Arbitration Use by Employers Up as High Court Affirms Validity

States’ attempts to ensure employees can take their workplace disputes to court are seeing their efforts chipped away by the US Supreme Court.

Forty-three states have laws focused on alternative dispute resolution between employers and employees, according to the Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law School. Many of those statutes say that arbitration language contained in various types of employment aren’t enforceable.

The state laws can run afoul of federal preemption, which generally holds valid arbitration agreements are enforceable and should be treated like any other legally formed contract between employers and employees.

The US Supreme Court has consistently held ...