NLRB’s joint employer rule struck down

Just as the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) new joint employer regulation was set to become effective, it was struck down by Judge J. Campbell Barker of the Eastern District of Texas. The flux and instability in this critical and hotly contested area of the law persists. Employers, employees, labor, management, and government are all back to arguing whether the 2020 regulation is viable because it was the regulation the current NLRB sought to supplant and must now enforce.

Expanding business sector at center

Along with the “gig economy,” the franchise model is one of the fastest growing sectors of the economy. Once the province of the fast food industry, franchising is now found in businesses ranging from dry cleaning to hardware. Franchised businesses now make up as much as 10% of U.S. businesses and generate 3% of the total GDP.

All those businesses employ tens of thousands of workers “in play,” either jointly employed or not. And since the disputed Browning-Ferris Board ruling in 2015, there has been little legal substance on which to rely.

What is ‘control’?