Department of Labor

Biden administration seeks input on independent contractor definition

The Biden administration has started the process to formulate a new definition of independent contractors under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

The rule has been a ping-pong ball since the early days of the Biden administration. A Trump-era rule seen as more sympathetic to employers that want to define their workers as independent was tossed out by the Biden administration before it went into effect. That action was then overruled in court, and the Trump administration rule was implemented.

Even as...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/biden-administration-seeks-input-on-independent-contractor-definition

Viewpoint: Federal court reinstates Trump-era DOL independent contractor rule

A Texas federal district court recently reinstated the independent contractor rule that was put into place by President Trump’s Department of Labor. The rule was previously withdrawn by the Biden Administration.

Background

At the end of the Trump Administration in January 2021, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued a rule that sought to clarify the controlling factors for who is, and who is not, an independent contractor for purposes of the Fair Labor Standards Act. The rule consisted of two main...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/viewpoint-federal-court-reinstates-trump-era-dol-independent-contractor-rule

Senate rejects Weil as Wage and Hour administrator

David Weil will not be responsible for defining what constitutes an independent contractor. A vote to invoke cloture and stop a filibuster of Weil’s ratification as head of the Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor failed in the Senate Wednesday by a 53-47 vote.  

Three Democrats — Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly of Arizona — voted with the entire Republican caucus in the Senate. 

Had the cloture vote succeeded, it would have allowed the full Senate to...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/senate-rejects-weil-as-wage-and-hour-administrator

Viewpoint: Biden’s NLRB, DOL seek to upend Trump-era labor laws

President Biden’s administration has its target set on business-friendly laws and regulations enacted under the Trump administration with a stated goal of becoming more employee and union friendly.  

Among the regulations targeted, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) under the Biden administration is eyeing changes to its joint employer standard and its independent contractor standard. The NLRB has also entered into a partnership with the Department of Labor (DOL) to share information and...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/viewpoint-bidens-nlrb-dol-seek-to-upend-trump-era-labor-laws

Weil’s controversial Wage and Hour Division nomination heads to Senate

For the independent contractors involved in the battle regarding what constitutes an IC — be it a truck driver or a freelance writer — one of the next big decisions is going to take place in the U.S. Senate.

That’s where the full Senate will take up the nomination of David Weil as the administrator of the Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor, a position that will be key in determining what guidelines the federal government will use to define ICs.

Weil was nominated to the job in...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/weils-controversial-wage-and-hour-division-nomination-heads-to-senate

Labor Department sues Paccar over firing worker who publicly questioned COVID safety

The U.S Department of Labor is suing Paccar Inc. over the 2020 firing of a Peterbilt Motors Co. worker who publicly questioned the heavy-duty truck manufacturer’s safety procedures to protect workers from COVID-19 infections at its Denton, Texas, plant.

The civil suit was filed last Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. It claims that Peterbilt, a subsidiary of Bellevue, Washington-based Paccar (NASDAQ: PCAR), fired Aaron Carey on March 20, 2020, a day after he...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/labor-department-sues-paccar-over-firing-worker-who-publicly-questioned-covid-safety

Will team drivers need to be vaccinated or tested for COVID-19?

With the trucking industry breathing a sigh of relief late last week after concluding solo truck drivers aren’t going to fall under the Biden administration’s vaccine rule, attention immediately turned to another question: What about team drivers?

The answer is that nobody is really sure. But it’s hard to see a way in which team drivers would not be required to be vaccinated or face a testing regime if they are working for a company with more than 100 employees given the provisions of the...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/will-team-drivers-need-to-be-vaccinated-or-tested-for-covid-19

Federal appeals court puts vaccine mandate on hold for now

Transportation industry on edge over potential vaccine mandate

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth District issued an emergency stay Saturday on the enforcement of the Biden administration’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate..

The appeals court questioned the constitutionality of the mandate in its decision.

“Because the petitions give cause to believe there are grave statutory and constitutional issues with the Mandate, the Mandate is hereby STAYED pending further action by this court,” a court document read.

The Department of Labor and Occupational Safety and...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/federal-appeals-court-puts-vaccine-mandate-on-hold-for-now

The Light Load: With ‘wake-up calls’ like this, who needs Ambien?

Maybe a reader smarter than I (one whose attempts at math aren’t a path-smoother to mental health counseling) can point out anything in the following debacle that makes it less dumb-as-a-sack-of-ostriches than it appears.

To wit:

A customs warehouse in San Diego employed 16 Mexican nationals as merchandise checkers. It paid them as little as $3.38 an hour and no overtime even when they worked up to 51 hours per week, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

The U.S. District Court for the...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/the-light-load-a-snoozefest-of-a-wake-up-call

Lyft, Uber execs strike balance in reaction to withdrawal of gig worker rule

Executives from Lyft (NYSE: LYFT) and Uber (NYSE: UBER) were under the microscope this week during their Q1 analyst earnings calls, and while they struck diplomatic tones around the regulatory environment surrounding gig workers, other stakeholders did not hold back.

“The decision by the Department of Labor to rescind the final independent contractor rule is disappointing as it disregards the will of individual workers, who greatly value the flexibility inherent in independent work,” said the...

https://s29755.pcdn.co/news/lyft-uber-execs-strike-balance-in-reaction-to-withdrawal-of-gig-worker-rule

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