News & Commentary

October 3, 2017

POLITICO reports that the Trump administration is weighing an executive order on low-income assistance plans.  The order would instruct federal agencies to review such plans as part of a larger effort to “make sweeping changes to the country’s welfare system.”  It is reported that the draft order directs agencies to develop new rules, notably, stricter work requirements and more mechanisms encouraging recipients to move back into the labor force.

Coverage of yesterday’s oral argument in Murphy Oil gives some indication of how the case might turn out.  At BloombergPolitics, Greg Stohr writes that “Justice Anthony Kennedy, often the court’s swing vote, suggested Monday through his questions that he would side with employers.”  Neil Gorsuch, Stohr reports, said nothing.  Adam Liptak, writing for the New York Times, also highlighted Justice Gorsuch’s silence and similarly read Justice Kennedy’s questions as revealing that he would side with employers.

In Uber news, Katrin Bennhold penned a piece for the New York Times discussing the questions of race and immigration that London’s Uber ban raises.  As Bennhold explains, in London, drivers of the iconic black cabs are predominantly white, while most Uber drivers are non-white and many are immigrants.  While Britain’s Trade Union Congress called the ban a win for worker rights, many of the Uber drivers Bennhold interviewed expressed frustration that many of the criticisms of labor standards mentioned in the aftermath of the decision did not actually factor heavily into it.  Instead, the city justified its decision primarily citing safety concerns.

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