
Alexandra Butler is a student at Harvard Law School.
As the number of COVID-19 cases continues to rise, the holiday season threatens to increase essential workers’ risk of exposure. In the days leading up to Thanksgiving, worker advocates responded to this heightened risk with renewed calls for employee hazard pay, a practice that several companies implemented and then quickly abandoned only a few months into the pandemic. While many of these companies have highlighted the steps that they have taken to protect their employees, the Brookings Institution has underscored that they can in fact do more. In its recent study focused on 13 large companies, Brookings found that despite an average 39% increase in profits from last year, average worker wages at these companies have only increased by 10%.
As the pandemic worsens, the Walt Disney Company indicated on Thursday that by March 2021, 32,000 of its employees will be laid off. In contrast, Amazon has managed to increase its workforce by record numbers. Between January and October, the company hired 427,300 employees. This payroll expansion can be attributed to both the company’s collaboration with other businesses, as well as its automated hiring platform. As the New York Times highlights, these discrepancies in company hiring indicate that “[t]his period has been partly about a recession but also about a pretty dramatic shift of economic activity from some sectors to others.” Amazon’s contribution to the job market, however, is only one part of the story, specifically in light of criticisms that the company mishandled its initial response to the pandemic.
Fiscal year 2020 marked the first time during the Trump Administration that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) increased the number of inspectors on its payroll. The increase, however, was small. OSHA hired only an additional 38 compliance and safety officers, bringing its total to 790. Starting with a series of congressional budgets cuts in 2014, there has been a steady decrease in the number of OSHA inspectors, a troubling fact for unions and worker advocates who argue that “more inspectors are needed . . . ‘to address the widespread safety and health hazards workers face every day.’” The pandemic seems to only have exacerbated the limitations of OSHA’s size. This year, the number of inspections that the agency conducted decreased by 35%, though the complaints filed have now expanded to include COVID-19 related violations.
This week, DoorDash settled a 2019 lawsuit that challenged the company’s tipping model as deceptive under the Consumer Protections Procedures Act. Filed by the DC Attorney General Karl Racine, the original complaint alleged that the company used customer tips to cover worker base pay, rather than to actually tip workers. The terms require that covered DoorDash drivers receive $1.5 million out of the $2.5 million settlement. In addition, DoorDash has pledged to “ensure[] that the entirety of consumer tips are distributed to workers,” as well as to ensure that workers and customers have access to information about the company payment system.
Daily News & Commentary
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February 7
In today’s News and Commentary, the NLRB withdraws its objections to SpaceX’s constitutional challenge, Whole Foods asks the NLRB to set aside a union election in Philadelphia, and the AFL-CIO launches a campaign to push back against Musk. The NLRB filed a letter with the Fifth Circuit indicating it would not address SpaceX’s challenge to […]
February 6
Gwynne Wilcox files lawsuit challenging her removal from the NLRB, and unions file a lawsuit challenging DOJE's request to access Department of Labor information.
February 5
Trump's disagreements with Abruzzo & Wilcox, Dollar General's plan for ICE agents, remote work in federal CBA's.
February 4
In today's news and commentary King Soopers workers announce a strike, Congressman Biggs introduces a bill to abolish OSHA, the UAW announces willingness to support Trump's tariffs, and Yale New Haven Health System faces a wage and hour class action.
February 2
President Trump seeks to nullify recent collective bargaining agreements with federal workers; Trump fired the NLRB’s acting General Counsel; Costco and the Teamsters reach a tentative deal averting a strike; Black History Month began yesterday with the theme African Americans and Labor
January 31
In today’s news and commentary, AFGE and AFSCME sue Trump for an Executive Order stripping protections from government employees, Trump fires members of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and Amazon shutters operations in the entirety of Quebec in response to union successes. On Wednesday, two unions representing government employees–American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) and […]