#16-3130 2016 WCAR Tickit Icon R!By Gerald L. Maatman, Jr.

Our 2016 Workplace Class Action Report is now available. At 853 pages, it analyzes 1,314 rulings and is our biggest and best Report ever.

Click here to order your copy in eBook format. Click here to download Chapter 1 on the 2015 Executive Summary/Key Trends. Our annual webinar on the Report is now set for February 1, 2015, and a link to register for the webinar is here.

The Report is the sole compendium in the U.S. dedicated exclusively to workplace class action litigation, and has become the “go to” research and resource guide for businesses and their corporate counsel facing complex litigation. We were humbled and honored by the review of our Report by Employment Practices Liability Consultant Magazine (“EPLiC”) – the review is here. EPLi said: “The Report is the singular, definitive source of information, research, and in-depth analysis on employment-related class action litigation. Practitioners and corporate counsel should not be without it on their desk, since the Report is the sole compendium of its kind in the United States.”

The 2016 Report analyzes rulings from all state and federal courts – including private plaintiff class actions and collective actions, and government enforcement actions –  in the substantive areas of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, and the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005. It also features chapters on EEOC pattern or practice rulings, state law class certification decisions, and non-workplace class action rulings that impact employers. The Report also analyzes the leading class action settlements for 2015 for employment discrimination, wage & hour, and ERISA class actions, as well as settlements of government enforcement actions, both with respect to monetary values and injunctive relief provisions.

We hope our loyal blog readers will enjoy it!

Executive Summary

Workplace class action litigation often poses unique “bet-the-company” risks for employers. An adverse judgment in a class action has the potential to bankrupt a business. Likewise, the on-going defense of a class action can drain corporate resources long before the case reaches a decision point. Companies that do business in multiple states are also susceptible to “copy-cat” class actions, whereby plaintiffs’ lawyers create a domino effect of litigation filings that challenge corporate policies and practices. Hence, workplace class actions can adversely impact a corporation’s market share, jeopardize or end the careers of senior management, and cost millions of dollars in defense fees. For these reasons, workplace class action litigation risks are at the top of the list of problems that keep business leaders up at night.

Skilled plaintiffs’ class action lawyers and governmental enforcement litigators are not making that challenge any easier. They are continuing to develop new theories and approaches to prosecuting complex employment litigation. In turn, the events of the past year in the workplace class action world demonstrate that the array of litigation issues facing businesses are continuing to accelerate while also undergoing significant change. Governmental enforcement litigation pursued by the U.S. Equal Employment Commission (“EEOC”) and the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) also manifests an aggressive “push-the-envelope” agenda of two activist agencies, with regulatory oversight of workplace issues continuing as a high priority. The combination of these factors are challenging businesses to integrate their litigation and risk mitigation strategies to navigate these exposures. These challenges are especially acute for businesses in the context of complex workplace litigation.

Key Trends Of 2015

An overview of workplace class action litigation developments in 2015 reveals five key trends.

First, class action dynamics increasingly have been shaped and influenced by recent rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court. Over the past several years, the Supreme Court has accepted supreme courtmore cases for review – and issued more rulings than ever before that have impacted the prosecution and defense of class actions and government enforcement litigation. The past year continued that trend, with several key decisions on complex employment litigation issues, and more cases accepted for review that are posed for rulings in 2016. While the Supreme Court led by Chief Justice John Roberts is often thought to be pro-business, the array of its key rulings impacting class action workplace issues is anything but one-dimensional. Some decisions may be viewed as hostile to the expansive use of Rule 23, while others are hospitable and strengthen the availability of class actions. Further, the Supreme Court has declined several opportunities to impose more restraints on class actions, and by often deciding cases on narrow grounds, it has left many gaps to be filled in by and thereby fueled disagreements arising amongst lower federal courts. Suffice it to say, the range of rulings form a complex tapestry that precludes an overarching generalization that the Supreme Court is pro-business or pro-worker on class actions.

Second, the monetary value of employment-related class action settlements reached an all-time high in 2015. The plaintiffs’ employment class action bar and governmental enforcement litigators successfully translated their case filings into larger class-wide settlements at unprecedented levels. The top ten settlements in various employment-related categories totaled $2.48 billion over the past year as compared to $1.87 billion in 2014. As success in the class action litigation context often serves to encourage pursuit of more class actions by “copy-cat” litigants, 2016 is apt to see the filing of more class actions than in previous years.

#15-3099 2015 WCAR Infographics - Aggregate Settlement Amounts R

Third, federal and state courts issued more favorable class certification rulings for the plaintiffs’ bar in 2015 than in past years. In addition to converting their class certification rulings into class action settlements with higher values and pay-outs, plaintiffs’ lawyers continued to craft refined and more successful class certification theories to counter the more stringent Rule 23 certification requirements established in Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, 131 S. Ct. 2541 (2011), and Comcast Corp. v. Behrend, 133 S. Ct. 1426 (2013). In the areas of employment discrimination, wage & hour, and ERISA class actions, the plaintiffs’ bar scored exceedingly well in securing class certification rulings in 2015. Statistically, the plaintiffs’ bar secured class certification at an astounding rate of 75% of cases in 2015. In sum, class actions continue to be certified in significant numbers and certain “magnet” jurisdictions continue to issue decisions that encourage or, in effect, force the resolution of large numbers of claims through class action mechanisms.

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Fourth, complex employment-related litigation filings are up from past years, but by far and away, wage & hour class actions and collective actions are the leading type of “high stakes” lawsuits being pursued by the plaintiffs’ bar. Case filing statistics for 2015 reflected that wage & hour litigation outpaced all other categories of lawsuits, and increased yet again over the past year, with no end in sight of the crest of the tidal wave of case filings. Additional factors set to coalesce in 2016 – including new FLSA regulations, the impact of digital technology, and increased scrutiny of independent contractor and joint employer relationships – are apt to drive these exposures even higher for Corporate America.

Fifth, government enforcement lawsuits brought by the DOL and EEOC continued the aggressive litigation programs of both agencies. Settlement numbers for government enforcement litigation in 2015 increased substantially over 2014, as did the litigation dockets of the DOL and the EEOC. This trend is critical to employers, as both agencies have a focus on “big impact” lawsuits against companies and “lead by example” in terms of areas that the private plaintiffs’ bar aims to pursue.

Implications For Employers

The one constant in workplace class action litigation is change. More than any other year in recent memory, 2015 was a year of great change in the landscape of Rule 23. As these issues play out in 2016, additional chapters in the class action playbook will be written.

The lesson to draw from 2015 is that the private plaintiffs’ bar and government enforcement attorneys are apt to be equally, if not more, aggressive in 2016 in bringing class action and collective action litigation against employers.

These novel challenges demand a shift of thinking in the way companies formulate their strategies. As class actions and collective actions are a pervasive aspect of litigation in Corporate America, defending and defeating this type of litigation is a top priority for corporate counsel. Identifying, addressing, and remediating class action vulnerabilities, therefore, deserves a place at the top of corporate counsel’s priorities list for 2016.