Management Memo

In the waning days of the Obama Administration, the President’s appointed General Counsel to the NLRB took official action this week to permit questionable and disruptive strike activity, including one day strikes that are frequently used by aggressive unions against hospitals and other employers.  Specifically, the GC’s Office issued an Operations-Management Memorandum acknowledging unions and employees “are more frequently engaging in short-term strikes” and seeking to “clarify and modify the law regarding intermittent and partial strikes” to address ...

The NLRB’s General Counsel’s Office, in an Advice Memo dated October 25, 2013  (pdf) and released to the public on August 7, 2014, has taken the position that “an enterprise that grows, processes, and retails medical marijuana” is an employer subject to the National Labor Relations Act provided it meets the Board’s monetary jurisdictional standards and is an employer engaged in commerce and that “the Board should assert jurisdiction over this type of business enterprise.”   

Notably, the General Counsel’s office advocates the position that even though all of ...

by: Adam C. Abrahms, Kara M. Maciel, Adam C. Solander, and Steven M. Swirsky

On September 13, 2013, the Obama Administration rejected the union movement’s intense  lobbying efforts to seek a waiver, so that their members would be able to receive tax subsidies in the Affordable Care Act (“ACA”) Marketplaces for those of their members who will be offered “affordable coverage” from their employers.

Beginning January 1, 2015, the ACA requires that large employers offer affordable health coverage that provides minimum value to their “full-time employees” (those working ...

By: Steven R. Blackburn

Wal-Mart Stores has filed an interesting and unusual lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court seeking injunctive relief to stop various activities conducted by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union and its subsidiary “OUR Wal-Mart” (Organization United for Respect at Wal-Mart) in connection with their long-running efforts to organize the giant retailer’s employees.  The complaint alleges that on numerous occasions in 2012 and 2013 demonstrators acting on behalf of the UFCW entered various Wal-Mart stores in California and disrupted store ...