Noah Feldman, Columnist

Some Rights Can't Be Signed Away

Soon the Supreme Court will have to decide whether employees find justice in court or in arbitration.

May 27, 2016 at 5:30 PM UTC

Noah Feldman is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. A professor of law at Harvard University, he is author, most recently, of “To Be a Jew Today: A New Guide to God, Israel, and the Jewish People."

On the dotted line.
Photographer: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

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Your credit card company can make you agree to arbitrate disputes as a condition of getting the card. But can an employer require workers to arbitrate rather than suing collectively as a condition of employment?

In recent years, all the federal courts of appeals to address the question have said there’s no difference between your credit card issuer and your employer: Both can make you give up legal remedies. This week that changed, when for the first time an appeals court said an employer can’t require employees to waive collective legal action. By creating a circuit split, this important opinion will almost certainly push the Supreme Court to consider the issue, and soon.