The drumbeat of union representation elections continued loud and clear over the past few weeks, notably within the Starbucks chain and within Amazon warehouses. Speaking to Starbucks’ ongoing unionizing issues, the Starbucks Workers United (SBU) caught a big fish last week when the Starbucks Reserve Roastery in New York City officially voted to unionize by…
Read More »Contrary to the union-favoring anti-business provisions of the Protecting the Right to Organize Act (PRO Act), there is finally a viable alternative floating around in the United States Senate. Republican Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) introduced the Employee Rights Act (ERA) of 2022 into the Senate just over a week ago. The legislation seeks to bring…
Read More »Earlier this week, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) agreed to hear a case challenging a set of California restrictions on animal housing. Approved by voters in 2018, Proposition 12 banned the production or sale in California of pork and other animals raised using conventional animal husbandry methods. Currently, 96 percent of the…
Read More »Aside from its ongoing union problems, there’s more news coming out of Starbucks of late. Of course, with the recent resignation of CEO Kevin Johnson, founder and former CEO Howard Schultz officially took the helm again this week and jumped right into the fray. He hosted a town-hall style open forum for employees at which…
Read More »On Wednesday of this week, the Senate effectively ended the nomination of Dr. David Weil for another stretch as the administrator of the US Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division. On a procedural motion to advance consideration of the Weil nomination, the Senate voted 53-47 against consideration, with three democrats – Senators Manchin (WV),…
Read More »On the flip side of the nomination coin, also on Wednesday of this week, Senate Democrats voted 51-50 to advance the nomination of Alvaro Bedoya to serve as a Member of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The Bedoya nomination was tied up in a deadlocked (14-14) Senate Commerce Committee and needed to be advanced by…
Read More »Last week, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that the independent contractor statute also applies to the franchisor-franchisee relationship and does not conflict with the FTC Franchise Rule 7-Eleven franchisees may in fact qualify as employees under the state ABC test. With its decision in Patel v 7-Eleven, Inc. the court in some ways “threaded…
Read More »Workers at yet another Mesa Arizona Starbucks coffee shop have voted to unionize under the flag of the Starbucks Workers United banner, an affiliate of Service Employees International Union (SEIU). By a vote of 11-3 with one ballot challenged, workers won their eighth union representation vote out of nine tries nationwide. And speaking of unionizing…
Read More »Despite the decreasing rates of COVID infections nationally, some states and locales are expanding the employee protections and benefits that were initially put in place because of the coronavirus pandemic. Primary amongst these dictates is the reimposition of COVID-19 emergency paid sick leave. For the third time, the city of Philadelphia has imposed a special…
Read More »As we have advised in the past, there is a dangerous legislative proposal advancing in California, AB 257, the co-called FAST Act (the Fast-Food Accountability and Standards Recovery Act). This bill has already passed the Assembly and is currently pending in the State Senate, where it will likely have an easier time winning support. As…
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