Skip to Main Content

For workplace safety and health, please call 800-321-6742; for mine safety and health, please call 800-746-1553; for Job Corps, please call 800-733-5627 and for Wage and Hour, please call 1-866-487-9243 (1 866-4-US-WAGE). This website is currently not being updated due to the suspension of Federal government services. The last update to the site was 10/1/2025. Updates to the site will start again when the Federal government resumes operations.

Employment Law Guide

Preface

This Guide, a companion to the suite of FirstStep Employment Law elaws Advisors(/elaws/firststep/), describes the major statutes and regulations administered by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) that affect businesses and workers. The Guide is designed mainly for those needing "hands-on" information to develop wage, benefit, safety and health, and nondiscrimination policies for businesses.

For businesses and other employers that do not know which of DOL's major laws apply to them, please start with the FirstStep Overview Advisor (www.dol.gov/elaws/firststep). The Advisor asks the user a short series of questions to determine which of the major DOL-administered laws apply to their organization. The Advisor takes into account relevant variables — such as size of business and type of industry — that determine coverage for these laws.

For those employers that know which employment laws they apply to them, or have an interest in a particular law, please read the Overview to understand how the Guide is organized.  Please note that each chapter (i.e., law) in the Guide corresponds to the laws covered in the FirstStep Advisor.

The Guide is offered as a public resource. It does not create new legal obligations and it is not a substitute for the U.S. Code, Federal Register, or Code of Federal Regulations as the official sources of applicable law. Every effort has been made to ensure that the information provided is complete and accurate.

Updated: December 2016


Table of Contents