Skip to main content

What I’ve Been Reading This Week


I came across two good articles this week that should give readers something to page through over the weekend.  While I do call attention to the article on Starbucks, I refer readers to the second article which traces the history of right to work laws in the country.  I encourage readers to spend the time paging through that article to get a better insight into the topic.

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



Readers recall that the spread of unions at nearly 100 Starbucks locations around the country has become a major thorn in the side of Starbucks and anti union supporters.  As Caitlin Harrington over at Wired recently noted, before Starbucks workers had a union, they had a platform called “Coworker” that gave them a voice to try and fight for changes in the workplace.  This platform took center stage when Starbucks workers fought for the right to roll up their sleeves to expose tattoos (with visible tattoos having been a no go with Starbucks.)  Since the time the platform launched in 2013, it has been utilized as a tool to use petitions to bring about change in the workplace.  With the rise of unions at Starbucks, the creators of Coworker are now looking at ways to incorporate these online petitions to further a pro union and worker friendly message at the company.



Ah yes, right to work laws…a bane to labor unions around the country.  For those unfamiliar with right to work laws, states that have these laws in place prohibit the requirement that a worker join a union or pay union dues as a condition of employment.  With Democrats having majority control in Congress, they are attempting to pass the PRO Act, legislation which would roll back right to work laws, among other labor friendly initiatives.  This is as good of a time as any to provide a bit of background on right to work laws and how they have evolved over the decades.

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