News Briefs
Date Posted: February 9 2018
For NLRB, Trump picks union-buster
WASHINGTON (PAI)— President Donald Trump nominated John Ring, a partner with the Philadelphia-based law firm of Morgan Lewis and Bockius – named in a prior AFL-CIO report as a top-union buster – to the vacant fifth seat on the National Labor Relations Board.
If or when confirmed by the GOP-run U.S. Senate, Ring would give the board, which rules worker-boss relations in most U.S. private industry, a 3-2 Republican majority. It’s now tied 2-2.Unions had no immediate comment on the Ring nomination.
But Ring, who heads the firm’s labor-management relations practice and who openly admits he represents management interests, drew praise from top corporate lobbies. The Chamber of Commerce said Ring’s confirmation would “open the door for the board to reconsider many other flawed rulings by the Obama NLRB.”A prior AFL-CIO report named Morgan Lewis as one of the top five “union avoidance” firms in the U.S., a fancy name for union-busters.
Certainly, Ring’s bio shows his tilt. He “represents management interests in collective bargaining, employee benefits, litigation, counseling, and litigation avoidance strategies. He has an extensive background negotiating and administering collective bargaining agreements, most notably in the context of workforce restructuring” – a fancy term for firings – “and multiemployer bargaining.”The Senate Labor Committee has yet to set a hearing date for Ring.
No tips for you! DOL proposes
The Department of Labor (DOL) has proposed a rule that would make it legal for employers to pocket their workers’ tips, as long as they pay those workers at least the minimum wage.The Economic Policy Institute reports that the proposed rule rescinds portions of longstanding DOL regulations that prohibit employers from taking tips. "We estimate that if the rule is finalized, every year workers will lose $5.8 billion in tips, as tips are shifted from workers to employers," the EPI said. "Of the $5.8 billion, nearly 80 percent—$4.6 billion—would be taken from women who are working in tipped jobs."
The EPI said the DOL has masked the fact that this rule would be a windfall to restaurant owners and other employers—out of the pockets of tipped workers—by making it sound as if this rule is about tip pooling. "Of course, once employers have full control of tips, one of the things they could do with those tips is distribute them to 'back of the house' workers like dishwashers and cooks. But the proposed rule does not require employers to distribute the tips, so employers would be no more likely to share tips with back-of-the-house workers than they would be to make any other choice about what to do with a business windfall, including using the money to make capital improvements to their establishments, to increase executive pay, or to line their own pockets," the EPI said.