The 2023 Minnesota legislative session proved to be the most consequential in recent memory for the Minnesota employment law landscape. Multiple new laws create significant and wide-ranging rights and protections for Minnesota workers. Schaefer Halleen is pleased to summarize some of the highlights, which include banning noncompete agreements, establishing a new paid family and medical leave program, clearer and more robust rights for nursing mothers and pregnant women, and other new protections.
Noncompete Ban
Minn. Stat. § 181.988 establishes a near total prohibition on post-employment noncompete provisions in employment agreements. Effective July 1, 2023, the bill prohibits all new noncompete agreements with employees or independent contractors regardless of occupation or compensation. The bill contains only two very limited exceptions for noncompetes in connection with a sale or dissolution of a business.
Statewide Earned Sick & Safe Leave
Minn. Stat. §181.9554-9448 creates statewide sick and safe time leave. While Minneapolis and St. Paul already have sick and safe time ordinances, this new law extends similar leave provisions to all Minnesota employers, regardless of the number of employees. Starting from January 1, 2024, employees will have the right to accumulate one hour of sick and safe leave for every 30 hours worked, up to a maximum of 48 hours per year. They can also carry forward accrued hours, but with a limit of 80 hours. Alternatively, employers can choose to provide an upfront allocation of 80 hours of sick and safe leave at the beginning of each applicable benefit plan year.
Under the statewide sick and safe time leave, employees can take time off for various health-related and emergency-related reasons, including: caring for their own or a family member’s health issues; dealing with situations of abuse and assault; addressing business/school closures due to severe weather; among other reasons.
Additionally, the law defines “family member” in a comprehensive manner. It includes nieces, nephews, aunts, uncles, children-in-law, siblings-in-law, and any individual who shares a close association equivalent to a family relationship with the employee. Furthermore, employees are allowed to designate one individual annually as a family member.
Added Protections for Nursing Mothers and Pregnant Employees
Existing law mandates that employers with more than 21 employees must offer reasonable daily break times for employees who require expressing breast milk. However, starting on July 1, 2023, all employers with more than one employee must adhere to this requirement. Additionally, employers can no longer insist on nursing breaks coinciding with scheduled breaks, and the previous exception for breaks that “unduly disrupt operations” has been eliminated. Furthermore, the right to breaks for expressing breast milk is no longer limited to the first year after childbirth.
The updated law also broadens the range of reasonable accommodations for pregnant employees, explicitly including options such as temporary leaves of absence, adjustments to work schedules or job assignments, and more frequent or longer breaks. These accommodations are in addition to alternatives like transferring to less physically demanding or hazardous positions, providing seating accommodations, or placing limits on heavy lifting.
Paid Family and Medical Leave Program
Minn. Stat. §268B.01-.29 requires that, starting in 2026, all Minnesota employers provide up to 12 weeks of job-protected paid leave for their own serious health condition or pregnancy leave. Employers must also provide up to 12 weeks of job-protected paid parental leave, caregiving leave, and deployment-related leave. Employees will be allowed to take a total of 20 weeks per year for all types of leave. Pay during these leaves will be based on a formula using the employee’s salary/wages. The law also includes anti-discrimination and retaliation provisions, meaning employers cannot interfere with an employee’s rights under the law or retaliate against an employee for exercising any rights under the law.
The law requires partial wage replacement related to a serious health condition and up to 12 weeks with partial wage replacement related to leave for pregnancy, bonding, safety, family care, or a military member’s active-duty service or impending call to active duty in the United States armed forces, with a total combined cap of 20 weeks per year. The only exceptions for coverage are independent contractors, self-employed individuals, federal government employees and seasonal employees. The amount of weekly benefit is tied to the individual employee’s income level and capped at the state’s average weekly wage ($1,287.00 in 2023).
Prohibitions of Employer Inquiries into Pay History
The legislation revises the existing Wage Disclosure Protection law (Minn. Stat. §181.172) by introducing new provisions that explicitly forbid employers from seeking, taking into account, or demanding the disclosure of an applicant’s previous salary from any previous employer. This prohibition aims to prevent employers from utilizing an applicant’s pay history as a basis for determining their compensation or benefits. Furthermore, the law now includes provisions that prohibit employers from retaliating against employees who exercise their rights under this law. For instance, employers are prohibited from penalizing employees who decline to provide information about their past salaries.
