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A State Constitutional Challenge to Washington’s Denial of Minimum Wage to Incarcerated Workers
No full textThis Comment challenges as unconstitutional Washington’s exemption of incarcerated individuals from the state Minimum Wage Act. Incarcerated people in Washington, unprotected by minimum wage guarantees, earn low wages in state-run inmate work programs. This statutory carveout is contrary to the rehabilitative purpose of Washington’s prisons because it impedes incarcerated people’s ability to afford necessities, participate in rehabilitative programs, and reintegrate into society. This exemption is unconstitutional under the state’s cruel punishment clause, because it is disproportionately cruel punishment and an excessive fine that incarcerated workers cannot afford. The exemption is also unconstitutional under the state’s privileges and immunities clause, because it unconstitutionally grants workers outside prison the privilege of earning a minimum wage that is not equally available to workers inside prison
Exploring the Future of Global ESG – Disclosures and Reporting Requirements
No full textThe Yearbook 2025 for Global Governance, Compliance & Integrity offers an up-to-date overview of recent and most significant developments in the interdisciplinary area of organizational governance, compliance and integrity management. The 2025 edition focuses – but is not limited to – on ESG, new approaches in compliance & integrity management, AI compliance and anti-bribery as well as supply chain compliance, whistleblowing and internal investigations. The exceptional concept of this publication offers exclusive insights both from practical and theoretical perspectives presented by over 50 experts from all over the world.The series was inaugurated by Professor Bartosz Makowicz in 2018 and has since become a recognised compendium of knowledge for scientists, practitioners, and interested parties in the latest developments in governance, compliance, and integrity, as well as the influence of AI on these areas.https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/faculty-chapters/1075/thumbnail.jp
Self-Determination Through Children\u27s Rights: Resisting the Paradoxical Pretext of Parents\u27 Rights Legislation
No full textWashington state law balances the interests of parents and the state in education, healthcare, and the general wellbeing of children. Despite the fact that children are at the center of emerging controversies, children’s rights are rarely discussed in state legislation debating the obligations and relationships between the state of Washington and parents. In education, for example, RCW 28A.605.005 finds “[p]arents are the primary stakeholders in their children’s upbringing.” While this may be true relative to the state, it overlooks the fact that children are the primary actors, agents, and rights bearers in their own personhood. This Article therefore considers ongoing public debates and legislation over parental rights of notification and control in education and healthcare under Washington state law, reframing these issues through the rights of children. State law provides a key vehicle for codifying, protecting, and even constitutionalizing the rights of everyone within the state, and this Article considers how state law could embrace a children’s rights framework to ensure self-determination for all marginalized populations. In balancing the interests of the state and parents, children are the fulcrum—the center point of the balance in weighing the two interests. Strengthening the fulcrum ensures both that the state and parents’ interests can be adequately weighed and considered, and that children’s rights and self-determination are protected in our understandings of the law through legislation and judicial frameworks. Emphasizing the rights of children—recognizing both their power and precarity without exploitation or subordination—creates conditions for the protection of all persons in the present and for the future
A Noncompete By Any Other Name: Assessing the Validity of Training Repayment Agreements Under Washington Law
Full text linkTraining Repayment Agreements (TRAs) are restrictive employment covenants that require an employee to pay their employer a fixed or prorated sum for training costs if the employee quits their job within some period defined by the agreement. The prevalence of TRAs has drastically increased in low-wage employment. TRAs harm employees by imposing an artificial financial constraint that disincentivizes employees from leaving their employer within the contract duration. The Washington State Legislature has not directly addressed TRAs despite having articulated limits on other restrictive employment covenants, like noncompetition agreements. This Comment reviews federal agency actions and other states’ approaches in response to the increased use of TRAs. Considering how Washington courts interpret the enforceability of similar restrictive employment covenants, this Comment assesses how Washington courts would interpret the enforceability of TRAs. This Comment analyzes TRAs by determining whether (1) TRAs violate the unconscionability doctrine, (2) TRAs are unenforceable under the Racine test used to evaluate noncompetes, (3) TRAs are de facto noncompetes and thereby unenforceable under RCW 49.62, and (4) TRAs violate minimum wage regulations. This Comment concludes that none of these pathways provide a ready answer for whether these agreements are enforceable under Washington law. Ultimately, the recent expansion of the unconscionability doctrine in Tadych provides the strongest argument for employees
REDEFINING CHILD PORNOGRAPHY IN AN AGE OF TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCEMENT: THE CONCEPT OF AVOIDABLE HARM
Full text linkIn 2020, Netflix released on its streaming service the movie Cuties, a coming-of-age story about an 11-year-old Senegalese immigrant who joined a dance group. The film is a commentary against the hyper-sexualization of children and the pressure young girls face from social media and society and received a director’s award at the Sundance Film Festival. Its release, however, kicked off a culture war, prompting a movement to cancel Netflix subscriptions in response to the film’s sexually provocative imagery of young girls. The movie’s award-winning director defended the film’s message, explaining that the film was her own story, struggling as a young girl with the expectations of two different societies: those of Western Europe, which objectified women’s bodies and traditional Senegalese, which was rooted in oppression. The outrage, in contrast, concerned the depictions of real children, in what was considered lewd behavior and had no serious value.
However, the focal point of the controversy and concern remains misplaced. The debate need not center upon whether the conduct was sufficiently lewd or instead of serious value, a specious inquiry at best for nonconsenting participants. Why? Today, the film’s message, an important social commentary about the sexualization of children, can be made without the need to use real children who cannot legally consent or who may not even understand what their actions convey. Art should be allowed to address taboo subjects, such as the sexualization of children, without fear of suppression under criminal law. With the advent of artificial intelligence (“AI”), the serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value of the film that Netflix asserted can be preserved without the use of minors. Therefore, when weighing that permanent record of forever being depicted in sexualized content (for which the participant could not legally consent) against a realistic version of the same message without an actual child, the balance should be struck in favor of laws protecting minors.
The concern about the harm to the child that prompted the Ferber Court in 1982 to exempt child pornography from the protection of the First Amendment is now avoidable harm that need not compromise the message; thus, criminal laws that recognize that truth should be constitutionally permissible. This conclusion necessarily permits a more generous statutory definition of conduct that can be proscribed with criminal penalties because there are other ways to convey the message without the exploitation, or even the involvement, of actual children, at least with respect to commercial producers. Our paper examines this new paradigm from a constitutional perspective, incorporating a discussion of the technological advancements in AI juxtaposed against the preservation of free speech along with the rights of children with respect to commercial producers and distributors
TAILORING THE LAW: PROTECTING FASHION IN THE FUTURE
Full text linkThis article identifies how the current legal system in the United States harms fashion designers and the art they produce. It explains how fashion as an industry lacks a system of law that best fits the issues posed by design theft due to fast fashion. Fast fashion companies, through modern technology, are able to reproduce stolen designs with haste. Currently, there are a few notable cases that have spawned from design theft, but their verdicts may be limited in their ability to change policy or raise significant legal issues. This article analyzes both current federal enforcement mechanisms and design practices in the European Union. Compared to available protections in the United States, European Union protections are more robust, but are still lacking when it comes to clarity. By combining the best of international protection and scholarly recommendations, this article contends that there is a necessity for a tailored set of laws that establish and maintain the unique industry that is fashion, both in the United States and beyond
