Which Massachusetts employment laws apply to my small business?

Massachusetts employment laws apply from your first employee: when you pay wages and final paychecks, a $15 minimum wage, earned sick time, Paid Family and Medical Leave contributions, and a strict test for contractors. More rules start at six, 11, 25, 50, and 100 employees, including paid sick time and pay ranges in job postings.

You are about to hire your first person in Massachusetts, open a location there, or hire someone who will work from home in the state. Or the company has grown and nobody has checked which state rules now apply. Several Massachusetts rules start at a headcount that a growing company crosses without noticing.

What follows is a map of the main rules, current as of November 4, 2026, with the official source for each. It is general information, not legal advice, and your employment counsel confirms how each rule applies to your company.

Which Massachusetts employment laws apply at each headcount?

The number of employees decides which rules apply, and many of them start with the first hire.

What applies from your first employee?

From the first hire you have rules on pay, breaks, worker classification, and insurance, in addition to earned sick time and PFML, which have their own sections below.

• Pay. The minimum wage has been $15.00 an hour since January 1, 2023 (Trial Court Law Libraries), and most employees earn at least 1.5 times their regular rate for hours over 40 in a week.
• Paydays and records. Hourly employees are paid weekly or every other week, within six or seven days after the pay period ends. Each paycheck comes with a stub that shows hours, rate, and deductions, and payroll records are kept for three years (Attorney General).
• Meal breaks. Anyone who works more than six hours in a calendar day gets a 30-minute meal break, free of all duties, which may be unpaid (Attorney General).
• Contractors. For the state wage laws, Massachusetts presumes that a worker is an employee. Under M.G.L. c. 149, § 148B, a contractor must be free from your control and direction, work outside the usual course of your business, and be customarily engaged in an independent business of the same kind, all three at once (Trial Court Law Libraries).
• Workers' compensation. Every employer must carry workers' compensation insurance for its employees, including family members who work in the business (Department of Industrial Accidents).
• Equal pay. Under the updated Massachusetts Equal Pay Act, in effect since July 1, 2018, an employer cannot pay someone less than an employee of a different gender for comparable work, except for reasons the law lists, such as seniority or merit. An employer also cannot ask an applicant about past pay until after an offer that includes compensation (Attorney General).

When is a final paycheck due in Massachusetts?

An employee you fire or lay off must be paid in full on the last day of work. An employee who quits is paid in full on the next regular payday, or by the first Saturday after leaving if there is no regular payday, according to the Attorney General's pay and recordkeeping guide. The Wage Act, M.G.L. c. 149, § 148, says that "any employee discharged from such employment shall be paid in full on the day of his discharge" (Trial Court Law Libraries).

Earned vacation is wages, so it goes in the final paycheck. Accrued, unused sick time is different. In Mui v. Massachusetts Port Authority (2018), the Supreme Judicial Court held that it is not wages under the Wage Act, so the Wage Act does not require paying it out when the job ends (Trial Court Law Libraries). If your policy puts vacation and sick time in one paid time off bank, ask your employment counsel how that bank is treated.

A late final paycheck can be expensive. Under M.G.L. c. 149, § 150, the Wage Act provides for mandatory triple damages, plus court costs and attorneys' fees, according to the Trial Court Law Libraries. If a termination is coming, have the final paycheck ready before the conversation; how to terminate an employee walks through the rest of that day.

How does earned sick time work in Massachusetts?

Employees earn at least one hour of sick time for every 30 hours worked and can earn and use up to 40 hours a year. With 11 or more employees the time must be paid, and with fewer it can be unpaid, according to the Attorney General's earned sick time page. The law took effect on July 1, 2015, as the Attorney General announced that June.

• Accrual starts on the first day of work, and employees can use the time 90 days after they start (940 CMR 33.03).
• Employees can use it for their own illness, injury, or medical appointments, for the same needs of a child, spouse, parent, or spouse's parent, and to address domestic violence. Since November 21, 2024, it also covers pregnancy loss and a failed assisted reproduction, adoption, or surrogacy.
• You can ask for a doctor's note only in limited cases, for example after more than three consecutive missed workdays, and never for details of the illness.
• Your own paid time off policy can serve as sick time if it gives the same benefits and protections the law requires, or better.
• You post the Notice of Employee Rights and either give each employee a copy or put your sick time policy in a handbook. The Attorney General publishes the notice in Spanish and other languages.

What does Paid Family and Medical Leave require of employers?

Paid Family and Medical Leave (PFML) is the state program that pays eligible workers for up to 12 weeks of family leave, up to 20 weeks of medical leave, and up to 26 weeks combined in a benefit year (Trial Court Law Libraries). Benefits have been available since January 1, 2021, according to the Department of Family and Medical Leave (DFML). The state pays the benefits, and your part is to withhold and send the contributions and to inform your workforce.

• Contributions. For 2026, an employer with 25 or more covered individuals sends 0.88% of eligible wages, of which up to 0.46% can be withheld from employees and at least 0.42% is the employer's share. An employer with fewer than 25 sends 0.46%, all of which can be withheld (DFML rates, updated October 1, 2026). Contributions are reported and paid every quarter through MassTaxConnect.
• A change for 2027. Chapter 101 of the Acts of 2026 moves the employer's share from medical leave to family leave starting January 1, 2027.
• Notices. Give each new employee the written PFML notice within 30 days of hire, tell current employees about a rate change 30 days before it starts, and display the DFML poster in English and in each language that is the primary language of five or more people in your workforce, when DFML offers it (Employer's Introduction to PFML).
• Penalties. Missing notices can cost $50 per employee for a first violation and $300 per employee after that (DFML).

What does the Massachusetts pay transparency law require?

Since October 29, 2025, employers with 25 or more employees in Massachusetts must include a pay range in every job posting and give the range to employees offered a promotion or transfer, and to any applicant or employee who asks about the position. The range is what the employer "reasonably and in good faith expects to pay for such a position at that time," in the words of the Attorney General's pay transparency guidance, and retaliating against someone who asks for it is prohibited.

• Postings for remote roles are covered when the primary place of work is Massachusetts.
• A commission or piece-rate role shows the commission or piece-rate range you expect to pay.
• A first violation gets a warning, a second a fine of up to $500, and a third a fine of up to $1,000. Until October 29, 2027, an employer has two business days to fix a problem after a notice to cure from the Attorney General.
• Employers with 100 or more employees that already file EEO-1 reports, the federal workforce demographic report, with the EEOC also file them with the Secretary of the Commonwealth, by February 1 each year starting in 2025.

What changes at six and at 50 employees?

At six employees the state anti-discrimination law, M.G.L. c. 151B, applies, and at 50 three leave laws do.

• Six or more. The law bars discrimination and harassment based on a protected class, and the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) enforces it (MCAD). You must adopt a written policy against sexual harassment (MCAD) and give each employee a written copy every year, and new employees when they start (M.G.L. c. 151B, § 3A). Employees also get up to eight weeks of unpaid parental leave for the birth or adoption of a child (MCAD).
• 50 or more. Eligible employees get up to 24 hours of unpaid small necessities leave every 12 months, for a child's school activities or a child's or elderly relative's appointments, and up to 15 days of paid or unpaid leave related to domestic violence. The federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) generally applies too, with up to 12 weeks of job-protected leave (Attorney General).

How do you count employees for each law?

Each law counts differently, so a company can be over one line and under another at the same time.

The sick time and pay range counts both include full-time, part-time, seasonal, and temporary employees. The sick time rule is in 940 CMR 33.04, the PFML rule in the Employer's Introduction to PFML, and the pay range rule in the Attorney General's pay transparency FAQ.

This map covers private employers in Massachusetts. If some of your people work in other states, those states' rules can apply to them too, and some jobs, such as tipped and agricultural work, have their own wage rules.

What to do next

1. Count your employees three ways: everyone for sick time, your covered workforce for PFML, and the people whose primary place of work is Massachusetts for pay ranges.
2. Write down how a final paycheck, including earned vacation, gets produced on the day someone is let go.
3. Post the required notices, give the PFML notice within 30 days of each hire, and give each employee the earned sick time notice or put the policy in your handbook. At six or more employees, hand out the sexual harassment policy every year too.
4. If you have 25 or more employees, set a pay range for each role before you post it.
5. List everyone you pay as a contractor and review each one against the three-part test with your employment counsel.

We help you take a clear look at the policies, pay practices, and records your team runs on, and decide what to fix first, alongside your employment counsel. See how we handle HR compliance. If a buyer, an investor, or a new executive is about to look closely, read when an HR audit makes sense.

Questions owners ask

Where do I get the posters and notices Massachusetts requires?

From the agencies that publish them. The Attorney General's Fair Labor Division offers the wage and hour poster, which every employer must post, and the earned sick time notice. DFML offers the PFML poster, the new-hire notice, and the rate sheets, and MCAD offers a model sexual harassment policy and poster. The sick time notice and the PFML poster and notices come in English and several other languages.

Do I need an employee handbook in Massachusetts?

None of the rules above requires a handbook by that name, but two of them point toward one: your earned sick time policy can go in a handbook instead of a separate notice, and at six or more employees the sexual harassment policy must be in writing and given to each employee every year. Why companies outsource human resources covers ways to get help writing it and keeping it current.