Legislative Updates

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed a bill into law Friday, 10/29/2021 that aims to make it easier for workers to get medical and religious exemptions to workplace COVID-19 vaccine requirements.

The Iowa House and Senate passed the bill Thursday, 10/28/2021 with bipartisan support.

Reynolds said in a statement Friday the new law will protect Iowans' freedom to make their own health care decisions.

According to Republican lawmakers who proposed the bill, employees seeking a medical or religious exemption simply have to state they believe the COVID-19 vaccine would hurt their health or would conflict with their religion. It doesn’t require them to get proof from a doctor or religious leader.

If someone gets fired for not getting vaccinated, the new law will allow them to remain eligible to receive unemployment benefits.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) today posted updated and expanded technical assistance related to the COVID-19 pandemic, addressing questions about religious objections to employer COVID-19 vaccine requirements and how they interact with federal equal employment opportunity (EEO) laws.

The expanded technical assistance provides new information about how Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 applies when an applicant or employee requests an exception from an employer’s COVID-19 vaccination requirement that conflicts with their sincerely held religious beliefs, practices, or observances. Title VII prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin.

The key updates to the technical assistance are summarized below:

• Employees and applicants must inform their employers if they seek an exception to an employer’s COVID-19 vaccine requirement due to a sincerely held religious belief, practice, or observance.
• Title VII requires employers to consider requests for religious accommodations but does not protect social, political, or economic views, or personal preferences of employees who seek exceptions to a COVID-19 vaccination requirement.
• Employers that demonstrate “undue hardship” are not required to accommodate an employee’s request for a religious accommodation.

Governor Kristi Noem issued an executive order October 27, 2021 allowing federally-contracted state employees to make religious or medical exemptions from the federal vaccine mandate.

Gov. Noem says she is working with South Dakota lawmakers to make these exemptions permanent and to extend them to employees of private businesses.

Republican state lawmakers have already called for a special session to consider legislation that would make it illegal to deny a religious or medical exemption from the COVID-19 vaccine by any “entity” operating in the state, such as businesses or schools.

The executive order doesn’t apply to South Dakota National Guard service members who must meet federal readiness responsibilities for deployment.

Effective Jan. 1, 2022, the minimum wage for non-tipped employees in South Dakota will be $9.95/hour. The minimum wage for tipped employees will be no less than $4.975/hour. Read the State's FAQs.

The VETS-4212 Report is due on September 30 annually. Federal contractors and subcontractors are encouraged to complete and submit the reports online through the VETS-4212 Reporting Application website. 

Federal contractors have to be vaccinated against COVID-19 by Dec. 8, the Biden administration announced today. The administration earlier this month had announced that federal employees must be vaccinated by Nov. 22. The anticipated emergency temporary standard for private-sector employers with at least 100 employees—requiring vaccination or testing—has not yet been released.

Following a summer with record heat waves in the western United States, the Biden administration announced that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) will draft a rule governing heat exposure designed to protect those working outdoors as well as inside.

The U.S. Department of Labor today issued a Federal Register notice announcing an annual update to the current Executive Order 13658 minimum wage for workers performing work on or in connection with covered contracts.

In 2014, President Obama signed Executive Order 13658, “Establishing a Minimum Wage for Federal Contractors,” which established a minimum wage rate for certain federal contractors that is adjusted annually based on inflation. As announced in today’s Federal Register notice, the Executive Order 13658 minimum wage rate will increase from $10.95 to $11.25 per hour effective Jan.1, 2022. The new rate must generally be paid to workers performing work on or in connection with covered contracts.

The IRS announced that employer-sponsored health coverage will satisfy the Affordable Care Act (ACA) affordability requirement next year if the lowest-cost, self-only coverage option an employer offers does not exceed 9.61 percent of an employee's income.

The threshold in 2021 was 9.83 percent. It had risen from 9.78 percent in 2020.

The IRS annually adjusts the affordability threshold by considering the ratio of premium growth to income growth in the preceding calendar year. Because premiums for employer-sponsored health coverage increased at a lower rate than national income growth during 2021, due largely to a drop-off in the use of nonemergency health care services as cases of COVID-19 surged, the 2022 affordability percentage dropped below the 2021 level.

The agency announced the 2022 affordability threshold—also known as the shared-responsibility affordability percentage or cost-sharing limit—on Aug. 30 in Revenue Procedure 2021-36.