When the Labor Department quietly rolled out a new policy this week to limit when companies will be on the hook for double penalties in wage settlements, it said the move stemmed from an executive order directing agencies to remove “barriers to economic prosperity as America strives to defeat the economic effects of Covid-19.”
But that explanation obscures the extended history of a contentious action that had been discussed within the Trump administration since at least 2017, and that wage-hour practitioners say will transform the landscape of how the federal government negotiates settlements with employers accused of stiffing workers on ...