A critical thinking application (12-A) Employment-At-Will

In the United States of America, all relationships that deal with employment are overseen and directed by external forces, such as the employment laws. These employment laws were created and adjusted over time to legally protect employees from unfair treatment and improve the relationships between employers and employees. There is a large variety of different “labor and equal employment laws,” however the predominantly most significant ones concerning the relationships of employment can be expressed in “four types of legal doctrine and legislation” (Bernardin & Russell, 2013, p. 439). These four legal issues are: Employment-at-Will, Whistle-blowing, Privacy, and Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN). One very large legal issue today is the employment-at-will doctrine. It is commonly misinterpreted by many employees and “89 percent of workers surveyed believed that an employee cannot be lawfully terminated for simple reasons of personal dislike” (Bernardin & Russell, 2013, p. 583). The termination for such reasons is “in fact lawful as long as EEO laws are not violated” (Bernardin & Russell, 2013, p. 583).
The employment-at-will doctrine is a very controversial law that brings up strong debates between its defenders and critics. Bernardin & Russell (2013) define the employment-at-will doctrine as “a common-law standard that states that a private institution has the right to terminate its employees, with or without just cause, in the absence of a written contract” (p. 439). This basically means that an employment relationship can be terminated at the will of either the employer or the employee. Neither the employer that lets go of an employee, not the employee that quits is liable to the other party in any way, “even if this termination causes damage to the other party” (“Employment at Will”, n.d.). However, it is of great importance “to note that employment-at-will does not exist when there is either a contract (implied or explicit) or a

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