The National Labor Relations Board recently proposed a rule that dictates that two entities will be joint employers only if each exercises substantial direct and immediate control over employees.  The NLRB seeks to establish a stricter joint employer standard by regulation. Doing so would add more permanence to the joint employer standard than interpreting it…

Managing employees in a union a quite different from managing non-union employees. Many unsuspecting first-time managers learn this the hard way. Hopefully this brief synopsis will help managers through this process. The collective bargaining agreement is a legally binding document that governs how the company interacts with unionized employees. Surprisingly, many supervisors lack a basic…

Companies whose employees are represented by a labor union are required to bargain with the union before changing most any term or condition of employment. An Illinois food processing company should have bargained with the union representing its employees before enrolling in the federal government’s E-Verify program. E-Verify is a web-based system that allows participating…

Two men affiliated with Ironworkers Local 395 were charged with labor-related extortion in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana through one count of the Hobbs Act Extortion conspiracy and two counts of attempted Hobbs Act extortion. The Hobbs Act prohibits actual or attempted robbery or extortion affecting interstate or foreign commerce. The statute is frequently…

EYM King of Michigan, LLC is a franchisor of Burger Kings. EYM maintained a neutral policy against loitering and soliciting by employees anywhere on company premises. The company relied on the policy to warn and discipline several workers who met in the restaurant parking lot to discuss their wages and protest. The National Labor Relations Board…

Eleven pension plans seek to cut retiree benefits because the plans are underfunded. If all eleven cut requests are approved, about 27,000 active workers and retirees could see a dip in their pension benefits by as much as 50%. The pending requests are from: Ironworkers Local 16 Pension Fund Ironworkers Local 805 Pension & Retirement Plan; Local 807…