No Small-Business Exemption: Which New York Employment Laws Cover a One-Employee Business

A landscaping business in Bay Shore runs one truck, one trailer and one crew member who mows from April to November. The crew member reports a slur the owner’s cousin keeps using on the job. Two weeks later the crew member is told there is no more work. The owner’s view is simple: a business this small is not covered by discrimination law.

Under federal law the owner is largely right. Under New York law the owner is wrong, and has been since 2020. The State’s Human Rights Law covers every employer in the state, with no headcount at all, and our post on what the 2019 amendments did to the value of a New York case explains why that statute now carries the most weight in most cases.

The federal floors: 15, 20 and 50 employees

The federal discrimination statutes were written with a headcount. Title VII defines an employer as one with “fifteen or more employees for each working day in each of twenty or more calendar weeks in the current or preceding calendar year.” The ADA uses the same 15. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act uses twenty. The Family and Medical Leave Act starts at 50.

The federal wage law works differently. The Fair Labor Standards Act covers an enterprise with “annual gross volume of sales made or business done” of at least $500,000, and it separately covers an employee who is personally “engaged in commerce,” whatever the size of the business. Wage coverage under federal law is therefore a question of fact, not a simple count.

Consequently, a crew member at a one-truck landscaping business has no Title VII claim at all. The federal door is closed before anyone asks what happened.

Jason Tenenbaum put it this way in an October 8, 2026 interview about the personnel file law:

And if you look at the federal legislation, Title VII, ADA, there’s a threshold number of employees before those federal protective laws kick in. So under Title VII, if indeed you are a small business, you have less than fifteen people, you can get away with it federally. Then in 2019 New York got rid of the whole provision for its human rights law.

What New York changed in 2019

Before 2020, the State Human Rights Law did not reach “any employer with fewer than four persons in his or her employ,” except in sexual harassment cases, which already covered every employer. Chapter 160 of the Laws of 2019 struck that language. Executive Law § 292(5) now reads: “The term ‘employer’ shall include all employers within the state.”

The change took effect on the one hundred eightieth day after the act became law, and it applies to claims filed on or after February 8, 2020. Every protected class the Human Rights Law lists, including race, sex, disability, age, religion and national origin, now reaches the business with one employee the same way it reaches a hospital system.

The other half of the 2019 act matters just as much to a small employer. The act also directs that the State law be construed liberally, regardless of how comparable federal laws are construed.

Here, the Bay Shore owner’s belief came from Title VII. It does not survive the State statute.

Who counts as covered: every size, every schedule

The same rule now runs through New York’s other employment statutes. The personnel file law defines an employer as “any individual, corporation, partnership, labor organization, unincorporated association or any other legal business,” including public employers, and an employee as “a person currently employed or formerly employed by an employer.” There is no size floor and no hours floor.

The whistleblower law, Labor Law § 740, covers an employer “that employs one or more employees.” The minimum wage law defines an employer as “any individual, partnership, association, corporation, limited liability company, business trust, legal representative, or any organized group of persons acting as employer,” with no count. The wage notice and payroll rule in Labor Law § 195 begins, “Every employer shall.” So does the paid sick leave law.

This is how Jason Tenenbaum explains the policy behind it:

So this is just following New York public policy which states that no matter how many people you employ, you as an employer have to treat your employees with dignity and respect. You may not discriminate against them nor harm them. So if you’re a landscaper who employs someone to mow the lawn, it applies to you. If you own a hospital, it applies to you. For the personnel file law, the number of hours that they work doesn’t matter. Whether they work one hour a week, ten hours a week or forty hours a week, it still applies.

Consequently, the right question for a small business is not “are we big enough to be covered.” It is “which rules apply to us, and are we following them.”

The table below sets the federal floor next to the New York rule for each type of law. It is built from the statutes’ definitions, and each row carries the cite.

Where size still counts in New York

Jason Tenenbaum’s shorthand in the interview was that New York dropped the employee limit across its labor laws. That is true of the Human Rights Law and the statutes in the table. It is not true of every New York rule, and a small business should know the three places where the count still matters.

The first is paid sick leave. Every employer must provide sick leave, but Labor Law § 196-b(1) sets the amount by size. An employer with four or fewer employees owes up to forty hours of unpaid sick leave a year, unless it had “a net income of greater than one million dollars in the previous tax year,” in which case the forty hours are paid. Five to ninety-nine employees: forty paid hours. One hundred or more: fifty-six paid hours.

The second is the State WARN Act, which requires notice before a plant closing or mass layoff. It defines an employer as a business enterprise with “fifty or more employees, excluding part-time employees,” and it excludes the state, local governments and school districts.

The third is New York City. The City Human Rights Law does not reach an employer with “fewer than four persons in the employ of such employer” during the relevant period, except in a claim of gender-based harassment, where it covers “any employer.” Independent contractors working in the business count toward the four. For a three-person business in Hicksville, the State law is the one that counts, and it has no floor.

What a small employer should do now

The duty does not depend on whether the business has an HR department. It depends on whether it has one employee. In practice, that means a written anti-discrimination policy and a way to report a problem, a wage notice at hiring with a signed acknowledgment, a pay statement with every payment, a sick leave policy, and a plan for the personnel file law before November 8, 2026. Our post on what records a New York employer has to keep sets out the files and the retention periods.

Jason Tenenbaum’s advice to business owners is plain:

So what the business needs to know is that essentially this is a training issue, just like anything else you would do. When you run your business, you have rules and regulations that everyone has to follow, and this is another rubric of rules that has to be implemented so that the company can operate in compliance with the law. And it’s always better to be safe than sorry.

Consequently, the cheapest compliance step for a five-person business is the one it skips most often: writing the rules down and telling the people who work there.

What an employee of a small business can do

If your employer has fewer than fifteen employees, there is no EEOC charge under Title VII to file. The State route is open. You can file a complaint with the State Division of Human Rights within three years, or sue in court under the Human Rights Law within three years. Filing with the Division generally gives up the court claim, so choose the forum before you file. Our guide to choosing between an EEOC charge and a New York lawsuit explains the trade-offs.

Retaliation follows the same rule. Executive Law § 296(7) bars retaliation for opposing discrimination or filing a complaint, at any size. If you were punished for complaining about a wage or safety violation, Labor Law § 215 and Labor Law § 740 can apply, and § 740 lists reinstatement or front pay, lost wages and benefits, attorney’s fees, a civil penalty and punitive damages for a willful violation. Starting November 8, 2026, asking for your personnel file is protected too; our guide to getting your personnel file in New York explains how to make the request.

Small businesses keep fewer records, so it is incumbent upon you to keep your own. That record is what proves the timeline.

Sources

• Executive Law § 292
• Executive Law § 296
• Executive Law § 297
• Chapter 160 of the Laws of 2019 (S6577), bill text and memorandum
• Labor Law § 195
• Labor Law § 196-b
• Labor Law § 210-b
• Labor Law § 215
• Labor Law § 651
• Labor Law § 740
• Labor Law § 860-a
• CPLR 214
• 42 U.S.C. § 2000e (Title VII definitions)
• 42 U.S.C. § 12111 (ADA definitions)
• 29 U.S.C. § 630 (ADEA definitions)
• 29 U.S.C. § 2611 (FMLA definitions)
• 29 U.S.C. § 203 (FLSA definitions)
• 29 U.S.C. § 206 (FLSA minimum wage)
• Administrative Code of the City of New York, Title 8

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The Bay Shore crew member worked for a business with one employee, and under federal law that would end the conversation. Under the State Human Rights Law it starts it: the report about the slur is protected, and the timing of the lost work is the evidence. Our employment discrimination practice covers claims against employers of every size, and our Long Island discrimination attorney page explains how those cases are built.

If you work for a small business on Long Island and were fired, cut back or harassed after you complained, call (516) 750-0595 with your last pay stub and the date you complained, or request a free case review.