Add “dress codes” to the laws that the current NLRB has changed. This list gets longer by the day. Now, when an employer attempts to impose any restriction on a worker’s right to display union insignia, that restriction is presumptively unlawful unless the employer proves “special circumstances” to justify the restriction. Tesla arguably met the…

Employers usually commit an unfair labor practice when unilaterally changing terms of a collective bargaining agreement. But not always. I’ve unilaterally changed many terms of a CBA without acting unlawfully. The safest way to do this is when there is an emergency (labor law calls it an “exigent circumstance”). Exigent circumstances are created by things…

Unions don’t always defend their members. They don’t always file grievances. They don’t always arbitrate grievances. For example, the IAM union, Kentucky Lodge No. 681 recently did not arbitrate the termination of union member Dylan Anderson. Cook Compression, Inc. terminated Anderson after co-workers expressed fear because he had distributed Nazi literature containing caricatures of Jewish…

When you think of Silicon Valley and the Tech Industry, you think of Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and other computer-based technology companies. I also think of transportation and manufacturing technology companies because I do a lot of work in that space. We can now think of unionized workforces, too. As a result of the Communications Workers…

Some experts think Unions have finally corrected their year-over-year decline in membership. Union campaigns, elections, unfair labor practices, and media attention certainly skyrocketed in 2022. Along with it came union wins to represent architects, doctors, bank employees, and museum workers. Architects The Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) union successfully organized architects working for…

Whether an employer is required to continue deducting union dues from employee paychecks after the expiration of a collective bargaining agreement is one of several laws related to unions that flip-flop depending on the make-up of the National Labor Relations Board. In Bethlehem Steel (1962), the NLRB ruled employers were permitted to stop deducting union dues from…