Labor Relations Law Blog

For the first time in years the NLRB’s five-member Board, which decides cases and enacts regulations, has a Democratic majority.  The Board will decide cases as presented.  It is expected that case rulings will revise legal standards applicable to the workplace and reverse decisions from the previous Administration and the previous Republican majority on the Board. 

On Friday night, right before Chairman Philip Miscimarra’s term ended with the National Labor Relations Board, the Board capped its flurry of rulings by issuing one more decision favorable to employers: PCC Structurals, Inc., 365 NRLB No. 160 (Dec. 15, 2017). This decision overruled the NLRB’s 2011 Specialty Healthcare ruling that permitted unions to organize “micro-units” of employees for voting purposes unless the employer could prove an “overwhelming community of interest” between the petitioned-for employees and other employees. Because it was almost impossible to prove an overwhelming community of interest and because the resulting micro-units frequently were those employees most favorable to unionization, employers often faced a difficult challenge contacting a union’s grouping of employees for organizing.

The National Labor Relations Board gained a Republican majority less than three months ago, but has already disposed of many of the prior Administration’s labor law rules. Just this past week, the NLRB issued 13 decisions, including several important rulings favorable to employers. This bevy of rulings is understandable, given that NLRB Chairman Philip Miscimarra, a Republican, retired on Friday.

In ...

A case from New York highlights the distinct labor law challenges for employers trying to do business in both union and non-union markets. In some instances, a company may have decided to set up union and non-union entities to operate independently of each other. In other instances, a unionized employer may have created a non-union entity to try to evade the legal and contractual obligations flowing from a ...

It seems to be increasingly the case that employers find themselves facing conflicting demands from labor unions for assignments of work.  Such competing claims are often referred to as jurisdictional disputes.  In other circumstances, employers may find themselves faced with a labor union’s claims that the employer does not provide employees with “area standard” wages or benefits.  While often ...

Employers that have become exasperated at the regulatory zeal of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in the area of workplace policies scored a welcome victory in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.  In T-Mobile USA, Inc. v. National Labor Relations Board, 2017 WL 3138612 (5th Cir. July 25, 2017), the Fifth Circuit refused to enforce an NLRB order that declared that an employee handbook policy requiring ...

On July 3rd, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit decided a case involving the interplay between Sections 7 and 10(c) of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). On the one hand, employers may not discharge employees for engaging in activities protected by Section 7 of the NLRA, including employees’ communications to third parties or to the public that seek to improve their lot as employees. On the ...

On June 7, the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) ruled that a company committed an unfair labor practice by unlawfully interrogating and discharging an employee. Specifically, in RHCG Safety Corp. and Construction & General Building Laborers, Local 79, LIUNA, 356 NLRB No. 88, 2017 WL 2497155, the NLRB found National Labor Relations Act (“Act”) violations when a supervisor sent an employee a text message inquiring about the employee’s union activity, and then told him there was no work for him.

The NLRB recently held that temporary employees and regular employees have a right to petition to join a combined bargaining unit, even if the staffing agency and employer object to the formation of the combined unit. In Miller & Anderson, 364 NLRB No. 9 (July 11, 2016), the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”) continued its campaign to undermine third-party staffing relationships.  The decision ...