Will the protests combine with concerns about workplace safety and COVID to spark radical change? I don't know, but I speculate in this episode ..read more

Some communities in rural Nebraska are per capita leaders in COVID exposure. In this episode I talk more about the link between occupational safety and workplace safety as well as moves to protect business from COVID litigation -- including workers' compensation claims ..read more

COVID-19 has struck cities and towns with meatpacking plants particularly hard. Nebraska cities and towns like Grand Island, Lexington, Crete and Dakota City are no exception. My legal practice takes me face to face with these workers and employers in those cities and towns. In this episode, I talk about COVID-19 and workers' compensation as well creative ways workers are skirting the limited remedies of workers' compensation to hold the packing plants legally accountable for their role in the COVID-19 crisis ..read more

In this episode I talk about how employment at-will is making the coronavirus crisis worse. I also talk unemployment benefits for gig economy workers and the weakness of the WARN Act. There is also some non-COVID 19 talk about the recent Comcast decision by the Supreme Court ..read more

In this episode I talk about how workers compensation insurance may not help most workers effected by coronavirus. I think paid leave and good health insurance are a better remedy. But while the proposed emergency paid leave legislation passed by the House could help some, it’s inadequate for many reasons ..read more

In Episode 11, I unpack Mike Bloomberg's use of non-disclosure agreements to settle sexual harassment and gender discrimination cases.  I'll skip the serpent imagery, but I'm going at least 3/4 Chapo taking the senior Senator from Massachusetts out of the show notes.  Bluntly. the first segment has some real strong Gen-X -guy -recording- something -in -his- car energy.  Then I tone it down a notch or three with a nice chill segment about marijuana and workers' compensation. It's a lot more fun to talk about preemption and fee schedules in workers' compensation when the focus is ..read more

This podcast talks about civil rights all the time, not just on MLK Day. In this episode I talk about the intersection of workplace safety and civil rights. I also go through some legal history of the civil rights movement and how cases from the Reconstruction and Jim Crow era still resonate today ..read more

I talk about the opioid crisis and workers' compensation, the ADA, the ACA, constitutional challenges to workers' compensation laws and the gig economy ..read more

Some employers do their worst to suppress workers' compensation claims. A recent article in Bloomberg Law documents what UPS is doing to under report work injuries and explains why pressure from Amazon may be increasing pressure for them to do so. I talk about how workers compensation laws help discourage the under reporting of injuries.Finally I talk about why stronger civil remedies rather than enhanced criminal enforcement should be the solution to this problem ..read more

How is Jeff Bezos like Frank Gallagher? Listen and find out ..read more