On Tuesday, April 4, 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit issued a landmark decision, holding that federal discrimination law prohibits workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.  In an 8 – 3 decision in Hively v. Ivy Tech Community ollege, the Seventh Circuit became the first federal court of appeals to hold that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is a form of sex discrimination prohibited by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Employers throughout the country had a little extra to be thankful for this past Thanksgiving.  On Tuesday, a federal district court issued a nationwide injunction preventing the U.S. Department of Labor (the “DOL”) from implementing a new federal regulation designed to expand the number of employees eligible for overtime pay under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Illinois law governing restrictive covenants in employment agreements has undergone a number of changes in the past few years.  The latest development is the Illinois Freedom to Work Act, which prohibits employers from entering into non-compete agreements with low-wage employees.