36 articles
At-will employment
At-will employment is the default U.S. employment rule letting employer or employee end an indefinite-term job at any time for almost any legal reason. All states except Montana apply it, subject to public policy, implied contract, and good faith exceptions.
Bosman ruling
Bosman ruling: ECJ judgment of 15 December 1995, Case C-415/93, from Jean-Marc Bosman's dispute with RFC Liège; ended transfer fees for out-of-contract EU players and nationality quotas, reshaping football's transfer market.
California Child Actor's Bill
The California Child Actor's Bill, or Coogan Act (1939), named for Jackie Coogan, requires 15% of a child performer's gross earnings be placed in a blocked Coogan Trust Account until 18; extended in 2024 to child influencers, with similar laws in New York, Illinois, Louisiana, and New Mexico.
Consolidation of Labor Laws
The Consolidation of Labor Laws (Consolidação das Leis do Trabalho, CLT) is the Brazilian statute uniting labor law in one code, decreed by President Getúlio Vargas on May 1, 1943.
Constructive dismissal
Constructive dismissal: an employee's resignation treated in law as a dismissal because of the employer's serious breach of contract. Also called constructive unfair dismissal (UK) or forced resignation (Australia); tested by repudiatory breach, causation, and non-affirmation.
Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974
ERISA, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (Public Law 93-406), is the US federal law setting minimum standards for private-sector pension and welfare plans: fiduciary duties, vesting, funding, disclosure, preemption, and PBGC termination insurance.
Employment discrimination
Employment discrimination is unfavorable treatment of workers or applicants based on race, sex, religion, disability, or other job-irrelevant traits, covered by Title VII and ILO standards, studied via correspondence experiments, and enforced by the EEOC.
Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938
The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA) is the U.S. federal wage-and-hour law establishing minimum wage, overtime after 40 hours, recordkeeping, and child labor standards, enforced by the Wage and Hour Division.
Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993
The Family and Medical Leave Act is a U.S. law that provides up to 12 workweeks of job-protected leave to employees at covered private-sector employers and public agencies.
Garden leave
Garden leave, or gardening leave, keeps a departing employee employed and on full pay and contractual benefits during the notice period while instructing them not to work. Unlike PILON it preserves employment; unlike restrictive covenants it applies before termination and usually needs an express contract clause.
Google's Ideological Echo Chamber
Google's Ideological Echo Chamber, also called the Damore memo, is a 2017 internal Google memo by engineer James Damore arguing biological sex differences partly explain women's underrepresentation in tech; he was fired August 7, 2017.
Hostile work environment
Hostile work environment: unlawful US workplace harassment based on a protected characteristic, severe or pervasive enough that a reasonable person would find the environment intimidating, hostile, or abusive, under Title VII, ADEA, and ADA.
Indian labour law
Indian labour law, governed by four Labour Codes effective 21 November 2025 (Code on Wages 2019, Industrial Relations, Social Security, and OSH Codes), consolidating 29 central acts covering wages, social security, safety, and industrial relations.
Joan C. Williams
Joan C. Williams is a law professor at UC Law San Francisco who founded the Center for WorkLife Law and is known for concepts like the maternal wall.
L-1 visa
The L-1 visa is a US nonimmigrant visa for intracompany transferees, split into L-1A (managers, executives, 7 years) and L-1B (specialized knowledge, 5 years), created in 1970, with no annual cap and dual intent.
Labour law
Labour law: the legislation and regulations defining employers' and workers' rights, individually and collectively. Also called employment law. Covers the employment relationship, collective bargaining, ILO standards since the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, and labour law reform assistance.
Leave of absence
Leave of absence: extended time away from work. In the US, governed by the FMLA (12 weeks unpaid job-protected leave), ADA accommodation leave, state workers' compensation, and state paid leave programs.
List of minimum annual leave by country
Statutory minimum paid annual leave by country: ILO Convention No. 132 floor of three working weeks, EU minimum of four weeks, and national minimums ranging from 7 to 30 days; the United States has no federal mandate.
Maternity Benefit (Amendment) Act, 2017
A 2017 Act of the Indian Parliament amending the Maternity Benefit Act, 1961, extending paid maternity leave to 26 weeks for the first two children.
Minimum Wages Act 1948
Minimum Wages Act 1948: Indian statute letting central and state governments fix and revise minimum wages in scheduled employments; assent 15 March 1948; repealed by the Code on Wages, 2019, effective 21 November 2025.
Non-compete clause
Non-compete clause: an employment term barring workers from joining competitors or starting rival businesses after leaving a job, also called a covenant not to compete. The FTC's 2024 US ban was vacated in 2025; California and three other states ban them outright while other states restrict by salary or duration.
Pay in lieu of notice
Pay in lieu of notice (PILON) is a lump sum ending employment immediately instead of a worked notice period. UK law requires a contract clause or agreement; since April 2018 the notice pay is taxed as earnings and NICs apply.
Permissible exposure limit
Permissible exposure limit (PEL): OSHA's legally enforceable US workplace airborne chemical limits, mostly 8-hour TWAs in 29 CFR 1910.1000 Tables Z-1 to Z-3; distinguished from non-enforceable NIOSH RELs and ACGIH TLVs.
Right-to-work law
Right-to-work laws are U.S. state statutes, authorized by Section 14(b) of the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act, that prohibit union security agreements requiring dues payment; 27 states have them, and Michigan repealed its law in 2024.
Ron McCallum
Ron McCallum AO, born 1948, is an Australian labor law academic at the University of Sydney and the first totally blind full professor in Australia or New Zealand.
Severance package
Severance package: payments and benefits given when employment ends, also called redundancy or termination pay. Covers statutory scales (Australia, Thailand, Ontario), US at-will voluntariness, OWBPA waiver rules, and economic rationale.
Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013
The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013, also called the POSH Act, is an Indian law protecting women from workplace sexual harassment.
Statute of Labourers 1351
Statute of Labourers 1351: English law passed at the first post-plague Parliament, freezing wages at pre-Black Death levels, compelling service, and restricting worker mobility; reinforced the 1349 Ordinance of Labourers and failed to hold wages down.
Termination of employment
Termination of employment: the legal ending of an employer-employee relationship. Covers at-will employment (all US states except Montana), ILO Convention No. 158's valid-reason standard, UK dismissal types, Ontario ESA notice rules, and OECD comparative dismissal-regulation strictness.
United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), federal civil rights agency enforcing workplace anti-discrimination laws including Title VII, ADA, ADEA, and GINA. Established under the 1964 Civil Rights Act, opened July 2, 1965, headquartered in Washington, D.C., with 53 field offices.