#department of labor

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

The company that chartered the cargo ship that destroyed the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore was recently sanctioned by regulators for blocking its employees from directly reporting safety concerns to the U.S. Coast Guard — in violation of a seaman whistleblower protection law, according to regulatory filings reviewed by The Lever.

Eight months before a Maersk Line Limited-chartered cargo ship crashed into the Baltimore bridge, likely killing six people and injuring others, the Labor Department sanctioned the shipping conglomerate for retaliating against an employee who reported unsafe working conditions aboard a Maersk-operated boat. In its order, the department found that Maersk had “a policy that requires employees to first report their concerns to [Maersk]... prior to reporting it to the [Coast Guard] or other authorities.”

#us politics #news #the lever #Francis Scott Key Bridge #baltimore #Maryland #Maersk #department of labor #2024 #whistleblowers #silencing whistleblowers #sanctions

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Dave Jamieson at HuffPost:

A new federal rule to expand overtime protections to millions of workers now excluded under current law has been finalized, the Biden administration said Tuesday. The Labor Department’s regulation would ensure that salaried workers who earn less than $58,656 per year would automatically be entitled to overtime pay when they work more than 40 hours in a week, starting in 2025. What’s known as the “overtime salary threshold” would then be updated every three years, starting in 2027, to account for inflation. The agency estimated that the change would extend the overtime law’s coverage to an additional four million workers, meaning they couldn’t be forced to work extra hours without their employers paying a premium. Julie Su, the Labor Department’s acting secretary, said updating the regulation was about basic fairness.

[...] Most hourly workers are entitled to time-and-a-half pay when they log over 40 hours, which discourages employers from working them too much. But whether salaried workers can get overtime pay depends on how much they earn and what their job duties are. Employers have an incentive to pile work onto those without overtime protections, since the extra work is done essentially for free.

[...] The current overtime salary threshold is just $35,568, set by the administration of former President Donald Trump. Salaried workers, such as retail store managers, must earn less than that amount to automatically be entitled to any additional pay when they work more than 40 hours. Progressives have fought for years to increase the salary threshold in order to restore the share of the U.S. workforce that gets paid overtime. An effort by former President Barack Obama was blocked in federal court in 2017. His successor, Trump, released a watered-down version of the reform that covered fewer workers than Obama’s version would have. Last year the Biden administration said it planned to raise the threshold to a little over $55,000. It ultimately hiked that figure to $58,656 to account for newer wage data.

Great news for workers: more workers could be eligible for overtime pay under a new rule from the Biden Administration.

#Overtime Pay #Workers' Rights #Joe Biden #Biden Administration #Department of Labor #Julie Su

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

#us politics #news #biden administration #president joe biden #vaush #vaush good #@vaushv #2022 #dark brandon #the wall street journal #marty walsh #union workers #unionize #Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen #railway workers #department of labor

[midnightfunk]

Make America great again, huh?

#child labor #meat industry #minnesota #nebraska #department of labor

[personal-blog243]

#dept of labor #please sign and share #petition #petitions #please sign this petition #please share #please sign #hot labor summer #fight for 15 #department of labor #overtime pay

[sabistarphotos]

March 20, 2022

Washington, DC

#photography #building #historic building #department of labor #department of labor building #washington dc #dc

[theusviral]

Twitter engineer says he was fired for helping co-workers prep for layoffs

Twitter engineer says he was fired for helping co-workers prep for layoffs

A Twitter engineer claimed he was fired days after Elon Musk bought the social media site because he developed a tool that allowed workers to save important documents in anticipation of mass layoffs, according to a lawsuit. Emmanuel Cornet, a 41-year-old software engineer based in San Francisco, filed a complaint with the US National Labor Relations Board on Monday, claiming the company violated…

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#Business #department of labor #Elon Musk #layoffs #Tech #Twitter

[ostensiblynone]

The court’s May 8, 2023, action follows an investigation by the department’s Wage and Hour Division that found Taqueria Garibaldi denied employees overtime pay for hours over 40 in a workweek, a violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act. They also learned the employer paid managers from the employee tip pool illegally, threatened employees with retaliation and adverse immigration consequences for cooperating with the department, and fired one worker who they believed had complained to the department. “Under oath, an employee of Taqueria Garibaldi explained how the restaurant offered a supposed priest to hear their workplace ‘sins’ while other employees reported that a manager falsely claimed that immigration issues would be raised by the department’s investigation,” said Regional Solicitor of Labor Marc Pilotin in San Francisco. “This employer’s despicable attempts to retaliate against employees were intended to silence workers, obstruct an investigation and prevent the recovery of unpaid wages.” In addition to aiding the recovery of $70,000 in back wages and an equal amount in liquidated damages, the judge ordered the restaurant and its owners to pay the department $5,000 in civil money penalties due to the willful nature of their violations.

#Taqueria Garibaldi #never underestimate the lows an employer will stoop to #department of labor #united states #california

[reasonandempathy]

What can we do to improve these independent contractor laws?

This has been sitting in my inbox for a minute, largely because I didn't have any real or solid answers other than "elect people", but something just came up today.

The Department of Labor is proposing new rules around Independent Contractors to strengthen their protections and make it more difficult to classify employees as ICs. It reverses a very late Trump DoL rule saying that the only 2 main things to consider when classifying an IC were "Degree of Control" and "ability to profit/lose money", which historically have helped companies like Uber get away with labeling their drivers ICs. Yes, it's an older issue than 2021, but the 2021 rule helped companies abuse their Independent Contractors.

From the Executive Summary:

the Department is not proposing the use of “core factors” but instead proposes to return to a totality-of-the circumstances analysis of the economic reality test in which the factors do not have a predetermined weight and are considered in view of the economic reality of the whole activity. The Department is further proposing to return the consideration of investment to a standalone factor, provide additional analysis of the control factor (including detailed discussions of how scheduling, supervision, price-setting, and the ability to work for others should be considered), and return to the longstanding interpretation of the integral factor, which considers whether the work is integral to the employer’s business.

The "totality of the circumstances" refers to:

the opportunity for profit or loss, [and company]investment

permanency

the degree of control by the employer over the worker

whether the work is an integral part of the employer’s business

Skill and initiative

By removing the other factors, an IC could be a key and integral part of your company and be untrained, meaning that arguments opened up for production line workers could be made into Independent Contractors, or (famously) uber drivers were almost certainly ICs under the federal law.

Adding them back in would significantly protect wide swaths of both skilled and unskilled workers.

In order to support the law, there is a public comment period from Oct 13th to Nov 27th where you can mail and digitally submit your comments and support.

You may submit comments, identified by Regulation Identifier Number (RIN) 1235-AA43, by either of the following methods:

Electronic Comments: Submit comments through the Federal eRulemaking Portal at https://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments.

Mail: Address written submissions to:

Division of Regulations, Legislation, and Interpretation, Wage and Hour Division U.S. Department of Labor, Room S-3502, 200 Constitution Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20210.

#civics #economics #worker rights #original content #department of labor #DoL #politics #independent contractors

[istandonsnowpiles]

Street Lights

#black and white #dc #national mall #nightography #department of labor #washington #january #around dc #my work #photography

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

The Biden administration is planning to prohibit the use of salary history when hiring for federal employee roles, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) will announce later Wednesday.

The OPM is set to release proposed regulations that will ban federal agencies from considering an applicant’s nonfederal salary history when setting pay for new federal employees. The proposed regulations are part of the administration’s efforts to advance pay equity and be a model employer for the rest of the United States.

“Relying on a candidate’s previous salary history can disproportionally impact women and members of other underserved communities. With these proposed regulations, the federal government is leading the way and demonstrating to the nation that we mean business when it comes to equality, fairness, and attracting the best talent,” OPM Director Kiran Ahuja said in a statement.

Twenty-one states have laws or executive orders limiting employers from using applicants’ salary history, and some states fully prohibit it. Department of Labor data found in places that have salary history bans, minority workers who changed jobs saw a 7.9% increase in their wages.

President Biden in his fiscal 2024 budget proposed a 5.2% average pay raise for federal employees and military personnel. The pay raise in the budget, announced in March, would be an increase from the 4.6% pay raise federal employees received this year.

#us politics #news #the hill #2023 #president joe biden #biden administration #Office of Personnel Management #Kiran Ahuja #department of labor #salary history #wages #worker's rights

[loudlylovingreview]

Rebecca Gordon: Republicans Have Plans for Working People

And You’re Not Going to Like Them Recently, you may have noticed that the hot weather is getting ever hotter. Every year the United States swelters under warmer temperatures and longer periods of sustained heat. In fact, each of the last nine months — May 2023 through February 2024 — set a world record for heat. As I’m writing this, March still has a couple of days to go, but likely as not, it,…

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#2024 election #Contract with America #Department of Labor #EEOC #Fair Laor #GOP #National Labor Relations Act #Newt Gigrich #OSHA #Project 2025 #Rebecca Gordon #Republican #SCOTUS #Trump #unions #workers

[hislop3]

Skilled Nursing Operator Takes Legal Action Against Staffing Platform for Alleged Overbilling

A little over a week ago, an SNF operator dropped a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in the District of Utah against a staffing platform that works somewhat, like a staffing agency. The platform Nursa acts as a software clearinghouse connecting nursing staff (RNs. LPNs, CNAs, etc.) to facilities with open shifts – “Nursa exists to put a nurse at the bedside of every patient in need, connecting…

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#1009 #Clipboard #Compliance #Department of Labor #DOL #Employment #Final Rule #gig employee #Industry Outlook #Labor #lawsuit #litigation #Management #Money #Nursa #Nursing Homes #nursing staff #Oxford Valley Health #ShiftKey #SNF #staffing #Staffing Agencies #Strategy #Trends #Washington

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Mike Luckovich

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

March 25, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

MAR 26, 2024

This morning The Boeing Company announced that the chief of Boeing’s commercial airplane division, Stan Deal, is leaving immediately. Chief executive officer Dave Calhoun is stepping down at the end of the year. Chair of the board Larry Kellner will not stand for reelection. 

On January 5 a door plug blew off a Boeing 737 Max jetliner operated by Alaska Airlines while it was in flight. The United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) immediately grounded about 170 similar Boeing planes operated by U.S. airlines or in U.S. territory until they could be inspected. “The FAA’s first priority is keeping the flying public safe,” it said, and added: “The safety of the flying public, not speed, will determine the timeline for returning the Boeing 737-9 MAX to service.”

Last year an FAA investigation “observed a disconnect between Boeing’s senior management and other members of the organization on safety culture,” with employees worrying about retaliation for reporting safety issues. After the door plug blew off, an FAA audit of different aspects of the production process released two weeks ago found that Boeing failed 33 of 89 product audits. On March 9, Spencer S. Hsu, Ian Duncan, and Lori Aratani of the Washington Post reported that the Justice Department had opened a criminal investigation into the door plug failure. 

Today, Boeing announced a change in leadership.

Also today, Acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su reminded readers of Teen Vogue, on the anniversary of the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire that killed 147 garment workers in New York City after their employer had locked the exits, of how that tragedy prompted the federal government to create “programs that generations of Americans have relied on for economic security and dignity, including a nationwide minimum wage, health and safety regulations, restrictions on child labor, and more.”

Each generation “has a duty to take the baton of progress from those who came before us,” Su said. She noted that industries whose workforces are mostly women or immigrants have historically often broken the law, exposing workers to dangerous conditions and withholding pay.

This problem persists in the present, and she reported that the Department of Labor is working to address it. For example, after three injuries at a plant outside Chicago, including the December 2022 death of a 29-year-old sanitation worker, the U.S. Department of Labor fined the company $2.8 million. And, earlier this year, the department recovered more than $1 million for 165 workers whose employer had cheated them of overtime pay, the largest settlement ever for California garment workers. 

The U.S. Department of Energy today announced it has selected 33 projects from more than 20 states that will be awarded up to $6 billion to jump-start the elimination of carbon dioxide emissions from industries that are hard to adapt to green technologies. The projects will match federal monies to invest more than $20 billion toward commercial-scale decarbonization solutions for cement and concrete, chemicals and refining, metals including iron and steel, pulp and paper mills, and so on. The projects are funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act, and will create tens of thousands of jobs. The Department of Energy estimates that the funded projects will cut carbon emissions by an average of 77%.

All of these news items today—airplane safety, worker protection, and technologies to address climate change—reflect a government designed to protect the American people. The nonpartisan civil servants staffing the agencies responsible for that protection are the ones that MAGA Republicans call the Deep State and Trump has vowed to replace with his own loyalists.  

For his part, as he faced cases in two different New York courts, Trump’s focus today was on the rule of law. He does not appear to be a fan of it.  

March 25 was the deadline for Trump to produce a bond to cover the $454 million he owes to the people of the state of New York for fraud. But before New York attorney general Letitia James could begin to seize his assets this morning, a New York appeals court threw him a lifeline, cutting the size of the required bond to $175 million and giving him 10 more days to post it. The order also paused the enforcement of many of the penalties Judge Arthur Engoron had imposed. So, for the time being, Trump and his sons can continue to do business in New York, although their businesses remain under the supervision of an independent monitor. 

The court’s order does not change Engoron’s judgment in the case. It simply puts the execution of that judgment on hold as Trump appeals it, which he must do on time.

In a different courtroom today, Judge Juan Merchan rejected further delaying tactics by Trump’s lawyers and set April 15 as the date for jury selection in the criminal case of election interference. This is the case in which Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records to hide payments to people with damaging information about him before the 2016 election. This scheme gave Trump “an illegal edge in a razor-thin race,” as legal reporter Adam Klasfeld of Just Security put it. 

Trump has said he will appeal. 

Last week, Brian Beutler of Off Message noted that “Trump is scarcely running a presidential campaign…. [H]is efforts are overwhelmingly fixed on evading justice or mooting judgments he’s already lost by any means necessary. He’d ideally like to prevail in these efforts before the election, but the task will become much easier if he’s able to win or steal the presidency despite the legal peril.”

Trump appeared angry today at a press conference after Judge Merchan set a date for the start of the election interference case. He blamed President Joe Biden for his legal troubles, although the case is in New York. He insisted that holding him accountable for his behavior is itself “election interference.” 

In a statement, the Biden camp replied: “Donald Trump is weak and desperate—both as a man and a candidate for President…. His campaign can’t raise money, he is uninterested in campaigning outside his country club, and every time he opens his mouth, he pushes moderate and suburban voters away with his dangerous agenda.

“America deserves better than a feeble, confused, and tired Donald Trump.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

#Letters from An American #Heather Cox Richardson #election 2024 #The Boeing Company #FAA #Department of Labor #US Department of Energy

[midnightfunk]

“So, we’re definitely about to go into a recession,” Emma starts in the clip. “And if you are nervous about getting laid off and you work for a big employer, I just want to let you know that a WARN notice is something that exists in every state and you can look it up by state through the Department of Labor if you just Google it.”

Keying off the green screen image behind her, she explains, “Large employers have to file a WARN notice when they’re going to do a big layoff. So, like we can see that on January 18, Microsoft filed a WARN notice that in Redmond, Bellevue, and Issaquah, Washington, they’re going to start laying people off starting March 20. And it’s going to be 878 workers.”

#worker adjustment and retraining notification #warn act #recession #department of labor

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"WAGES KEEP STEP WITH HIGH LIVING," Kingston Whig-Standard. November 30, 1912. Page 6. ---- Pay Roll and Prices of Food Both Rise. ---- 110 Strikes Prevented-Department Failed to Conciliate in Only Fourteen Cases. --- Ottawa, Nov. 30. - The annual report of the Department of Labor notes an upward tendency in wages attended by an increase in the cost of living. The success of the Industrial Disputes Act is indicated in the fact that in five years 124 disputes. in which it was invoked, have arisen, and only in 14 cases did the conciliatory proceedings fail to prevent a strike. Last year there were 97 industrial disputes, as against 94 in the year previous. Building trades predominated in these difficulties.

The report explains and reviews at length the work of the department, an important feature of which is the regular investigation and reports of wholesale prices in relation to the cost of living.

The uncertainty of the Canadian naval policy has done much to curtail the activity of the naval service department in the last financial year, according to the annual report just published. No special effort to obtain recruits has been made, and all told they number 349. Of this number 111 recruits and 38 others deserted. Many of them came from inland points, disliked sea life and quit. The appropriation in the year was $3,000,000 and the expenditure $1,233,456. Considerable incidental work was done on dockyards, but this, too, was curtailed because of uncertainty as to the naval policy.

#dominion of canada #official reports #department of labor #industrial disputes act #canadian military #royal canadian navy #government of canada #borden government #canadian history #high cost of living #raising wages #rising cost of living