The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of allowing employers to require new employees to sign arbitration agreements barring them from organizing or filing class-action lawsuits to settle workplace disputes, according to media reports.
The ruling could affect thousands of employees nationwide whose complaints now can only be heard and decided internally by corporate arbitrators.
A Capital Timesarticle notes that the high court decided the case on a 5–4 decision, with Justice Neil Gorsuch casting the deciding vote.
The federal lawsuit, brought by former Epic Systems technical writer Jacob Lewis, argued that by forcing employees to sign a document when first hired, Epic unlawfully deprived him and other technical writers of taking a wage dispute to court.
A second, similar class-action suit filed against Epic by a group of quality assurance workers could now be at risk, as well. In that 2016 case, the workers claimed they were illegally denied overtime pay, according to a Wisconsin State Journalfollow up.
