California Employment Lawyer Resources

California has the most worker-protective employment law scheme in the United States, and that is not an accident. Decades of legislation, Industrial Welfare Commission wage orders, and landmark appellate decisions have built a system where daily overtime kicks in at 8 hours, meal and rest breaks are statutorily mandated, wrongful termination in violation of public policy is a tort, and harassment can create employer liability even without a tangible job action. If you work in California and you believe you have been mistreated at work, the law is probably on your side, but enforcing it is a different story.

The core statutes are the California Labor Code, the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA), and the Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA). FEHA is enforced through the Civil Rights Department and covers discrimination, harassment, retaliation, failure to accommodate disability, and pregnancy-related claims. The Labor Code governs wages, overtime, breaks, reimbursement of business expenses, wage statements, and final paychecks. PAGA allows an aggrieved employee to sue for civil penalties on behalf of the state for Labor Code violations. Add in independent contractor misclassification under the ABC test from Dynamex and AB 5, and you have a body of law that employers struggle to comply with and plaintiffs' lawyers must know cold.

I am George Goldberg, founding partner of Goldberg & Loren. Over more than 32 years and 20,000+ cases, we have represented California workers in wrongful termination, sexual harassment, wage-and-hour, retaliation, whistleblower, and disability discrimination cases. I spent the early part of my career on the defense side before switching to plaintiff work in 1996, and that background drives how we build every case. We know what the other side is looking for, and we do not give it to them.

Below you will find our California-focused employment law articles and answers to the questions workers ask us most. If you have been fired, harassed, underpaid, or retaliated against at a California job, call Goldberg & Loren at 1-888-352-9243 for a free, confidential consultation.