A while back (I am being intentionally vague here to avoid identifying anyone) a U.S. client company contacted our China lawyers about shutting down its China WFOE and/or terminating all of its roughly 47 China employees in one fell swoop. The U.S. company had discovered rampant corruption among its employees and its CEO wanted the
In late 2017, an old and yet important set of China Employment laws —the Measures for Severance Payment due to Violation or Termination of Employment Contracts — issued by the then-Ministry of Labor back in 1995 was abolished by the PRC Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security. Since our China employment lawyers keep getting
Expect U.S. customs to get even tougher on imports in the next year.
U.S.-China Trade Policy and The Future of China-Focused Section 301 Duties and the best tariff mitigation strategies you should employ now.
U.S. companies importing goods from Southeast Asia must beware of transshipment schemes by Chinese suppliers. Not only do these schemes mean dealing with China problems after a supposed China departure, they also give rise to serious liabilities if importing into the United States. Over the past few years, companies have had plenty of reasons to
I recently received a message from an American lawyer interested in working abroad. In this post I share part of my reply, together with some additional comments. While this post is China-focused, most of what I say applies to other countries. It’s also important to note that much of what follows is moot at this
Next week, I will be a panelist at a Washington State Bar Association (WSBA) event discussing dual nationality. I’ll be sharing the platform with Dr. Dana Raigrodski and David Freeburg. Registration is free, and if you’re an attorney in Washington State, you can earn CLE credit for attending. Interestingly, the event being scheduled on St.
If you are a China employer, you need written employment contracts with enforceable provisions for all of your China employees. But merely putting the terms and conditions regarding the employment relationship in writing is not sufficient to protect you. An unenforceable employment contract or even an unenforceable provision in an otherwise well-written employment contract can hurt you as the employer.
When our employer clients seek our counsel on new China employee hires, we usually (but not always) advise they use an initial fixed term of three years. We also recommend that before the initial employment term is up, they consider whether to extend the employee’s contract for a second employment term.
Reporting someone else for illegal transshipping under the False Claims Act can make you rich. The United States has imposed tariffs and duties against a whole slew of Chinese products, increasing the costs of those products sold to the United States.To avoid these tariffs and duties, many companies are shipping their Made in China products to countries other than China and then shipping those products to the United States, claiming those products were made in a country other than China. This is called transshipping and it is illegal.
