| A |
| Affected Employees: |
The term "affected employees" means employees who may reasonably be
expected to experience an employment loss as a consequence of a proposed
plant closing or mass layoff by their employer. They include individually identifiable
employees who will likely lose their jobs because of bumping rights or
other factors, to the extent that such individual workers reasonably can be
identified at the time notice is required to be given. The category of affected
employees includes managerial and supervisory employees but does not
include business partners. Consultant or contract employees who have a
separate employment relationship with another employer and are paid by that
other employer, or who are self-employed, are not "affected employees" of the
business to which they are assigned. |
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| B |
| Bumping Rights: |
Bumping rights are those rights of an employee to displace another employee
due to a layoff or other employment action as defined in a collective bargaining
agreement, employer policy, or other binding agreement. These
rights are often created through a seniority system. |
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| C |
| Constructive Discharge: |
In general, a constructive discharge is when a worker's resignation or retirement
may be found to be involuntary because the employer has created a
hostile or intolerable work environment or has applied other forms of pressure
or coercion that forced the employee to quit or resign. |
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| D |
| Dislocated Worker: |
A dislocated worker is an adult, 18 years or older, who - through no fault of his or her own - has been terminated or laid off, received a notice of termination or layoff from employment, is eligible for unemployment insurance, or has exhausted their unemployment insurance. |
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| E |
| Employer: |
The employer is any business enterprise that employs 100 or more full-time
workers or 100 or more full- and part-time workers who work at least a combined
4,000 hours a week. Business enterprises include private for-profit and
not-for-profit entities as well as governmental or quasi-governmental organizations
that engage in business and are separately organized from the regular
government. |
| Employment Loss: |
The term "employment loss" means:
- An employment termination, other than a discharge for cause, voluntary
departure, or retirement;
- A layoff exceeding 6 months; or
- A reduction in hours of work of individual employees of more than 50% during each month of any 6-month period.
An exception to this definition of employment loss is a case where a worker
is reassigned or transferred to employer-sponsored programs, such as
retraining or job search activities, and the reassignment does not constitute
an involuntary termination or a constructive discharge, and the employee
continues to be paid. |
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| F |
| Facility and Operating Unit: |
A facility refers to a separate building or buildings. An operating unit refers
to an organizationally or operationally distinct product, operation, or specific
work function within or across facilities at the single site. Whether a specific
unit within an employer's organization is an operating unit depends on such
factors as collective bargaining agreements, the employer's organizational
structure, and industry understandings about what constitutes separate work
functions. |
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| M |
| Mass Layoff: |
The term "mass layoff" means a reduction in force that:
- Does not result from a plant closing; and
- Results in an employment loss at the single site of employment during
any 30-day period for:
- At least 50-499 employees if they represent at least 33% of the total
active workforce, excluding any part-time employees; or
- 500 or more employees (excluding any part-time employees). (In
this case, the 33% rule does not apply.)
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| P |
| Part-Time Worker: |
A part-time worker is an employee who:
- Averages less than 20 hours per week; or
- Has been employed for fewer than 6 of the last 12 months before the
notice is due.
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| Plant Closing: |
A plant closing is the permanent or temporary shutdown of a single site of
employment, or one or more facilities or operating units within a single site of
employment, if the shutdown results in an employment loss at the single site
of employment during any 30-day period for 50 or more employees, excluding
part-time employees. All of the employment losses do not have to occur within
the unit that is shut down. For example, if the 45-person accounting department
in a firm is eliminated and, as a result of the accounting department's
closing, five positions in the clerical support staff are eliminated, a covered
plant closing has occurred. |
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| S |
| Single Site of Employment: |
The term "single site of employment" may refer to:
- A single location or a group of contiguous locations. Groups of structures
that form a campus or industrial park or separate facilities across
the street from one another may be considered a single site of employment.
Also, several single sites of employment may exist within a single
building if separate employers conduct activities within the building;
- Separate buildings or areas within reasonable geographic proximity
and share staff and equipment; or
- For workers who primarily travel:
- a home base from which work is assigned; or a home base to which workers report when:
- a worker's primary duties require travel from point to point;
- the worke's duties are outstationed; and
- the worker's primary duties are outside any of the employer's regular employment sites.
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| State Rapid Response Dislocated Worker Unit:: |
The term "State Rapid Response Dislocated Worker Unit" means a unit designated
in each state by the Governor under the Workforce Investment Act. |
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| W |
| WARN: |
The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) was enacted on August 4, 1988 and became effective on February 4, 1989. WARN offers protection to workers, their families and communities by requiring employers to provide notice 60 days in advance of covered plant closings and covered mass layoffs. This notice must be provided to either affected workers or their representatives (e.g., a labor union); to the State dislocated worker unit; and to the appropriate unit of local government. |
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