- “Hard hat dispute pits Amish miners against Labor Dept.” [The Hill]
- What, ProPublica do a tendentious, one-sided report with NPR on workers’ compensation? Can’t be the ProPublica we know [Joe Paduda, Workers Comp Insider and more, Insurance Information Institute and ProPublica response]
- “One government lawyer’s war on the franchising business” [Home Depot founder Bernie Marcus, The Hill, on NLRB’s Richard Griffin] Not even pretending any more: NLRB holds public seminar in SEIU offices [Labor Relations Institute]
- What unions stand to gain from minimum wage campaigns [Labor Pains]
- Speakers predict major damage to Los Angeles small theater scene from Actors Equity plan to end unpaid rehearsals [L.A. Times]
- Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) introduces bill to reverse NLRB’s “micro-unions” initiative [Sean Higgins, earlier] House holds critical hearing on ambush election rule [Diana Furchtgott-Roth, related Senate resolution] Adding a member to the NLRB might cut down on partisan swings, but why not check out more radical reform, along the lines of New Zealand’s Employment Contracts Act? [Trey Kovacs]
- Public college labor education center uses taxpayer funding to organize against proposed right to work law. You got a problem with that? [Freedom Foundation, Washington]
Posts Tagged ‘labor unions’
Labor and employment roundup
- Jury convicts Ironworkers Local 401 boss in union violence case [Philadelphia Inquirer, CBS Philly, earlier here, etc. on Quaker meetinghouse arson and other crimes] Pennsylvania lawmaker proposes to end unions’ exemption from laws defining crimes of harassment, stalking, threatening [York Dispatch; more on exemption of unions from these laws]
- Emergent regime under federal law: if you’ve ever offered light duty to a disabled worker or returning injured worker, you’d better offer it to pregnant worker too [Jon Hyman]
- Everything you know about company towns is wrong [Alex Tabarrok]
- “The EEOC issues you’ll want to keep an eye on in 2015” [Littler Mendelson via Tim Gould, HR Morning]
- Sued if you do: employers struggle to navigate between government rules encouraging, penalizing hiring of applicants with criminal records [WSJ, paywall] “Watch Your Back: The Growing Threat of FCRA Background Check Class Actions” [Gregory Snell, Foley & Lardner]
- “Nearly 30 Percent of Workers in the U.S. Need a License to Perform Their Job: It Is Time to Examine Occupational Licensing Practices” [Melissa S. Kearney, Brad Hershbein and David Boddy, Brookings via John Cochrane]
- “The Effect of Mandatory Sick Leave Policies: Reviewing the Evidence” [Max Nelsen] “Popularity of Obama’s paid sick leave proposal depends on workers not realizing it ultimately comes out of their paychecks.” [James Sherk]
Labor and employment roundup
- Obama wants Hill to force paid leave on employers. What, his rule-by-decree powers didn’t stretch that far? [RCP, USA Today] Department of Labor, using funds taxed from supporters and opponents alike, happy to act as frank advocate for legislation [its blog]
- Employers brace for salaried-overtime mandate, wrought by unilateral Obama decree [KSL, earlier at Cato]
- Related: “Employers To Face More Litigation In 2015 As Plaintiff Lawyers Swoop In” [Daniel Fisher on Gerald Maatman/Seyfarth Shaw report] Here come more NLRB decisions too [Tim Devaney, The Hill]
- Krugman on minimum wage: two economists in one! [Donald Boudreaux, Cafe Hayek via Coyote, @Mike_Saltsman (“Min wage in France is closer to $12/hr US. But Krugman still being inconsistent bc he’s also backed $15 US minimum”)]
- Five pro-de Blasio unions — SEIU/1199, teachers, hotel workers, doormen/building staff, CWA District 1 — help enforce NYC mayor’s agenda [NYDN]
- Testimony: “worst-kept secret” in Philly ironworkers’ union was that you could get ahead through violent “night work” [Philadelphia Inquirer; earlier on Quaker meetinghouse arson here and here, related here]
- Loads of new compliance burdens: “Changes in California Employment Law for 2015” [Baker Hostetler] And it wouldn’t be California without many more employer mandates pending in legislature [Steven Greenhut]
NLRB and labor law roundup
The National Labor Relations Board has been so hyperactive lately reshaping the law for the benefit of labor unions that it gets a roundup all to itself:
- NLRB announces new right to use employer’s email system for union organizing [Daniel Schwartz]
- Per 2-1 vote, NLRB agrees with ALJ that restaurant can’t fire workers over false posters claiming its food is unsafe [Patrick DePoy and Christopher Johlie, JD Supra; earlier on case, and IWW campaign against MikLin/Jimmy John’s]
- Other recent NLRB insubordination rulings expand frontiers of right to flip off, cuss out one’s boss [Loren Lee Forrest Jr. and Frederick D. Braid, Holland & Knight, WSJ on Hooters case, earlier]
- “Unions win again at NLRB with ‘ambush elections’ rule” [Kent Hoover/Business Journals, Eric Stuart and C. Thomas Davis, Ogletree Deakins, Hirsch/Workplace Prof, earlier]
- “Expanding Joint Employer Status: What Does it Mean for Workers and Job Creators?” [House Education and Labor hearing, September; earlier here, here, etc.] Related, first and second batch of critical amicus letters;
- Confirmation of nominee Lauren McFerran by lame-duck Senate will lock in union-friendly majority for next two years or so [Sean Higgins, Washington Examiner; Richard Rahn, Washington Times]
- “Congress Must Rein In the NLRB” [Ryan Williams, Roll Call]
Labor and employment roundup
- I’m quoted dissenting from the seeming ENDA consensus [Caroline Preston, Al Jazeera America; earlier here and here; related, Mark Lee, Washington Blade last year, “ENDA and the Seduction of Symbolic Gestures”]
- EEOC gears up to fight employer wellness programs under ADA [Stephen Miller/SHRM, ABA Journal, John Holmquist/Michigan Employment Law Connection, Robin Shea/Employment and Labor Insider]
- Evidence still points to disemployment effects for low-skilled workers from minimum wage hikes [David Neumark et al NBER working paper via Ira Stoll, related] What’s the right minimum wage? As the NYT correctly perceived in 1987, $0.00. [David Henderson video, Prager]
- “Judge Calls Out NLRB Pro-Union Partisanship” [Labor Pains; document demands levied by agency against Univ. of Pittsburgh Medical Center]
- If you so much as think of declaring me fit for work, my lawyer will make you rue the day [Coyote on employer role in Social Security Disability]
- New Cato research brief, “Labor Market Fluidity and Economic Performance” [Stephen J. Davis and John Haltiwanger]
- Philly councilman wants to reserve city subsidies for unionized hotels [Joel Mathis, Philadelphia mag]
Labor and employment roundup
- Operator of Jimmy John’s sandwich shops asked low-level employees to sign a noncompete. What would be the point? [Bainbridge, Hyman]
- GOP Congress might take aim at a range of current union and NLRB practices including political dues spending without member opt-out [Sean Higgins, Washington Examiner]
- Reminder: turning union activity into a protected category under the Civil Rights Act is one of the very worst ideas around [George Leef, earlier on Ellison-Lewis proposal here and here]
- Scrutiny of occupational licensure intensifies [Ira Stoll]
- “House Committee Examines EEOC Transparency and Accountability Legislation” [On Labor]
- “The Dawn of ‘Micro-Unions’: A Scary Proposition for Employers” [John G. Kruchko, Kevin B. McCoy, Ford Harrison, earlier here, etc.]
- Immigrant status and national origin discrimination: “DOJ Brings Issue of Hiring Documentation to Forefront” [Daniel Schwartz]
Labor and employment roundup
- EEOC investigating claim that personality tests for job applicants discriminate against mentally ill [ABA Journal]
- Many “living wage” ordinances contain a sneaky provision that encourages unionization [Maxford Nelsen, WSJ]
- Sixth Circuit agrees to rehear case suggesting employees can demand telecommuting as accommodation [Jon Hyman, earlier; EEOC v. Ford Motor]
- Should employers give informative references? [Daniel Schwartz, Evil HR Lady]
- EEOC will abuse conciliation process unless judges exercise oversight [Merrily Archer]
- Here is how Politico proposes to cover labor issues as “straight news right down the middle” [The Weekly Standard, RiShawn Biddle/Rare]
- Study: extended jobless benefits prolonged labor market’s woes [Karahan, Kapon, Satar, New York Fed via Tuccille]
Labor roundup
- What’s wrong with the NLRB attack on McDonald’s franchising, cont’d [On Labor, earlier here, here, etc.]
- Postal union calls in American Federation of Teachers, other public employee unions to kill Staples postal partnership plan [Huffington Post]
- U.S. Department of Labor uses coercive hot-goods orders to arm-twist blueberry farmers, judges say no [Jared Meyer, Econ21 and Salem Statesman-Journal]
- “Watch Closely Obama’s Treatment of Unions” [Diana Furchtgott-Roth] “Obama ‘Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces’ Executive Order Will Punish Firms in Pro-Worker States” [Hans Bader, CEI]
- Judge: massive document request signals NLRB’s emergence as litigation arm, and co-organizer, of unions [Sean Higgins, Examiner] Wobblies on top: NLRB sides with IWW workers over poster claiming eatery’s food was unsafe [Minneapolis Star-Tribune, earlier]
- Academic debate on union issues already wildly lopsided, union-backed labor history curriculum unlikely to help [Alex Bolt, Workplace Choice]
- Turning unionism into a protected-class category in parallel with discrimination law is one of the worst ideas ever [Jon Hyman, earlier here, etc.]
Boston attack on Padma Lakshmi and crew
If done by anyone other than unionists, this would by now be a trending national story:
The Teamsters picketers were already mad. By the time Top Chef host Padma Lakshmi’s car pulled up to the Steel & Rye restaurant in the picturesque New England town of Milton just outside Boston, one of them ran up to her car and screamed, “We’re gonna bash that pretty face in, you f*cking wh*re!”
“She was scared,” said a Top Chef crewmember who witnessed the incident.
Bravo had incurred the wrath of Charlestown-based Teamsters Local 25 by using its own production assistants as drivers, reports the Boston Herald:
The picketers lobbed sexist, racist and homophobic slurs at the rest of the cast and crew for most of the day, the website reported, and when production wrapped, the “Top Chef” crew found that tires were slashed on 14 of their cars. Milton police confirmed that the union members were “threatening, heckling and harassing” but said no arrests were made.
The Herald quotes a spokeswoman for Local 25, Melissa Hurley, sounding completely unapologetic: “As far as we’re concerned, nothing happened.” Or to put it differently: Teamsters Will Be Teamsters.
More, including the violent history that makes this incident anything but “isolated,” from the Boston Globe. I’ve posted on the curious exemption of unions from the law of harassment, stalking, hostile environment, intimidation, etc. here, here (more on Philadelphia Quaker meetinghouse arson), and in various other posts, as well as in my book The Excuse Factory.
Labor and employment roundup
- “The tie that binds public employee unions and Wall Street” [Daniel DiSalvo] “Unions Manipulate New York City’s Public Pension Funds To Punish Their Enemies” [NYT via Jim Epstein, Reason]
- Illinois latest state to pass “ban the box” law restricting employers’ inquiries on criminal records [Workplace Prof]
- Two ex-football pros file suit claiming union conspired with owners on concussions [Bloomberg]
- Average Illinois public retiree’s pension rapidly narrowing gap with average salary of worker still on job [Jake Griffin Daily Herald via Reboot Illinois] By 2006, 1,600 California prison guards were making $110K+, plus more on tendency of state/local government pay to outrun private [Lee Ohanian via Tyler Cowen]
- Great moments in employment law: Seventh Circuit says other employees’ having sex on complainant’s desk not hostile work environment when not targeted at gender [Eric B. Meyer]
- Next step signaled in SEIU fast food protest campaign: unlawful property occupations [AP, Chicago Tribune, arrests in May]
- Trial lawyer win: Obama federal-contractor fiat will forbid pre-dispute agreements to submit bias claims to binding arbitration [AP, AAJ jubilates]