Posts tagged joint-employer standard

    Comer introduces bill to help small business owners

    July 19, 2025 // Kentucky First District Congressman James Comer, R-Tompkinsville, has introduced the Save Local Business Act, which clarifies the joint employer standard to provide certainty for small business owners and workers across the country. Comer notes that in recent years, small businesses have suffered under unelected bureaucrats at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) who have dramatically expanded the definition of “joint employer” and implemented burdensome regulations for small businesses. “Congress must promote policies that empower small businesses and free them from stifling regulations pushed by an unchecked and unelected federal bureaucracy,”

    Lawmakers Should Not Let a Lame Duck Pack the NLRB

    July 28, 2024 // For instance, on her watch, Chair McFerran has allowed workplace discrimination to be weaponized for pro-union activities. This decision has subjected workers to traumatizing harassment, while simultaneously barring employers from intervening. According to a report by the Institute for the American Worker, McFerran’s NLRB has used Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) to excuse “racist rhetoric, sexist harassment, and vulgarity in the workplace, as long as it takes place in the context of ‘union activity.’”

    Opinion: This Looming Regulatory Change Is Endangering Your Entrepreneurial Livelihood. Here’s What You Can Do About It.

    March 7, 2024 // On the independent contractor language, the U.S. Department of Labor acknowledges in its new rule that there may be "conceptual overlap" with the ABC Test's most harmful section to independent contractors. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce says the "DOL's claim that the regulation does not reflect the ABC Test leaves something to be desired." The independent contractor CRA was introduced in the House and Senate in early March with more than 70 co-sponsors and needs more in both chambers to advance. Federal lawsuits have been filed against both federal agencies, trying to stop these policy changes through the courts. But, given the snail's pace with which the wheels of justice can turn, it's important for Congress to act.

    Opinion: NLRB says ‘common law’ — and common sense — defines joint employers

    December 5, 2023 // The mandate, to take effect Dec. 26, says when two employers — think a local McDonald’s franchise and McDonald’s headquarters in Chicago — control a worker’s toil, from wages and hours to duties and work rules to hiring and firing to uniforms and training, then both are responsible for obeying or breaking Labor law. And that means it should be easier for workers to organize and bargain without being bounced from pillar to post when it comes to whom to bargain with. Using that same “basic common sense” explanation, AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler called the new rule “an important win” for workers.

    Op-Ed: Biden’s joint-employer rule is bad for workers

    November 9, 2023 // Included in the Employee Rights Act are the commonsense provisions of the Save Local Business Act, which would provide much-needed clarity in determining joint-employer status and prevent franchise owners from becoming corporate middle managers. More specifically, the bills amend the National Labor Relations Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act to clarify that two or more employers must have “actual, direct, and immediate” control over employees to be considered joint employers. It rolls back a convoluted joint-employer scheme that threatens job creation and undermines the American dream, and it restores a commonsense definition of employer to provide certainty and stability for workers and job creators. Simply put, the Employee Rights Act seeks to update our nation’s labor policies to match the needs of the 21st-century worker and workforce.