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On May 1, 2008, the U.S. House passed, by a vote of 414-1, a landmark bill designed to protect personal genetic information from misuse by employers and insurance companies. The U.S. Senate passed the measure on April 24, 2008, by a vote of 95-0, and the bill will now go to the White House where President Bush is expected to sign it into law. The Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) (H.R. 493 as amended) would prohibit employers from using individuals' genetic information when making hiring, firing, job placement or promotion decisions. It would make it illegal for group health plans and health insurers to deny coverage to healthy individuals or charge them higher premiums based solely on a genetic predisposition to a disease. The purpose of the bill is to encourage Americans to take advantage of genetic testing without fear of discrimination. CCH Human Resources Management Daily Document Update ¶24,846.
The majority of U.S. companies have a formal, written plan for emergency preparedness, according to a report released by The Conference Board. But a widely adopted certification standard for such plans does not exist yet. Three-quarters of the 302 senior corporate executives surveyed in mid-2007 said that an emergency preparedness plan exists in their companies. A "voluntary" certification process for preparedness was adopted as part of the 2007 homeland security legislation (Public Law 110-53). The choice of standards that would permit certification under the law is currently under review. As this report goes to press, it is expected that several different standards may qualify for certification. CCH Human Resources Management Daily Document Update ¶24,843.
As foreign-born workers make up a larger share of the U.S. workforce, more employers will be dealing with language limitations. But a new survey by The Conference Board finds that a majority of employers are doing very little to overcome this challenge. U.S. Census data show that fewer than one in four Mexican-born immigrants speak English well, while only about 40 percent of other Hispanic, Asian, and European (non English-speaking countries) immigrants speak English. With nearly half of all non-English speaking immigrants to the U.S. self-reporting as unable to speak English well, language is proving to be a major barrier to upward mobility. CCH Human Resources Management Daily Document Update ¶24,863.
Older workers without other health care insurance options are more likely to defer retirement to stay covered under their employer's plan, according to an analysis by Watson Wyatt Worldwide. Other factors, such as whether an employee has a pension, also contribute to decisions on when to retire. The Watson Wyatt analysis found that employees who rely on their employers for health care coverage and do not expect to receive employer-provided health benefits in retirement are 16.5 percentage points less likely to retire in any given year than workers with access to health care coverage through another source. CCH Human Resources Management Daily Document Update ¶24,865.
Nonfarm payroll employment was little changed in April (-20,000), following job losses that totaled 240,000 in the first 3 months of the year, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on May 2. The unemployment rate, at 5.0 percent, also was little changed in April. Employment continued to decline in construction, manufacturing, and retail trade, while jobs were added in health care and in professional and technical services. CCH Human Resources Management Daily Document Update ¶24,853.
Legislation providing paid family leave benefits to employees caring for sick family members and newborn or newly adopted children was signed by Governor Jon S. Corzine on May 2, 2008. New Jersey becomes the third state in the nation to enact a family leave program. The state of California implemented its program in 2004 while the state of Washington passed legislation last year. The legislation extends the state's existing Temporary Disability Insurance (TDI) program and permits up to six weeks of insurance benefits for workers taking leave to provide care certified to be necessary for a family member. The program requires no contributions from employers and is 100% funded by an employee payroll deduction amounting to approximately $33 a year, or 64 cents a week. Participating workers will receive no more than two-thirds of their weekly pay, up to a maximum weekly benefit of $524 in 2008. CCH Human Resources Management Daily Document Update ¶24,851.
Participants in the April online poll don’t have very high hopes for the Department of Labor’s (DOL) revisions to the FMLA regulations. A majority of participants (60 percent) do not expect big changes to be in the DOL’s revised regulations and think that the new regulations will produce new grey areas. Only 20 percent of you do expect big changes and believe that the DOL will address employer concerns while another 20 percent don’t really know what to expect. There were 179 respondents to the online poll.
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