Skip to main content

What I've Been Reading This Week


Even though I spent most of the week in the office, for seemingly several weeks in a row now, and had plenty of time to read through several articles, I wanted to keep this post concise & to the point.  With that being said, with references below in regard to the government shutdown and a new Representative from New York, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, perhaps this should have been titled ‘What I’ve Been Reading This Week:  Government Edition’.  In all seriousness, the three articles I highlighted this week are all worth reading, politics aside.

As always, below are a couple articles that caught my eye this week.


Government Shutdowns & Employee Furloughs

A few weeks ago, the shutdown of the federal government dominated news coverage.  With that prolonged shutdown, many government contractors were put in a tough spot:  they had contracts with the federal government but with the shutdown in place, there was no work do be done...which meant that these contractors had an abundance of employees with no work to do.  As Eric Suits writes, one option that many of these contractors took was to furlough some of their employees until the shutdown ended.  While Eric's article is tailored to employers and employees in California, it is worth a review for anyone interested in the topic.  As always though, consult with the laws in your state/jurisdiction to determine what risks could arise when an employee is furloughed.


New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez To Pay Staffers $52k/Year

For those that have been living under a rock the past few months, New York's 14th Congressional District has a new Congresswoman that was sworn in this past January.  Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (or "AOC" as she is often referred to) has hit the ground running since she was sworn into Congress.  Depending on what side of the aisle you fall on, you either think she is a lightning rod for unwarranted criticism or think she is too far out in front of her skis for such a new member of Congress.  With that being said, while not talking about the Green New Deal or a proposed 70% marginal tax rate on the top earners in the country, AOC made waves recently when she confirmed she would pay her staffers $52,000.00 per year.  Brad Tuttle over at Money notes that this pay would be significantly higher (and I do emphasize significantly) than what other Congressional staffers earn on average, about $31,500.00 per year.  As for her interns, AOC has pledged to pay them at least $15 per hour (while many other members of Congress expect interns to work for free).  As many readers are likely wondering, "Ok, how are you going to pay for it?"  It turns out members of Congress receive about $1 million per year to pay their staff salaries.  While $1 million is plenty of money to pay salaries, if AOC starts taking money that traditionally went to higher ranking staff members, that will raise staff salaries for lower ranking members of her team (at the cost of others).


Documentary Chronicles Minimum Wage Fight By NFL Cheerleaders

Over the past few years, minimum wage lawsuits filed by NFL cheerleaders against teams and the league were a big talking point in employment law circles.   Things have cooled on that front lately, although there have been a few lawsuits filed within the last year.  Pamela Avila at Los Angeles Magazine sat down a few weeks ago with documentarian Yu Gu, and producer Jin Yoo-Kim to talk about their documentary on the topic, A Woman’s Work:  The NFL’s Cheerleader Problem.  Included in Pamela’s article is a brief Q&A with Gu and Yoo-Kim that is worth a read.  While this documentary might not be the definitive source on the cheerleader lawsuits, it seems to provide a good overview of their prior (and ongoing) minimum wage fight.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NLRB: Discussion Among Employees About Tip Pooling is Protected Concerted Activity

  This Advice Memorandum from the National Labor Relations Board’s Associate General Counsel, Jayme Sophir, addressed whether employees which discussed and complained about tip pooling at work constituted protected concerted activity. In relevant part, an employer in New York operated a chain of steakhouses.  While tip pooling was in place at these steakhouses, some of the employees objected to it on the grounds that it was not transparent and improperly divided tips among the workers.  Employees were told not to complain or talk to each other about the tip pool and were told that doing so would endanger their jobs.  Despite the employer later attempting to provide some clarity as to how the tips were being divided, rancor still existed among some employees.  At one point, the employees were told by a general manager that some employees that had been talking about the tip pool were “cleared out” and the employer would continue to do so. In the Advice Memorandum, it was noted that emplo
Post a Comment
Read more

What I’ve Been Reading This Week

A few years ago, I remember when the “Fight for $15” movement was taking off around the country.  Lo and behold, it appears that a $15/hour minimum wage is not the stopping point, which should be no surprise.  As the below article notes, New York is aggressively moving to ramp up hourly wage rates even higher.  While all the  below articles are worth a read, I called particular attention to that one. As always, below are a couple article that caught my eye this week. Disney World Workers Reject Latest Contract Offer Late last week, it was announced that workers at Disney World had rejected the most recent contract offer from the company, calling on their employer to do better.  As Brooks Barnes at The New York Times writes, the unions that represent about 32,000 workers at Disney World reported their members resoundingly rejected the 5 year contract offer which would have seen workers receive a 10% raise and retroactive increased back pay.  While Disney’s offer would have increased pa
Post a Comment
Read more

Utah Non-Compete Bill Falters in House

Last month, a non-compete bill sponsored by Representative Brian Greene (Republican from Pleasant Grove) & up for vote in the Utah House failed to make it through the Legislature.  The bill sought to ban enforcement of non-competes if they came after a worker was already employed, given no compensation (such as a bonus or promotion) for signing the non-compete, and laid off within six months.  However, by a 22 - 49 vote, the bill was resoundingly defeated after some business groups lobbied to kill the non-compete bill.  One group in particular, The Free Enterprise Utah coalition, argued that the Utah State Legislature should hold off on any changes to non compete laws in the state until a survey about non competes was done among Utah businesses.  Representative Greene had countered this claim and argued that a survey was not needed to show that the current non compete laws in the states allowed many businesses, including some small high tech companies in the state, to per
Post a Comment
Read more