On January 10, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Glacier Northwest v. Teamsters Local 174. The outcome of this case may change whether and when labor unions will engage in strikes or work stoppages.
The case involves Teamsters Local 174 in Seattle which represents ready-mix cement drivers employed by Glacier Northwest. Local 174 initiated a work stoppage after contract negotiations broke down and the drivers’ contract had expired.
Keep readingWhile California still has thousands of new COVID cases each day, the law requiring special paid time-off for COVID is set to expire on September 30, 2022. This article discusses the state of the law with regard to paid COVID leave and the new vaccines.
Supplemental Paid Sick Leave
In California, employers of 26 employees or more are required to provide up to 80 hours of supplemental paid sick leave to full-time employees who are unable to work (or telework) because of symptoms of COVID-19 or a COVID-19 vaccine,
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The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has reported that union election petitions have increased by 57% during the first half of Fiscal Year 2022 (October 2021 – March 2022). From October 2020 to March 2021, there were only 748 election petitions. As of March 31, 2022, there were 1,174 election petitions filed with the NLRB. If this trend in union election petitions continues through the rest of the year, it will be the highest annual total of election petitions filed in the last ten years.
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Now that the courts have blocked the Biden Administration’s COVID-19 vaccination or weekly testing requirements for employers of 100 or more employees and for federal contractor employers, and now that California has largely removed its masking requirements, is masking and/or proof of vaccination finally a thing of the past? This article explains where masking or vaccinations may continue to be part of the California workplace.
California law continues to require masks for workers in public transit,
Keep readingGovernor Newsom signed several bills that will provide greater protections for California workers. Here are some of the most noteworthy:
Employers subject to imprisonment for intentional wage theft
AB 1003 makes intentional theft of wages, including gratuities, punishable as grand theft. An employer commits intentional wage theft by use of fraud or while knowingly paying less than minimum wage, not paying workers overtime, not allowing workers to take meal and rest breaks,
Keep readingAs if parenting and holding down a job weren’t already hard enough, the coronavirus pandemic has forced working parents to juggle competing demands from their employers and their children, many of whom were in ‘virtual’ school or had to stay home because their child-care was closed due to health and safety concerns.
A federal law was passed to address this problem, but most of that has expired. However, California law still provides some protection for parents.
Keep readingGovernor Newsom ended California’s stay-at-home order effective June 15, bringing an end to capacity limits and physical distancing requirements for businesses and allowing fully vaccinated people to stop wearing masks in most places.
As of June 15, if you are fully vaccinated (both doses of the vaccine and at least 14 days after the final dose), you have no obligation to wear face masks except,
(1) on public transit and in public transit stations;
Keep readingOne of the first things the Biden Administration did after January 20 was to make sweeping changes to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the agency that oversees the conduct of work between unions and employers. On Day One, President Biden demanded the resignation and eventually terminated, the Trump NLRB General Counsel Peter Robb, whose term otherwise would not have ended until November. Robb was responsible for pushing an agenda that would do more damage to unions than any of his Republican-appointed predecessors.
Keep readingIn early November, loosening its longstanding appearance restrictions, UPS will allow employees to wear beards and “natural black hairstyles.” Most observers attribute this change to the company’s belated recognition that the previous policy was discriminatory, as alleged in numerous grievances filed by Teamsters locals over the past decades.
The new policy expressly permits traditional black hairstyles, such as “Afros, braids, curls, locks, twists, and knots.” The policy also makes clear that beards and mustaches “are definitely acceptable as long as they are worn in a businesslike manner and don’t create a safety concern.”
As further evidence of its acknowledgment that we are living in the 21st Century,
Keep readingIt can be discouraging to keep track of the Trump NLRB’s rollback of worker rights, but it’s important for unions and their members to stay abreast of the shifting legal landscape. One recent setback alters the decades-old rules for employees voicing support for organizing, for shop steward conduct in the workplace, and for union member conduct on picket lines.
In recognition of the fact that employee discussions with their fellow workers and with management about union-related issues can become heated,
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