Chapter 20 - Labor Law

Question 1

What is the Norris-LaGuardia Act?

Answer 1

It prohibits federal court injunctions in peaceful labor disputes.

Question 2

What is the National Labor Relations Act?

Answer 2

AKA The Wagner Act - Ensures the right of workers to form unions and encourages management and unions to collectively bargain. Congress was declaring that workers should be permitted to organize unions and to use their collective power to achieve legitimate economic ends.

Question 3

What does Section 7 of the NLRA do?

Answer 3

Guarantees employees the right to organize and join unions, bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and engage in other concerted activities.

Question 4

What does Section 8 of the NLRA do?

Answer 4

Prohibits employers from engaging in the following unfair labor practices:

• Interfering with union organizing efforts
• Dominating or interfering with any unions
• Discriminating against a union member
• Refusing to bargain collectively with a union.

Question 5

What is the National Labor Relations Board? What does it do?

Answer 5

Formed by the NLRA, it administers and interprets the NLRA and adjudicates labor cases. They make final agency decisions about representation and ULP cases. But the Board has no power to enforce its orders. If it is evident that the losing party will not comply, the Board must petition a federal appeals court to enforce the order.

Question 6

What is the Labor-Management Relations Act?

Answer 6

Also known as the Taft-Hartley Act. A statute designed to curb union abuses. It amended Section 8 or the NLRA to outlaw certain unfair labor practices by unions

Question 7

How many members are on the National Labor Relations Board? How are they chosen?

Answer 7

There are five members

They are appointed by the president.

Question 8

What are the steps resulting in an appeal relating to the NLRB?

Answer 8

• The Board issues a decision
• The Board orders a company to bargain
• The Board then appeals to the US Court of Appeals to enforce its order
• The company cross-appeals, requesting the court not to enforce the Board’s order.

Question 9

What unfair labor practices by unions did the Labor-Management Relations Act outlaw?

Answer 9

Section 8(b) makes it an unfair labor practice for a union to:

• Interfere with employees who are exercising their labor rights under Section 7.
• Encourage an employer to discriminate against a particular employee because of a union dispute.
• Refuse to collectively bargain
• Engage in illegal strikes or boycott, particularly secondary boycotts.

Question 10

What did the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act do?

Answer 10

Requires financial disclosures by union leadership. Guarantees union members free speech and fair elections.

Question 11

How many people belonged to unions in the US in the 1950s? Today?

Answer 11

1950s - about 1 in 4

Today - about 1 in 8, or 15 million US workers

Question 12

Who is generally not protected by the NLRA?

Answer 12

Public employees, despite being five times more likely to be union members.

Question 13

What is a Collective Bargaining Unit?

Answer 13

The precisely defined group of employees represented by a particular union.

Question 14

What does Section 9 of the NLRA say?

Answer 14

A validly recognized union is the exclusive representative of the employees. This means that the union will represent all of the designated employees, regardless of whether a particular worker wants to be represented. The company may not bargain directly with any employee in the group, nor with any other organization representing the designated employees.

Question 15

What is the general pattern of stages of organizing a union effort? 5

Answer 15

Campaign
Authorization Cards
Petition
Election
The "Card-Check" Debate

Question 16

What is the Campaign stage of organizing a union?

Answer 16

Union organizers talk with employees and try to interest them in forming a union. It may be organizers as employees of the company talking with coworkers about unsatisfactory conditions or a union may send non-employees of the company to hand out union leaflets to workers as they arrive and depart from work.

Question 17

What is the Authorization Cards stage of organizing a union?

Answer 17

Union organizers ask workers to sign authorization cards, which state that the particular worker requests the specified union to act as her sole bargaining representative. If a union obtains authorization cards from a sizable percentage of workers, it seeks recognition as the exclusive representative for the bargaining unit. The union may ask the employer to recognize it as the bargaining representative, but most of the time, employers refuse to recognize the union voluntarily. The NLRA permits an employer to refuse recognition.

Question 18

What is the Petition stage of organizing a union?

Answer 18

If the employer does not voluntarily recognize a union, the union generally petitions the NLRB for an election. It must submit Authorization Cards signed by at least 30% of the workers. If the NLRB determines that the union has identified an appropriate bargaining unit and has enough valid cards, it orders an election.

Question 19

What is the Election stage of organizing a union?

Answer 19

The NLRB closely supervises the election to ensure fairness. All members of the proposed bargaining unit vote on whether they want the union to represent them. If more than 50% of workers vote for the union, the NLRB designates that union as the exclusive representative of all the members of the bargaining unit.
-Unions win about half the elections held in private corporations

Question 20

What is the “Card Check” Debate stage of organizing a union?

Answer 20

There is a bill (not passed, but debated) called the Employee Free Choice Act. It states that when more than 50 of workers sign an authorization card, the NLRB must immediately designate that union as the exclusive representative of all members in the bargaining union without an election.

Question 21

What actions are workers allowed to take regarding the organization of a union?

Answer 21

The NLRA guarantees employees the right to talk about themselves about forming a union, to hand out literature (content generally can’t be limited by employer), and ultimately to join a union.

The statute permits an employer to restrict organizing discussions if they interfere with discipline or production (or in the presence of a customer).

Question 22

What actions are employers allowed to take regarding the organization of a union?

Answer 22

Management is entitled to communicate to the employees why it believes a union will be harmful to the company. The employers efforts must be limited to explanation and advocacy. The employer may not use threats or promises of benefits to defeat a union drive. They are not allowed to offer benefits designed to defeat the union.

Question 23

What is ULP?

Answer 23

Unfair Labor Practice. For example it is an unfair labor practice for an employer to interfere with a union organizing effort. The union claiming such interference will file a ULP with the NLRB.

Question 24

What is a Collective Bargaining Agreement?

Answer 24

A contract between a union and management.

Question 25

What does the NLRB look for in its decision to determine whether it certifies a proposed bargaining unit? How is that determined? Why is it important?

Answer 25

The Board generally certifies a proposed bargaining unit -If and only if the employees share a “community of interest”.
-They look for rough similarity of training, skills, hours of work, and pay.
If the Board rejects the proposed bargaining unit, then it will dismiss the union’s request for an election.

Question 26

Who must be excluded from the bargaining unit? How is it determined if an employee is managerial?

Answer 26

Managerial employees.
An employee is managerial if she is so closely aligned with management that her membership in the bargaining unit would create a conflict of interest between her union membership and her actual work.

Question 27

What are the three most common conflicts in collective bargaining?

Answer 27

• Whether an issue is a mandatory subject of bargaining
• Whether the parties are bargaining in good faith
• How to enforce the agreement

Question 28

What subjects may the parties bargain? What subjects must the parties bargain?

Answer 28

The NLRA permits the parties to bargain almost any subject they wish.
It requires them to bargain:
-Wages
-Hours
-Others Terms and Conditions of Employment

Courts have ruled these subjects mandatory
-Pay
-Benefits
-Order of Layoffs and recalls
-Production Quotas
-Work rules (safety practices, etc)
-Retirement Benefits
-In-plant Food Services and Prices
Courts have ruled subjects as nonmandatoy
-Product type and design
-Advertising
-Sales
-Financing
-Corporate Organization
-Location of Plants

Question 29

What is subcontracting?

Answer 29

That a manufacturer, rather than producing all parts of a product and then assembling them, contracts for other companies, frequently overseas, to make some of the parts.

Question 30

When is bargaining about subcontracting not mandatory? When is it mandatory?

Answer 30

• It is not likely mandatory when a company does it to maintain its economic viability
• It is mandatory if the subcontracting is designed to replace union workers with cheaper labor.

Question 31

What is a no-strike clause?

Answer 31

An agreement that the union promises not to strike during the term of the contract. This is legal.

Question 32

What is a no-lockout clause?

Answer 32

An agreement where, in the event of a labor dispute, management will not prevent union members for working. This is legal.

Question 33

What is a union shop?

Answer 33

In a union shop, membership in the union becomes compulsory after the employee has been hired. The management retains unfettered right to hire who is pleases, but all new employees who fit into the bargaining unit must affiliate with the union.

Question 34

What are the two limitations to a union shop being legal?

Answer 34

• New members need not join the union for 30 days.
• The new members, after joining the union, can only be required to pay initiation feeds and union dues. They are not required to participate in the union.

Question 35

What may management not unilaterally change? What is the exception?

Answer 35

It may not change wages, hours, or terms and conditions of employment without bargaining the issues to impasse.

Question 36

What does “bargaining to impasse” mean?

Answer 36

Both parties must continue to meet and bargain in good faith until it is clear that they cannot reach an agreement.

Question 37

What is Grievance-Arbitration? What are the steps?

Answer 37

When an employee believes an employers move is prohibited by the union contract.

• Employee complains to the union
• Union files a grievance (formal complaint with the company notifying management that the union claims a contract violation)
• Generally, the CBA establishes come kind of informal hearing, usually conducted by a member of management, at which the employee, represented by the union, may state her case.
• After the manager’s decision, if the employee is still dissatisfied, the union may file for arbitration.

Question 38

What is arbitration?

Answer 38

A formal hearing before a neutral party to resolve a contract dispute between a union and a company. Each side is represented by a lawyer. The arbitrator is required to decide the case based on the CBA.

Question 39

What is Concerted Action?

Answer 39

Tactics taken by union members to gain bargaining advantage. It is this power that gives a union strength.

Question 40

What are the limitations to the NLRA granting unions the right to strike?

Answer 40

• A no strike clause
• A 60-day cooling off period before many strikes
• In some state, a flat prohibition on strikes by public employees

Question 41

When does a union have a guaranteed right to strike? Why might they strike?

Answer 41

-If the parties are unable to reach a collective bargaining agreement

• To exert economic pressure on management
• To protest an unfair labor practice
• Preserve work that the employer is considering sending elsewhere

Question 42

What is the legality of replacement workers?

Answer 42

Management has the right to hire replacement workers during a strike.

Question 43

What is an economic strike?

Answer 43

One intended to gain wages or benefits.

Question 44

When can a company offer replacement workers permanent jobs? When must the company give union members their job back?

Answer 44

After an economic strikes, an employer may not discriminate against the striker, but the employer is not obligated to lay off a replacement worker to get a striker back his job

After an unfair labor practice strike, a union member is entitled to her job back, even if that means the employer must lay off a replacement worker.

Question 45

What is an unfair labor practices strike?

Answer 45

When an unfair labor practice happens and a union strikes

Question 46

What is the legality of picketing?

Answer 46

It is generally lawful at the employers workplace. The picketer are not permitted to use physical force to prevent anyone from crossing the line.

Question 47

What is the legality of secondary boycotts?

Answer 47

They are generally illegal. (They are when a picket line is established not at the employer’s premise, but at the workplace of a different company that does business with the union’s employer.

Question 48

When is a lockout legal?

Answer 48

When both parties have reached a bargaining impasse.

Question 49

The landmark federal labor statute that requires financial disclosures by union leadership and guarantees union members free speech and fair elections is the:
Answer

Labor-Management Relations Act.

Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act.

NLRA.

Norris-LaGuardia Act.

Answer 49

Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act.

Question 50

Zoe, who works as a retail clerk, wishes to talk with her co-workers about organizing a union. Her employer forbids her from talking with other workers about union activity in the presence of customers and threatens to fire her if she joins the union. Does the employer have a legal right to make this threat to Zoe?
Answer

No. An employee may limit the time and place of conversation, but may not threaten to fire the employee.

Yes, but only if expressly authorized by state law.

Yes, the employer may limit time and place of discussions about union organizing.

No, an employee has the right of free speech at anytime.

Answer 50

No. An employee may limit the time and place of conversation, but may not threaten to fire the employee.

Question 51

Which of the following is an unfair labor practice for a union?
Answer

To encourage an employer to discriminate against a particular employee because of a union dispute.

To bargain collectively.

To engage in a legal strike.

All of the above are unfair labor practices by a union.

Answer 51

To encourage an employer to discriminate against a particular employee because of a union dispute.

Question 52

An employer is in the process of negotiating a new contract with its union. During negotiations, the employer changed the workweek from a five-day, eight-hour-per-day week to a four-day, ten-hour-per-day week. Which statement is correct?
Answer

This is a violation of the National Labor Relations Act.

This is not violation of the NLRA because the total number of work hours per week has not changed.

Whether or not this is a violation of the NLRA will depend on the relevant state statutory law.

This is not a violation of the NLRA because the employer is bargaining with the union.

Answer 52

This is a violation of the National Labor Relations Act.

Question 53

Ron and several fellow workers of Vicy, Inc., a small manufacturing company, wished to organize a union. When Vicy learned of this activity, it issued a bulletin to all workers stating that a union will only hurt the company and that “we are a family that can solve any problems ourselves – we do not need union activists from outside our company trying to tell us what to do!” Which statement is correct?
Answer

The employees have the right to organize a union, regardless of Vicy’s status.

If the union will hurt the company, Vicy can obtain an injunction halting the unionizing drive.

If union activists from outside the company are involved in the unionization drive, Vicy can obtain an injunction halting the drive.

As a small family business, Vicy can obtain an injunction halting the unionizing drive.

Answer 53

The employees have the right to organize a union, regardless of Vicy’s status.

Question 54

Kelly is upset with her supervisor and believes his conduct violates the terms of her union’s collective bargaining agreement (CBA). The union filed a grievance on Kelly’s behalf. Who will conduct the grievance hearing?
Answer

A replacement worker.

A member of the company’s management team.

The U.S. Court of Appeals.

The National Labor Relations Board.

Answer 54

A member of the company’s management team.

Question 55

All of the following might be in the same collective bargaining unit except:
Answer

the department manager.

plant workers.

secretarial workers.

clerical workers.

Answer 55

the department manager.

Question 56

In 1932, Congress passed what legislation prohibiting federal court injunctions in nonviolent labor disputes, thereby declaring that workers should be permitted to organize unions and use their collective power to achieve legitimate economic ends?
Answer

The Sherman Act.

The Labor-Management Relations Act.

The National Labor Relations Act.

The Norris-LaGuardia Act.

Answer 56

The Norris-LaGuardia Act.

Question 57

Exec-Pac, Inc. is extremely opposed to having its employees organize. What is true about Exec-Pac’s rights?
Answer

Exec-Pac may prevent the employees from interfering with the company’s work.

Exec-Pac mays speak out against unionization

The company may not offer better wages to prevent unionization

All of these answers are correct.

Answer 57

All of these answers are correct.

Question 58

Stacy believes her rights as a union worker have been violated by her employer. If the specific rights are addressed by both state and federal law:
Answer

the state law will apply.

both state and federal law will apply.

she may choose which law, state or federal, will govern her rights.

the federal law will apply.

Answer 58

the federal law will apply.

Question 59

Which of the following are tasks of the National Labor Relations Board?
Answer

To adjudicate claims that an employer has committed an unfair labor practice.

To adjudicate claims that a union has committed an unfair labor practice.

To decide whether a particular union is entitled to represent a group of employees.

All the above are tasks of the National Labor Relations Board.

Answer 59

All the above are tasks of the National Labor Relations Board.

Question 60

Ron and several fellow workers of Vicy, Inc., a small manufacturing company, wished to organize a union. When Vicy learned of this activity, it issued a bulletin to all workers stating that a union will only hurt the company and that “we are a family that can solve any problems ourselves – we do not need union activists from outside our company trying to tell us what to do!” Which statement is correct concerning the bulletin issued by Vicy?
Answer

Vicy has committed an unfair labor practice. Vicy must remain neutral during the organizing drive.

Whether Vicy has committed an unfair labor practice depends on whether the bulletin was approved by the NLRB.

Vicy has committed an unfair labor practice. The bulletin constitutes outrageous interference with the union organizing campaign

Vicy has not committed an unfair labor practice. An employer may vigorously present anti-union views to its employees.

Answer 60

Vicy has not committed an unfair labor practice. An employer may vigorously present anti-union views to its employees.