The new episode of Employment Law This Week features the U.S. Supreme Court's easing of class certification standards in a case against Tyson Foods.
In Iowa, a group of Tyson employees brought a hybrid class and collective action for unpaid overtime spent changing clothes and walking to their work area. An expert determined the average amount of time spent on those activities, and the employees relied on those averages to get class certified and prove liability and damages. On appeal, Tyson argued that the employees should never have been grouped into a single class, because each employee took different amounts of time for the unpaid activities. But the Supreme Court ruled that this representative sample could be used to establish classwide liability, and the case will move forward in the district court.
View the episode below or read more about the case in an earlier blog post.
[embed]https://youtu.be/nGdmM9QyrUQ?t=1m48s[/embed]