Arbitration: Class Action, Waiver, FAA, Employment: Employment Contract Providing For Individualized Arbitration Provisions Not Invalidated By The Federal Arbitration Act’s Savings Clause, The Fair Labor Standards Act, Or National Labor Relations Act

FAA Collective Actions And Related State Law Class Actions Governed By Individualized Arbitration Proceedings Under Employment Contract.

          On May 21, 2018, the United State Supreme Court issued its decision in Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis, 584 U.S. __, No. 16-285. SCOTUS decided that the FAA instructed federal courts to enforce individualized arbitration proceedings under an employer-employee arbitration agreement such that nothing in the FAA’s savings clause, FLSA, or NLRA dictated a different result. This was a 5-4 decision along political lines, authored by Justice Gorsuch. The minority justices believed that the result in this case will gut the effectiveness of FLSA collective actions and state court class actions in the wage/hour area.

        See my previous posts regarding this case, and the article I wrote entitled, “The Politics of Arbitration” wherein I discussed the same issue raised in Ernst & Young v. Morris.  My previous posts were on August 23, 2016, October 11, 2016, November 3, 2016, January 17, 2017, July 24, 2017,   September 28, 2017, and October 9, 2017.  See also, my post on June 19, 2017.