Cox, Bok & Gorman's Labor Law (University Casebook Series)

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The Seventeenth Edition makes a number of significant changes to its predecessor, reflecting the evolution of the law relating to employers, employees, and unions in a dynamic economy and polarized political environment. This edition includes new decisions of the National Labor Relations Board appointed by President Trump, which has departed in many, significant ways from the approach of the Board under the Obama Administration. The Trump Board’s starkly different outlook on the role of labor law in the contemporary workplace is reflected in its overturning or reversing precedents on many key issues, such as protections for employee electronic communications, accountability for employers in “fissured” enterprises, and treatment of various other employer restrictions on collective employee activity. The book also contains judicial decisions addressing these developments, evincing the growing conflicts over the role of labor unions in society.

This edition supplies a comprehensive revision in light of major legal shifts occurring from 2016 through 2020, notably

• Newly revised NLRB representation election rules
• SuperShuttle and more, addressing the distinction between employees and independent contractors
• The Boeing Company, adopting a new and markedly different framework for analyzing whether facial neutral workplace rules interfere with Section 7 rights, including rules addressing matters such as employee use of cameras in the workplace and workplace civility standards
• Caesars Entertainment, reverting to the Board’s prior approach (under The Register Guard) to rules on employee use of employer email for concerted activity
• The NLRB General Counsel’s advocacy of stricter limitations on neutrality agreements
• Newly enacted rules overturning Browning-Ferris and narrowing the scope of joint employer status
• Alstate Maintenance, seemingly narrowing the scope of concerted activity for mutual aid or protection
• Epic Systems, in which the Supreme Court rejected the Board’s decision in Murphy Oil, thereby unwinding protection against contractual waivers of the capacity to participate in group arbitration or adjudication of employment-related claims
• General Motors, adopting a new approach to determining when allegedly abusive conduct loses protection under Section 7.
• MV Transportation, abandoning the “clear and unmistakable” standard for determining whether a CBA waives the duty to bargain and replacing it with a “contract coverage” standard.

New discussion problems and exercises throughout the text offer students the opportunity to engage with this new material, illustrating how exciting and challenging the study of labor law is today.

The 2023 statutory and case supplement not only contains all relevant statutory provisions but also highlights and summarizes significant developments since the publication of the 17th edition of the casebook, including:

• The Board’s decision in The Atlanta Opera, Inc., 372 NLRB No. 95 (2023), overruling SuperShuttle and returning to the standard set for in its 2014 FedEx Home Delivery decision for determining the independent contractor status
• Updates on and problems addressing union organizing activities at Amazon facilities
• The Board’s decision in McLaren Macomb, 372 NLRB No. 58 (2023), returning to prior precedent holding that employers may not offer employees severance agreements that require the employees to broadly waive their Section 7 rights
• The Board’s invitation for briefs in Stericycle, Inc., 371 NLRB No. 48 (2021), on whether the Board should alter the work rules standard adopted in The Boeing Company
• The Supreme Court’s decision in Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid, 141 S. Ct. 2063 (2021), holding unconstitutional California’s Agricultural Labor Relations Act’s right to access by union organizers
• The Board’s decision in Thryv, Inc., 372 NLRB No. 22 (2022), holding that “make whole” relief should address all direct or foreseeable pecuniary harms to employees as a result of an employer’s unfair labor practices, and its decision in Noah’s Ark Processors, LLC, 372 NLRB No. 80 (2023), detailing potential remedies when an employer has shown repeated or egregious disregard for employees’ rights
• The Board’s purposed “Fair Choice and Employee Voice Rule,” addressing election-blocking charges, voluntary recognition, and construction industry bargaining relationships
• The Supreme Court’s decision in Glacier Northwest, Inc. v. International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 143 S. Ct. 1404 (2023), holding that the NLRA does not “arguably protect” the union’s conduct or preempt the employer’s state law tort claims against the union when striking drivers ceased of work while the employer’s trucks were full of concrete and failed to take reasonable precautions to protect the employer’s property
• The Board’s notice that it will engage in rulemaking on the standard for determining joint employment
• The Board’s decision in Lion Elastomers LLC, 372 NLRB No. 83 (2023), overturning Board’s prior decision in General Motors and returning to the “setting-specific” standards approach in situations in which employees are disciplined or discharged for misconduct that occurs during activity otherwise protected by Section 7
• A number of General Counsel Abruzzo’s important memoranda and arguments in briefs, including:
  • Memorandum GC 21–04, setting out a long list of cases and subject matter areas that would be subject to the Office’s “initiative” for change
  • Memorandum GC 21–08, stating that scholarship football players at Northwestern University and those similarly situated are employees with Section 7 rights
  • Memorandum GC 22–04 and briefing in CEMEX Construction Materials Pacific LLC, 28–CA–230115 advocating that the Board abandon its toleration of “captive audience” meetings and proposing new safeguards for Section 7 rights and also urging that the Board reinstate the Joy Silk doctrine
  • Memorandum GC 23-08 setting forth Counsel’s view that, except in limited circumstances, noncompete provisions in employment contracts and severance agreements violate Section 7 because they chill employees from exercising their rights to take collective action to improve their working conditions
• New Problems for Discussion throughout the text based on other recent judicial and Board developments