Skip to main content

What I’ve Been Reading This Week


Some readers might recall a prior attempt by Northwestern football players to unionize several years ago.  While that effort was struck down by the National Labor Relations Board, the matter has been simmering since that time.  As the below article from Sports Illustrated notes, things have taken a sudden change in recent weeks following an announcement that an advocacy group on behalf of college athletes had failed an unfair labor practice charge that the National Labor Relations Board is moving forward with, to the dismay of many.

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


OSHA Notes Several Violations at Amazon Warehouses

Recently, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) had found several violations at six Amazon warehouses, noting a failure to properly record workplace injuries.  These violations came about following inspections earlier this year at several of the warehouses.  Now for those hoping/expecting severe penalties coming Amazon’s way…I have some bad news for you.  It appears Amazon will be on the hook for a whopping $30,000.00 or so in fines.


Are College Athletes Employees? The NLRB Sure Seems to Think So

Earlier this month, the National Labor Relations Board’s Los Angeles Region plans to proceed ahead with unfair labor practice charges against the University of South California, the PAC-12, and the NCAA.  The argument follows that college athletes are employees (under the National Labor Relations Act) and therefore entitled to wages, overtime pay, and benefits.  While the advocacy group that filed the unfair labor practice charge has the winds to their backs, now that the National Labor Relations Board is moving forward with the claim, there is still the question of what will ultimately come of this unfair labor practice charge.  Even if a Democratic controlled National Labor Relations Board would eventually find that college athletes are employees, I would expect this matter to eventually hit the courts and drag on for some time.  Stay tuned.

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