 forms: 3 years from hire or 1 year from termination, whichever is later
• OSHA 300 logs: 5 years following the year covered
• ERISA plan records: 6 years for fiduciary records; longer for plan documents themselves
• FCRA disclosures and authorizations: 5 years (with caveats around state law)

When a charge or lawsuit is filed, the litigation hold extends every relevant retention period until the matter resolves.

How AllVoices Helps

Federal employment law sets the floor every state builds on, and HR teams need infrastructure that works the same way: a single system that captures every report, every investigation, every accommodation request, and every retaliation flag with the documentation discipline these statutes require.

AllVoices is an employee relations platform built for the cases federal compliance turns into work:

• Centralized intake for harassment, discrimination, retaliation, safety, wage, accommodation, and ethics complaints, including an anonymous reporting channel. Reports flow through structured forms that capture the data agency investigators ask for: who, what, when, where, witnesses, supporting documents.
• Structured investigations with task assignments, evidence locker, witness interviews, deadline tracking, and audit-ready reports. The workplace investigations workflow covers Title VII, PWFA, ADA accommodation, and FLSA-style retaliation cases on the same intake surface.
• Vera, the AI co-pilot for employee relations, summarizes case activity, drafts intake summaries, suggests interview questions, and surfaces patterns across cases that point to systemic issues before they trigger an EEOC charge.
• Anonymous and identified reporting channels in parallel, with every Section 7 protected concern, every OSHA-protected refusal, and every ADA accommodation request handled through the same platform with the same documentation trail.
• HRIS integrations with Workday, Rippling, Paylocity, BambooHR, and others, so employee data, manager hierarchy, and case assignment stay in sync with the source of truth.
• Pulse surveys and trend analysis to spot cultural risks (harassment hot spots, retaliation patterns, accommodation backlog) and shore up psychological safety before issues become charges or lawsuits.
• SOC 2 Type II certified, with role-based access controls so investigators see what they need and nothing else.

For organizations operating across multiple states, the platform handles the layered compliance picture: Title VII at the federal floor, state civil rights statutes that broaden coverage, local ordinances that add notification or training requirements, and the documentation each layer requires. The 2024 software comparison and the startup-to-IPO compliance roadmap cover how the platform fits inside an HR stack at different stages of company growth.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does federal law require paid sick leave?

No general federal paid sick leave statute exists for the private sector. The Healthy Families Act has been introduced in successive Congresses but has not passed. Federal contractors covered by Executive Order 13706 must provide up to 56 hours of paid sick leave per year. Most paid sick leave obligations come from state and local law, with more than 15 states and dozens of cities having enacted paid sick leave mandates.

What is the federal minimum wage in 2026?

The federal minimum wage under the FLSA remains $7.25 per hour, where it has been since July 24, 2009. Federal contractors covered by Executive Order 13658 must pay $13.65 per hour for non-tipped workers effective May 11, 2026. The previously scheduled $17.75 EO 14026 contractor minimum was rescinded in March 2025.

How many employees trigger FMLA coverage?

FMLA covers private employers with 50 or more employees in 20 or more workweeks in the current or preceding calendar year. Public agencies and public/private elementary and secondary schools are covered without the 50-employee minimum. Employee eligibility separately requires 12 months of employment, 1,250 hours of service in the prior 12 months, and a worksite where the employer has at least 50 employees within 75 miles.

Does Title VII protect sexual orientation and gender identity?

Yes. The Supreme Court held in Bostock v. Clayton County, 590 U.S. 644 (2020), that Title VII's prohibition on sex discrimination extends to discrimination based on sexual orientation and transgender status. The decision applies to all Title VII-covered employers (15 or more employees) nationwide. The EEOC's January 2026 rescission of the 2024 harassment guidance does not change the Bostock holding.

When are background-check disclosures required under FCRA?

When an employer uses a third-party consumer reporting agency to perform a background check, FCRA requires a standalone written disclosure (not combined with other documents), written authorization from the applicant, a pre-adverse action notice with a copy of the report and "Summary of Your Rights" before any negative decision, and a final adverse action notice after the decision. Procedural failures are independently actionable regardless of the underlying check result.

What's the federal threshold for the FLSA white-collar exemption?

The standard salary level is $684 per week ($35,568 annualized), and the highly compensated employee threshold is $107,432 in total annual compensation. These are the 2019 figures, currently in effect after the November 2024 Texas court vacatur of the 2024 DOL final rule that would have raised the standard threshold to $1,128 per week. Salary alone is not enough; the employee must also pass a duties test for the applicable exemption category.

How long do employees have to file a federal discrimination charge?

EEOC charges under Title VII, ADEA, ADA, GINA, and PWFA must be filed within 180 days of the alleged discriminatory act, extended to 300 days where a state or local fair employment practices agency enforces a parallel law (most states). Section 1981 race claims have a 4-year statute of limitations and don't require an EEOC charge.

Are non-compete agreements enforceable under federal law?

There is no current federal rule banning non-competes. The FTC's 2024 rule was vacated in Ryan, LLC v. FTC (N.D. Tex. Aug. 20, 2024), and the FTC abandoned its appeal on September 5, 2025. Non-compete enforceability is governed by state law, and several states (California, Minnesota, North Dakota, Oklahoma) broadly prohibit non-competes. The FTC retains case-by-case authority to challenge non-competes under existing antitrust law.

The Bottom Line

Federal employment law is the floor every state builds on. The 2026 priorities for HR teams operating under U.S. federal law:

• By June 2026: audit white-collar exemption classifications against the $684/week standard salary level and the duties test. The 2024 rule remains vacated.
• By June 2026: review I-9 files for technical errors, confirm use of the current January 20, 2025 edition, and prepare audit response procedures given the surge in ICE Notices of Inspection.
• By July 2026: review handbook policies (confidentiality, civility, social media, non-disparagement, recording) against the Stericycle framework, recognizing the Board may revisit the standard later in the year.
• Ongoing through 2026: continue applying PWFA accommodation duties broadly given the Fifth Circuit's August 2025 ruling upholding the statute. The EEOC's final rule remains in effect for accommodation analysis.
• Ongoing through 2026: maintain anti-harassment policies, training, and investigation procedures consistent with Title VII case law including Bostock, even though the 2024 EEOC harassment guidance was rescinded in January 2026.
• Ongoing through 2026: monitor non-compete law on a state-by-state basis since the federal rule is vacated and FTC enforcement is now case-by-case rather than categorical.
• Ongoing through 2026: keep retaliation prevention front-of-mind in every accommodation and complaint workflow, since retaliation claims remain the EEOC's most-filed charge category.

For state-by-state detail on how local statutes layer on top of these federal baselines, the California, New York, Texas, and Florida compliance pillars cover the four largest state frameworks, with the rest of the state guides walking through each jurisdiction's distinct rules. To see how an employee relations platform can carry the documentation load federal compliance generates, see how HR case management works across the full case lifecycle.

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