Your trusted source for Iowa business and franchise law insights.
Your trusted source for Iowa business and franchise law insights.
The Iowa Association of Business and Industry has published a survey indicating Iowa’s legal climate is hurting job growth. The survey also states that many Iowa business leaders are dissatisfied with Iowa’s legal climate and believe it is costing the state jobs because of competition from other states.
The survey seems to contradict the U.S.
The six-year old Iowa private antitrust class-action against Microsoft is finally heating up. The case is set for trial November 13, 2006 but yesterday a hearing was held on Microsoft’s allegations that Plaintiffs’ lawyer, Roxanne Barton Conlin, engaged in misconduct when she persuaded a Hewlett-Packard technician to give her internal documents from another case. …
Lawpportunities, a joint venture between Des Moines lawyers Rush Nigut and Brett Trout, is receiving national attention for its legal blogging seminar coming up this November 10th in Johnston, Iowa. According to LexBlog’s Kevin O’Keefe, Lawpportunities is hosting the country’s first full-day CLE devoted to blogging. LexBlog is one of the country’s…
Today’s Des Moines Register Business Section contained an article by Patt Johnson featuring the assistance provided by SCORE to local entrepreneurs. SCORE is made up of retired executives that mentor and counsel new entrepreneurs.
People generally think of SCORE in the context of their one day workshops for new entrepreneurs. However, it was also surprising…
Employers Must Protect Employees’ Social Security Numbers
In a recent newsletter update from the Krupin O’Brien employment law firm, attorney Natalie Cantor Gros wrote an informative article regarding the importance of employers protecting the Social Security numbers of employees.
The article points out that a Michigan employer paid $275,000 settlement to group of 911 operators…
The Use of Comp Time in Place of Overtime
Some employers decide to provide employees comp time instead of paying overtime. Under the law, employers are usually not allowed to provide only one hour of comp time for each hour of overtime. Instead, an employer may be able to give compensatory time if the overtime…
How to Name Your Iowa Business
The first step in naming your Iowa business is to make sure it is available for use. This requires a little homework. You need to make sure you are not infringing someone else’s business name.
To stay out of trouble you should first see if the name is available…
Start-Up Businesses Should Develop Solid Relationship with Business Attorney
It is a good idea for start-up businesses to develop a solid relationship with a business attorney. Hiring an attorney is usually not as expensive as entrepreneurs imagine. In many instances entrepreneurs may try to set up their own incorporations through online resources but boilerplate article…
Look Before You Leap With Blogs
I read this interesting article entitled, "Blogs Raise Copyright, Other Legal Issues" from The Business Journal of Milwaukee. The article discusses the legal issues raised by blogging including copyright infringement, defamation and privacy issues.
For lawyer bloggers there are a whole host of ethical issues to consider including…
According to an annual survey released by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Iowa’s legal system ranks No. 4 in the nation. Iowa has ranked in the top five each of the last three years.
The five top states for overall legal fairness according to the survey are Delaware, Nebraska, Virginia, Iowa and Connecticut.
The survey…