As of 8:00 p.m. Thursday evening, March 19, 2020, all “non-life-sustaining” businesses throughout Pennsylvania must close its physical locations in response to the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak, according to a new order issued by Gov. Tom Wolf.
The new mandate, which is a follow-up to the administration’s recommendation that all non-essential businesses suspend operations to…
Yesterday, President Trump signed into law historic legislation that will have a significant impact on a many employers nation-wide. The legislation, called the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, has many provisions. We will focus this discussion on the workplace issues that most employers can expect to face.
Paid Sick Leave
The law includes the Emergency…
On February 26, 2020, the National Labor Relations Board issued a final rule governing joint-employer status under the National Labor Relations Act. The final rule restores the test that the Board had applied for several decades prior to the 2015 Obama-era decision in Browning-Ferris. The final rule also provides more clear guidance on the issue,…
The flurry of activity from National Labor Relations Board in late 2019 was a fairly consistent drum beat of good news for employers. In many cases, the Board restored decades of precedent that had been upended by the Board during the Obama administration. Some would say the Board restored order and sanity in the world…
If you follow our blog, you know that the National Labor Relations Board’s election rules have been a hot topic over the past several years. The Board’s election rules are critical, because time can often make a difference in whether a union election is won or lost.
In 2011, the Board started the process to…
A lot of times, determining whether a worker is an independent contractor or an employee is tough. Different laws have different standards, and government agencies and the courts often apply different tests in addressing this question. Under any test, the analysis is highly fact intensive, and the consequences of misclassification can be steep.
Luckily, the…
On August 9, 2019, the National Labor Relations Board announced a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. The Notice, which was issued on August 12, 2019, covers three proposed rules. A majority of the Board is proposing to change the Blocking Charge Policy, the Voluntary Recognition Bar and rules governing union recognition in the construction industry.
The…
Have you ever felt that reading the decisions of the National Labor Relations Board is a lot like watching a tennis match? The decisions on key workplace issues go back and forth, back and forth, and you are just stuck watching. The good news, at least, is that lately, employers have been holding serve. Recently,…
As stewards of taxpayer dollars, there are many details that public sector employers must consider when negotiating collective bargaining agreements with their unionized employees. What are the phases of the collective bargaining process? Should outside counsel be engaged for some or all of these phases? How many bargaining sessions will be conducted? What happens after…
The Third Circuit Court of Appeals, the appeals court that has jurisdiction over federal cases in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and the U. S. Virgin Islands, recently held that a public employer violates the First Amendment of the United State Constitution when it retaliates against an employee based on the employee’s union membership. In reaching…
