President Joe Biden seems to have spent the past two years cramming more into his days than the influencers who document their early-morning routines. (#RiseandGrind!)
Biden has introduced so many labor changes in the first half of his term that even David Madland, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, whose job it is to track Biden’s labor agenda, has a “hard time keeping up.”
Biden began his term by nominating or appointing pro-union leaders to agencies including Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh and NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo. Since then, the Brookings Institute reports, the president and his team have attempted six major labor regulatory actions, while OSHA has proposed new standards related to workplace health and safety, and Congress has upped funding for the EEOC.
As Madland said, it’s a lot to keep track of. Public policy experts from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), American Center for Progress, and the Brookings Institute talked to HR Brew about the most notable labor updates under Biden and how they have reshaped the employee–employer (and employee–HR) relationship so far.
Protecting workers’ health and safety during Covid-19. OSHA introduced two emergency temporary standards (ETS) related to Covid-19: The first required workers in healthcare settings to mask up, among other things, while the second required vaccination or testing for large private organizations. (The second was struck down.)
Though the private sector initiative was, as Margaret Poydock, policy analyst at EPI, put it, ultimately “abandoned,” many HR departments created policies based on OSHA’s proposed guidance—and kept them in place. Jim Paretti, attorney at Littler Mendelson, told HR Brew that many of his clients wanted to require vaccination or testing but feared backlash. The proposed ETS, in November, 2021, empowered HR to do so without taking heat, said Paretti. Keep reading here.—SV
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