Workers walked off their jobs at a bottling plant in Puerto Rico to protest the company’s change in its access policy for off-duty employees. The company responded by suspending all five of the union shop stewards. The union grieved the suspensions, but never took any action to process the grievance. Instead, the membership unanimously approved…

The United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) is objecting to Patriot Coal’s proposed plan to sell the majority of its operating assets. Patriot Coal proposes using a “stalking horse bidder,” which is when the best bidder gets some incentives before the auction. These incentives are intended to increase the value of the starting bid and…

A hotel suspended a union employee pending investigation of an alleged theft from a hotel guest. In response to the suspension, employees gathered in a staff cafeteria demanding to discuss the employee’s suspension. The housekeeping director began suspending the employees about an hour after they had gathered. He suspended 77 workers for five days and…

In right-to-work states, unions are forbidden from automatically charging representation fees to workers in unionized shops. Roughly half of the states have right-to-work laws. Organized labor fears right-to-work laws because of what they call the “free rider” problem. The union in a unionized workplace is obligated to represent the entire bargaining unit. But, under right-to-work…

In 1984 the NLRB held that it should defer action if the contractual issue under a collective bargaining agreement is “factually parallel” to an unfair labor practice issue, an arbitrator is presented with relevant facts to resolve the issue, and an arbitration award is not “clearly repugnant” to the National Labor Relations Act. Thirty years…

Seven different unions were negotiating a collective bargaining agreement with a single employer. While bargaining for the 2011 agreement, everyone agreed to exclude newly hired workers from an established pension plan, but did not discuss the “Copper Price Bonus” or workers’ eligibility for it. The bonus was kept in place in the 2011 version of…