Wages
Boulder, CO – A city council hearing was held to determine if the city should expedite a planned increase in the local minimum wage to 15 percent above the state wage, effective 2025. Some council members are advocating for the effective date to be pushed up to Jan. 1, 2024 in part to mirror Boulder County which is considering a similar increase in 2024. Boulder is part of a working group alongside Longmont, Louisville, Lafayette, and Erie agreeing to increase the minimum wage starting Jan. 1, 2025 and taking advantage of a 2019 law allowing local governments to set their own minimum wages. The effort of the city council ultimately failed and the 2025 timeline is still in effect. More details.
Paid Leave
Michigan – Prior to the return of the legislature next week, the governor delivered an address outlining her priorities for the remainder of 2023. At the top of the list was enacting a new paid leave law. Various paid leave bills are currently pending in the legislature and the governor committed to putting the full weight of her office behind getting a bill passed in the next few months. More details.
Labor Policy
Labor Department – The Biden administration proposed their long-awaited new overtime rule that would make 3.6 million more U.S. workers eligible for overtime pay, reviving an Obama-era policy effort that was ultimately scuttled in court. The new rule would require employers to pay overtime to so-called white collar workers who make less than $55,000 a year. That’s up from the current threshold of $35,568 which has been in place since 2019 when the Trump administration raised it from $23,660. In another significant change, the rule proposes automatic increases to the salary level each year. The new threshold is lower than many business groups anticipated and in fact, a group of Democratic lawmakers had urged the Labor Department to raise the salary threshold to $82,732 by 2026, in line with the 55th percentile of earnings of full-time salaried workers. The proposed rule is subject to a 60-day public comment period before it is final and almost certainly will be the subject of litigation from the business community. More details.
OSHA – The Labor Department proposed a new rule to clarify that a non-employee, including a union representative, can represent employees during workplace inspections in many circumstances. Either an employee or a non-employee third party that’s “reasonably necessary to aid in the inspection” may be authorized to accompany OSHA officers during inspections, according to the proposed rule. Union representatives chosen by employees could fall into this category, as could local safety council representatives, knowledgeable translators or close third parties on multi-employer or joint-employer worksites, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s proposed rule said. The Trump Administration rescinded a directive that said authorized third-party representation could participate in workplace walkarounds. OSHA’s actions this week revisit the issue as the agency looks to clarify who can be allowed to tag along on inspections. The agency is accepting public comments on the proposal until Oct. 30. More details.
Chipotle – The company agreed to pay the city of Washington, D.C., more than $300,000 to resolve allegations that it violated child labor laws. Washington, D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb announced the $322,400 penalty and agreement Monday, saying Chipotle will also implement new policies to ensure compliance with D.C. labor laws, provide training to all restaurant managers and supervisors in the District, and have store managers review child labor laws with all new hires. According to the attorney general’s office, it investigated more than 800 potential violations of the district’s child labor laws committed at Chipotle’s 20 D.C. restaurants over the past three years. The settlement states that the company denies the allegations and the agreement may not be construed to be an admission of violating any law, liability or wrongdoing. More details.
Labor Activism
Massachusetts – Next week, the attorney general’s office will approve or reject the legal basis for the initiative being driven by One Fair Wage to eliminate the tip credit by 2029. If the language is approved, proponents would have until Nov. 22 to gather 74,574 signatures to keep the petition alive. Legislators would then have until April 30, 2024 to take action on subjects related to the petitions to circumvent the ballot process. If no action, then activists would need to gather an additional 12,429 signatures by June 19, 2024 to get on the ballot. The Massachusetts Restaurant Association is contesting the current language saying it violates the single subject rule. More details.
Dunkin’ – Workers at a restaurant in Cincinnati filed for a union election with the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers’ International Union (BCTGM). The push is the first union drive to reach the petition stage at Dunkin’ in more than 12 years. If the union drive succeeds, the Dunkin’ location in question would be the first standalone Dunkin’ restaurant to unionize. More details.
Good Karma Café – Two locations of the regional coffee chain in Philadelphia have collected enough employee signatures to trigger a vote with the National Labor Relations Board to decertify the store’s unionization with Workers United on Sept. 7. A decertification petition is filed when at least 30 percent of workers at a unionized business wish to no longer be represented by their union. According to the National Labor Relations Act, workers have to wait at least one year under a union before starting the decertification process. Four Philadelphia locations of Good Karma Café have been unionized since last year, and if workers voted yes to decertify the union election, the stores would no longer be represented by Workers United, the union that also represents more than 340 Starbucks stores. Employees that led the campaign to decertify are being represented by the National Right to Work Foundation legal defense, which states that Pennsylvania lacks Right to Work protections for private center employees. More details.
Key Takeaways
- This week, the Treasury Department released a new report entitled, “Labor Unions & The Middle Class,” ostensibly outlining the benefits that unions and a unionized workforce can have on the economy, on society and the country as a whole. In reality, the primary purpose of the report is to give the academic and intellectual justification for the Administration’s aggressive, labor-friendly agenda and why strong White House leadership in this space is critical for the nation. Traditionally, the Labor Department and other-related agencies in some Administrations argue the case for a strong union movement. It is unusual that the Treasury Department would be engaged in this space in an official way and for it to advocate changes to the tax code to promote unions. The next two – and possibly six – years could change the labor landscape more than any era since the 1930s.
- Last week, we noted that the NLRB’s Cemex decision would likely result in immediate action with unions potentially coming forward and demanding recognition under the new standard. Right on cue, earlier this week, Trader Joe’s United, the independent union that has unionized four Trader Joe’s locations across the country so far, filed a request for a bargaining order with the NLRB. The union is the first to seek such an order under the new rule now known as the “Cemex standard”. If granted, Trader Joe’s would be forced to recognize and bargain with the union at the Manhattan location in question. Brands with current organizing activity such as Starbucks, Chipotle, Waffle House and now Dunkin should closely monitor the NLRB’s response to this petition.
Podcast
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