I. Introduction Wage & hour litigation has long been a focus of the plaintiffs’ class action bar. The relatively low standard by which plaintiffs can achieve conditional certification under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), often paired with state law wage & hour class claims, offers a potent combination by which plaintiffs can pursue alleged misclassification or unpaid overtime claims, for example. Over the last few years, approximately 8,000 FLSA collective action suits have been filed in courts nationwide each year, and there is little reason to think that the number of filings will decrease in the near future. In 2023 alone, there were over 2,600 new FLSA collective action lawsuits filed. This does not include filings under state wage & hour laws or individual wage & hour actions. The map below shows the dispersion of the filings throughout the United States. Leading the way with new collective action lawsuits filed were New York (775), Florida (296), Texas (231), Ohio (145), and Illinois (140). In 2023, courts again issued more certification rulings in FLSA collective actions than in other types of cases. Plaintiffs historically have been able to obtain conditional certification of FLSA collective actions at a high rate, which surely has contributed to the number of filings in this area.
Significant developments and trends emerged in wage & hour litigation in 2023. Further, the U.S. Department of Labor has indicated its intention to broaden the number of employees that are eligible for overtime pay, in part by revising the executive, administrative, and professional exemptions to the FLSA.
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© Duane Morris LLP 2024
Wage & Hour Class And Collective Action Review – 2024
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