State labor legislation enacted in 2001; increases in minimum wage rates, restrictions on youth peddling, bans on discrimination because of genetic information, and protection from workplace harassment and violence were among major subjects of State labor legislation - State Labor Laws, 2001 - United States - Statistical Data Included

Monthly Labor Review, Jan, 2002 by Richard R. Nelson

Domestic partners were given rights to benefits in California and Maine.

Child labor. At the beginning of 2001, a tight labor market drew considerable attention to child labor issues. A large number of bills were introduced and a variety of laws were enacted.

Vermont granted the labor department rulemaking authority, conformed State hours and hazardous occupations restrictions to Federal law, and increased penalties for law violations. Tennessee also increased penalties for violations. Maine adopted new rules governing prohibited hazardous occupations, including adding restrictions on selling door-to-door, operating amusement rides, working alone in cash-based businesses, and working in places having nude entertainment (all occupations). Nevada superseded administrative actions taken last year prohibiting youth under age 16 from peddling, by limiting applicability to counties of 100,000 or more population. Minnesota and Tennessee revised requirements for acceptable proof of age.

Indiana will now require rest breaks for minors under age 18, and Nebraska will more closely regulate detasseling work.

Also, Maine will ease a prohibition on work in theaters to allow specified work, Michigan will permit longer and later hours of employment for minors aged 16 or older, and Oregon will exempt soccer referees from coverage.

In the entertainment industry, Nevada employers who employ minors for more than 91 school days are to provide tutoring or equivalent educational services. A new Texas law limits contract duration for minors and provides that a court may require that a portion of earnings be set aside in a trust for those employees.

Equal employment opportunity. The trend to enact legislation banning employment discrimination against individuals based on genetic characteristics, genetic information, or test results accelerated this year, with new laws passed in Arkansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Nebraska, and South Dakota, and with a revision to the Texas law. More than half of the States now have laws of this kind.

Among other measures that were enacted, banning various forms of employment discrimination, Maryland made it an unlawful employment practice to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation, and Rhode Island enacted a related measure banning employment discrimination on the basis of gender identity or expression. Connecticut added mental disability and marital status to lists of prohibited forms of discrimination for purposes of hiring and other personnel decisions involving State employees. Montana amended its ban on marital status discrimination to allow an employer to employ a person for a position and to also employ the person's spouse. North Carolina passed a law to protect board of education employees from sexual harassment.

Drug and alcohol testing. Tennessee will now require covered employers to notify the parents or guardians of a minor of the results of any drug or alcohol-testing program conducted pursuant to the drug-free workplace act. Other laws require the testing of nuclear storage facility employees in Utah, and revise the drug testing policy requirements for nursing homes in Texas.