Look Around HR

I have talked about wellness plans, and the need to implement them, but it looks like some state legislators think that businesses are moving to slow and are trying to mandate the programs.

From Workforce Management:

While most of the measures gently encourage employers to promote wellness by offering financial incentives, at least two states are now considering taking a harder line: A California Assembly committee passed a bill this month that would require employers contracting with the state to offer one or more wellness programs to their employees. A bill introduced in Michigan would require that the state give preference to employers that offer wellness programs in awarding contracts.

Read the rest of the article, with details on the plans, here.

I am always cautious on mandates especially when an initiative is rather new and there are details we do not know (like how much it will cost and what the return on investment is). If it is financially beneficial, the companies will take the lead in implementing wellness programs (trust me).

I read this story on HREOnline.com earlier this week detailing a new law that makes it easier for former employees to collect unemployment benefits. Most people in the States are use to being able to challenge unemployment claims if a former employee quits or is terminated for good reason. In France, not so much…

Apparently this legislation is supported by the country’s Conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy, and protested by the French Socialist Party. This is part of Sarkozy’s proposed overhaul of the French employment laws, which include generous protections for the workers but making it easier to hire and fire.

France is dominated by labor unions that have held the country back for years, made it less competitive on the international scene, and left their economy staggering at best for some time. Unemployment currently stands at over 7 percent.

While not receiving as much attention as Florida, the Georgia legislature and the governor signed new legislation known as the “parking lot bill.” Some of the main highlights of the bill include a prohibition against employers from maintaining or enforcing a concealed weapons ban and limits on searching an employee’s vehicle.

The NRA, whom led the fight in Georgia and elsewhere for this legislation, has a timeline and bullet point details of the bill on their legislation website.

Jackson Lewis, a workplace law firm, also has some very good details on the bill including the rights of employers, exemptions, limitations, and the perceived impact of it.

According to Jackson Lewis, it states that employers who own the property that their business is on are “exempt from the law and may restrict access to their property as a property owner.” Not only can you prohibit firearms from property you own, but you can also search employees or guests as you have in the past. As far as searches go, Jackson-Lewis outline specific instances when they are legal, and that mainly includes when you have good reason to think it might prevent an immediate threat or if you believe the employee unlawfully has company property. Normal law enforcement search warrants also apply.

Certain sensitive industries are exempt from the law (prisons, airports, etc.). The law also protects employers from liability:

An employer, private property owner, or property owner’s agent may not be held criminally or civilly liable for actions resulting from the transport or use of a firearm unless the employer commits a criminal act involving the firearm or the employer knew the criminal act would be committed on its premises.

Read more about the bill at the Jackson Lewis website.

I recently wrote about a bill in Iowa that attempted to undermine the right-to-work status of the state. You can read more about the bill here.

After a few weeks, the governor (a Democrat) decided to veto the bill in what was a major blow to labor. Iowa legislature control had recently flipped from Republican to Democrat making passage of this bill likely, until Gov. Culver decided to veto it.

You can read more on the veto here.

I must admit I am taking the idea for this post from Field and Stream magazine, just putting a little twist on it relating to HR and labor. Today’s edition of heroes and villains is the D.C. edition, focusing on two Senators in the news for labor related bills.

Hero: Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC)
South Carolinians are lucky to have Sen. DeMint representing them. As the Senate was getting ready to violate the Constitution and force unionism on localities with H.R. 980, DeMint offered two amendments to protect the worker from forced unionism.

Here are the two amendments:

Right to Work: make it unlawful in any state to force public safety or private sector workers to pay fees to a labor union as a condition of employment. No American should be forced to pay tribute to a union in order to get or keep a job.

Secret Ballot Protection: make it unlawful to certify a union as the representative for a group of employees without a secret ballot election. No American should be forced to choose their representatives under pressure or coercion from a union or their employer.

And here are the Senator’s statements on the amendments:

“Organized labor is rapidly losing membership because the free market is helping workers more than unions. Realizing they can’t compete in a free market, organized labor is desperately trying to force more public workers to unionize.”

“Americans must have the freedom to work without being forced into paying dues to a union and they must have the freedom to vote by secret ballot in union elections. The right to work and the right to a secret ballot election are fundamental American freedoms that must not be trampled on.”

Villain: Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR)
Like most national Democrats, regardless of ideology, Sen. Pryor is beholden to union bosses. So it is not surprising to note that Pryor has voiced his unconditional support for the so-called Employee Free Choice Act, which he views as no big deal:

Mark Pryor on Wednesday said the Arkansas Chamber of Commerce has “probably exaggerated” claims about the impact of a controversial labor union bill to the state economy.

”I think they’re probably exaggerated, and I think the get a lot of this from the national organization,” Pryor said. “I think the people in Arkansas are very common-sense. They’re very hard-working. They expect when they work in a place to be treated fairly. Arkansas is a very good place to have a business.”

But the last line of the article is what really got me:

Pryor has said the bill is a first step toward modernizing American labor law.

I must say I am young but I have never heard anyone defend rolling back the right to vote with secret ballots as “modernizing.”

When campaigning last year, Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee (or whatever the word is for the person who is probably going to win the nomination but it’s not offical yet) made this statement about the Employee Free Choice Act:

“We will pass the Employee Free Choice Act. It’s not a matter of ‘if’; it’s a matter of ‘when.’ We may have to wait for the next president to sign it, but we will get this thing done.”

So far Republicans have been able to block passage of the card check legislation, and currently have one key tool- the presidential veto. However, uccess or failure of this bill in the future will ultimately be dependant upon the Senate.

The Democratic House has already passed the bill, and with expected gains in the lower chamber in November, they should have no problem passing it next year. Assuming (and this is a big assumption), the Dems win the White House, the fate of this bill will lie in the Senate. The current split is 51D and 49R. It requires 60 votes to break a filibuster. During the 2007 vote on this bill, one Republican (Arlen Specter) supported it and no Democrats opposed it. This means Dems would have to pick up 8 seats to break a Republican filibuster. That may not be impossible, but is very unlikely even in today’s political climate.

The fact that Obama supports this should not be too surprising. The Democrats allegiance to labor is greater than any other tie to special interest groups (for either Rs or Ds).

John Lott, a senior research scientist at Univ. of Maryland, has a good column at FoxNews online breaking down Obama’s views on labor and the EFCA:

Obama claims that strengthening unions is good because unions will “lift up the middle-class in this country once more.” But protecting teachers unions from competition comes at the expense of students. Protecting workers from trade competition comes at the expense of customers and even other workers (e.g., if you protect steel workers from competition, the prices of American-made cars rise relative to foreign-made ones).

Unionization virtually always raises some workers’ salaries at the expense of other workers. If unions insist on increasing worker pay by threatening strikes that shut down companies, firms reduce the number of workers they hire. Some workers gain higher wages, but only at the expense of causing other workers to lose their jobs. Possibly this last point explains why unions want to scrape secret ballots.

It is hard to believe that Obama and Democrats really think that eliminating secret ballots is a good idea. Surely, they are not going to start proposing we start getting rid of secret ballots all together and let voters simply sign cards? But their desire to impose unionization, whether workers really want it, is overriding their common sense. Their proposal will make the country and most workers poorer.

Read the entire column here. It is a good one.

The Heritage Foundation blog has this story about a California city, which recently declared bankruptcy, becoming the largest city to do so.

The Vallejo City Council voted May 6 to become the largest city to ever declare bankruptcy in California. The cause of Vallejo’s demise? Contracts with fire and police unions account for 74% of the city’s $80 million budget. Why did the city sign such ridiculous contracts? Because public sector unions are a controlling force in the Democratic Party and Democrats dominate Vallejo’s government. So when it came time for the city to negotiate salaries with its unions, the Democrats were represented and the unions were represented, but the city’s taxpayers were not.

This is interesting because the Senate recently voted to expand collective bargaining rights to all police officers, firefighters, and first responders. I talked about this pending legislation last week following a Wall Street Journal op-ed publicizing the scary bill.

The president’s administration has recommended a veto, but there is currently enough support in the both houses to override the veto. If it becomes law, city managers and administrators will have their hands full and the unfortunate situation of Vallejo may be seen across the country.

The Wall Street Journal published this column yesterday titled “The Union Police.” In it they describe a law national Democrats are trying to pass through Congress. No, not the Employee Free Choice Act, but it is another attempt by Democrats to increase Union power (and their power as a result).

From the WSJ:

Under current law, every state has the ability to set policies that govern its public workforce…Democrats want to change this for the entire country. A bill that passed the House last year would make the top officials at local unions the exclusive bargaining agents for public safety officers in every town or city with more than 5,000 people. They would also have the authority to bargain for everything- pay, benefits and work rules. The goal is to give labor the whip hand with local governments, and further coerce nonunion members to join the dues-paying ranks.

The Journal also adds that similar legislation has failed at the state level every time it has been brought up, and it may possibly violate the Constitution as it gives states any powers not specifically given to the federal government.

You probably will not hear a lot about this but the reality of this is it may become law. It passed the House with a veto proof 314-97 margin last year, and has 11 Republican co-sponsors in the Senate (to go along with the unanimous Democrat support) that may break any filibuster attempt.

The Las Vegas Sun has an excellent article detailing the Employee Free Choice Act. I encourage you to read the whole thing, but what caught my attention was some of the scary statistics from localities that already have card-check legislation.

From the Las Vegas Sun:

To illustrate card check’s cascading effect, Sonneborn pointed to Illinois.

The state passed mandatory card check in 2003. As a result, union density soared, she said. The International Union of Operating Engineers Local 150, for instance, doubled its number of bargaining units in four years, Sonneborn said.

In Las Vegas, the Culinary Union has tripled its membership over the past 20 years primarily through negotiating voluntary card check agreements with casino companies. The union added 10,000 members from 2002 to 2005 alone- and will add another 6,000 when MGM Mirage’s CityCenter opens in 2009.

In Canada, the effect also has been striking. Thirty-two percent of the country’s workers belong to a union, a density not seen in the United States since the American labor movement’s pinnacle in 1955. Only 12 percent of American workers today belong to a union. Labor benefits from mandatory card check laws in some Canadian provinces. Alberta sports the lowest union density of those places- a whopping 24 percent.

If Congress enacts similar legislation, expect to see Canada like unionization throughout the U.S.

One of the under-the-radar labor related bills that Democrats (and labor unions) are promoting is what is known as The Healthy Families Act. This bill would mandate that businesses with 15 or more employees provide a certain number of paid sick days each year. Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) is the chief sponsor of this legislation.

While it may have fizzled out in Washington (at least for now), this issue is alive in many states. There are currently two cities that have policies like this (San Francisco and Washington D.C.), although they may vary in scope. A number of states are considering mandatory paid leave (including AK, CA, CO, CT, MA, MN, NC, PA, RI, WV, and WY).

The Connecticut Senate recently debated this measure, and here is some of what was reported in the Hartford Courant:

Proponents said the bill would give average people the chance to address the health needs of themselves and their families- a chance they need more as they work harder while disposable income, job security and benefits shrink in the “global economy.”

But opponents said the increasing business competition of that same economy is the reason that lawmakers should not approve the bill: It would put Connecticut at a disadvantage and cost the jobs of some of the very workers it is intended to help, they said.

I understand the arguments of both sides.

The specifics of this bill included one hour of paid sick leave for every 40 hours worked. This would equal about 6 ½ days per year (in a typical 2080 hour year).

I think that 6 ½ days per year is a reasonable amount of paid time off as long as the number of hours work determines the amount accrued. I must admit I am a little shocked that many companies do not offer some form of PTO for full-time employees. Being in a competitive, professional field (healthcare)- it is rather foreign to me. We currently offer 20 days of PTO after one year of service (with a prorated amount during the first year that employees can use after 90 days). That number goes up to 25 after five years and 30 after 10.

The Heritage Foundation has a well thought out essay opposing the mandatory sick leave, while offering other proposals that would not be as costly to employers. Of course costs are the number one concern of business when legislation like this is considered.

From Heritage:

Congress should make it easier for employees to manage the demands of work and family life, but requiring employers to provide paid time off is the wrong approach. Employers would respond to mandatory greater sick leave benefits by reducing other benefits and wages. Congress should not force workers to take a pay cut to receive more sick leave. Instead of making this choice for workers, Congress should raise incomes by reducing taxes, creating sick leave savings accounts for workers, and allowing employers to offer comp time. Unlike a mandatory sick leave benefit, these policies would give workers more choices and greater flexibility to balance work and family life.

Read the entire essay here.

For the record, I think we will see legislation begin passing in state legislatures, and then Congress- possibly as soon as the next session.

Iowa Governor Chet Culver, a Democrat, is said to be contemplating vetoing a controversial labor backed bill that would force unionism on public employees. Iowa, as shown in this graph, is a Right-to-Work state. However, a simple repeal by the Democratic majority could do away with that status, as it is not a constitutionally protected right. This is what the majority hopes to do; just under a different name.

Here is a good rundown of the legislation and the controversy surrounding it from Linda Miller of the Quad City Times:

The bill, with the amendment, adds several mandatory bargaining items to the teacher quality law and eliminates some provisions that provided a balance between management and labor. The changes significantly tilt the playing field in favor of labor. The Des Moines Register reported on 3-20-08 that “school boards would lose much of their authority to determine a number of issues, including scheduling, class size and early retirement benefits for staff…”

None however were as controversial as the House Democrats attempt to sneak through the wildly controversial “Fair Share” provision. “Fair Share” is not fair. It is forced unionism. The House Democrats plan allowed forced unionism, which is currently illegal, to be placed onto the bargaining table by public employee unions. Forced unionism legislation like “Fair Share” forces non-union public employees - like teachers- to pay union dues. The only way for public employees to avoid paying union dues is to quit their jobs. The effect of any forced unionism legislation is the same as a direct repeal of the Right to Work law.

More…

The rest of the House Democrat’s plan stripped school board members, city council members and county supervisors of their ability to control the level of property tax increases. That ability is forfeited to an unnamed and unelected adjudicator. The reason is because property taxes makeup the vast majority of local government revenue and pay for nearly all of any employee contract. If the costs for that contract increase, so do property taxes.

And she finishes with this point…

With public employee unions able to bargain for that list of items, what use is there for managers, principals or superintendents anymore?

The specific language of the bill forces school districts and local governments to pay for whatever the eventual employment agreement is between labor and management. The language also states that if there is an impasse, an adjudicator decides between the two positions. Which means that if the adjudicator makes a decision on class size that forces a school district to hire more teachers or build new classrooms to meet the bargained class size number, the school district must levy property taxes to cover those increased costs.

Please read her entire post as it provides the best explanation of this scary legislation that I can find anywhere. I am not going to get into the games that Democrats and Republicans have been playing with this (I’ll leave that for the politicos). I will just say this is an attempt to undermine the right-to-work status of Iowa, and that is a dangerous thing. This will be bad for employers, it will be bad for employees that will be forced into unionism, and bad for every taxpayer that will see tax increases.

Last week, the bill was officially sent to Culver’s desk, and here is what he had to say on this subject:

Culver on Thursday sent a message to reporters saying that after more than 30 meetings with managers, union members, lawmakers and the public, he realized there’s no way to rewrite the bill in a way that would satisfy all parties.

“Through these meetings and communications, we have attempted to reach consensus among the many stakeholders who would be affected by this legislation,” Culver said in the statement. “Unfortunately, it has become clear that it is not possible to amend or revise this bill in a way that reflects a genuine consensus.”

Let’s hope the governor vetoes it, and we will keep you updated.

I have reported on the attempt by national Democrats and labor unions to pass the so-called “Employee Free Choice Act.” The Senate killed it last week, and it is dead for the remainder of this Congress.

Similar attempts to pass the card-check bill have been going on at the state level as well. The most notable legislation occurred in Hawaii. The state House and Senate passed a bill, but the governor recently vetoed it.

From the Pacific Business News:

Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle (a Republican) vetoed a bill Monday that would replace secret ballot elections for union representation with a simple petition.

The so-called “card-check” bill would replace a current law that requires an election by secret ballot when workers attempt to organize.

House Bill 2974 requires that union organizers only need to gather signatures from a majority of employees that favor forming a union.

The legislation is modeled after the Employee Free Choice Act, currently under consideration by the U.S. Congress.

I have read that the Democrats have a veto-proof majority in Hawaii, and every Democrat supported this measure so it may become law after all. We might want to remind Hawaiians of this poll showing overwhelming opposition to the card-check legislation.