When a Minnesota Public Employee Can Be Disciplined for Speech
Pickering balancing, Connick's public-concern threshold, and Garcetti's official-duties rule — plus the Eighth Circuit's allocation of the burden on workplace disruption.
Read →Work & Employment
Non-competes, wages, leave, discrimination, and being fired.
Is My Non-Compete Enforceable in Minnesota? If You Signed It On or After July 1, 2023, Almost Certainly Not.
Minn. Stat. § 181.988 makes employee non-competes void and unenforceable, with only two narrow exceptions — but it applies only to contracts and agreements entered into on or after July 1, 2023. Older agreements are still governed by common-law reasonableness review.
Read →Salaried Doesn't Always Mean 'No Overtime': A Plain-English Guide to Minnesota Wage-and-Hour Rights
Exempt vs. non-exempt, tips, overtime, and wage theft in Minnesota — what the law actually says, told through everyday scenarios.
Read →You Can Be Billed for Leaving a Pension Plan Using Assumptions Nobody Had Adopted When You Left
In M&K Employee Solutions v. IAM National Pension Fund, a unanimous Court held that withdrawal-liability assumptions need not be chosen by the measurement date. Minnesota has one of the most heavily unionized workforces in the country.
Read →Minnesota Paid Leave Is Live: What Employers and Employees Need to Know Now
Benefits began January 1, 2026, and the first premiums were due April 30. A plain-English guide to the 2026 premium rate, the leave categories, the 20-week cap, and where Minnesota employers most often get this wrong.
Read →Minnesota Banned Non-Competes in 2023. Trade Secret Law Is What Employers Have Left — and It Is Sharper Than People Think.
Minn. Stat. ch. 325C protects information with independent economic value that is not readily ascertainable and is the subject of reasonable efforts to keep it secret. Exemplary damages up to twice compensatory, attorney's fees running both directions, and a three-year clock from discovery under § 325C.06.
Read →In Minnesota Construction, Every Worker Is an Employee by Default. Fourteen Requirements Get You Out — and You Must Meet Every One.
Minn. Stat. § 181.723 makes every individual performing building construction services an employee unless they operate as a business entity meeting all fourteen statutory requirements — with penalties up to $10,000 per worker and personal liability for owners.
Read →Minnesota Took the Non-Compete Away. It Did Not Take the Protection Away — It Moved It Somewhere Most Employers Have Never Built.
Minn. Stat. § 181.988 voids employee non-competes signed on or after July 1, 2023. What remains is ch. 325C and the DTSA, the carve-outs in subd. 1(a), § 181.9881, the sale exception, and the duty of loyalty.
Read →Minnesota Discrimination Claims Are Usually Lost on the Calendar, Not the Merits
Minn. Stat. § 363A.28, subd. 3(a) gives one year from the occurrence. Then § 363A.33, subd. 1 adds 45- and 90-day windows, § 363A.07, subd. 3 makes the forum choice exclusive, and § 363A.31 gives 15 days to rescind a release.
Read →Minnesota Gives Every Employee Free Discovery Before the Lawsuit Exists. Almost Nobody Uses It.
Minn. Stat. §§ 181.960–181.966 give an employee the right to review and copy the personnel record on written request — seven working days, no fee — and § 181.963 bars the employer from later using what it left out.
Read →Minnesota Does Not Ban Workplace Drug Testing. It Makes Your Policy Document the Thing You Get Sued Over.
Under Minn. Stat. §§ 181.950–181.957 an employer may not request or require a drug or alcohol test except as authorized — and nothing is authorized unless it is done pursuant to a written policy meeting § 181.952, subd. 1.
Read →Minnesota's Whistleblower Act Protects the Report, Not the Reporter's Motive — and Since 2013 It Has Not Mattered Whether the Employee Was Right
Minn. Stat. § 181.932 protects six categories of conduct. Since the 2013 amendment defining 'good faith' in § 181.931, subd. 4, the only state-of-mind question is whether the report was knowingly false or reckless.
Read →Minnesota's Ban-the-Box Law Is Two Different Statutes Wearing One Chapter Number
Minn. Stat. § 364.021 bars a public or private employer from asking about criminal history before the interview. But the direct-relationship standard in § 364.03 and the written-explanation duty in § 364.05 reach only public employment and licensing — and § 364.06, subd. 2(d) makes the private-employer remedy exclusive.
Read →Minnesota Gives a Fired Employee 24 Hours' Leverage. Most Employers Do Not Know the Clock Exists.
Under Minn. Stat. § 181.13, wages owed a discharged employee are due immediately on written demand, and the employer is in default 24 hours later — with a penalty of one day's average earnings for every day, up to 15. Attorney fees are mandatory.
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