The National Labor Relations Board recently came out with a new smartphone app, in iPhone and Android versions. The Board had an app a few years ago, but you had to pay for it, and if I remember correctly, the price was in two figures. Because I am a cheapskate, I never downloaded it. The new one is free, as a government app should be, and I tested it this week on my iPhone 4. It's not terribly ...

Are you in retail, fashion, or marketing, and getting ready to reject a job candidate because he or she doesn't have the "look" you want?

You might want to look before you leap. Or before you have to go to trial in front of a California jury against the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

The apparel chain Abercrombie & Fitch is learning that the hard way.

Abercrombie was sued a while ago ...

By David Phippen, Fairfax Office

UPDATE: David's client bulletin analyzing the D.C. Circuit's Noel Canning decision is available here.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit struck down today the "recess appointments" of Sharon Block and Richard Griffin to the National Labor Relations Board. Without Members Block and Griffin, most of the Board decisions ...

Is this new UPS pregnancy discrimination decision really such great news for employers?

HINT: Check the dates!!!

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit* held this week that there is no "reasonable accommodation" requirement for pregnancy. The defendant, United Parcel Service, had a collective bargaining agreement that required it to offer light duty in two ...

Happy new year, everybody! Although I've been on vacation, the news never sleeps, and the Mayans were wrong. Accordingly, I have a few items to catch you up on.

"Ha-ha! We were just kidding!"

UPDATE: Thanks to reader John Perkins, SPHR, for the 2013 Mayan Calendar. Most educational!

"Near occasion of sin" is a legitimate ground for termination, Iowa court says. You've probably already ...

Well! OK!

It's been an interesting week, hasn't it? Congratulations to President Obama on winning a second term. My Election 2012 coverage would not be complete without some labor and employment prognostications for Obama Administration II.*

*Please do not read these again in 2016 to see how accurate I was. I don't want to be known as the Dick Morris of employment law bloggers.

All this week, while formulating my questions for our presidential and vice presidential candidates, I avoided reading what my fellow bloggers were asking because I wanted *sniff* to maintain my independence. Actually, I was afraid that their questions would be so good, I'd be tempted to "borrow" too much.

Lois Lane and I have to maintain our journalistic integrity.

Last night, I ...

Remember that one little bone that the National Labor Relations Board threw to employers on social media policies? The guidance was generally atrocious, but in the last memorandum of the Acting General Counsel a policy developed by Walmart was approved and attached.

I've suggested that employers use that Walmart policy as a go-by in developing their social media policies.

Well, now ...

If we don't laugh, we'll cry, right? In honor of Phyllis Diller, the queen of the one-liners, who died this week, and her counterpart, the great Henny Youngman, here is the latest labor and employment news - all in one-liners, of course.

"A bachelor is a guy who never made the same mistake once."

"Take my federal agencies -- please!" The National Labor Relations Board has taken the position ...

The latest guidance on social media and protected concerted activity, issued last week by Lafe Solomon, Acting General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board, is for the most part an unrealistic, hair-splitting mess. ("But Robin, tell us how you really feel about it!") However, there is a somewhat happy ending that I'll talk about at the end of this post.

The first two ...