Three Big Ideas for a Future of Less Work and a Three-Dimensional Alternative

The objective of this study is to examine how entrepreneurs in North Rinkeby perceive the Enterprise zone (EZ) program suggested by the Swedish government. The purpose of implementing an enterprise zone program is to revive the economic and social condition of deprived areas. This study analyzes the perception of this proposal by examining it on a regional level.  What are the entrepreneurs’ knowledge about the proposed policy and their perception on how it will influence their decisions of employment or relocation? The method of the research is a case study of North Rinkeby area, which is one of the areas under consideration for becoming part of the proposal.  Survey questionnaires were conducted in North Rinkeby, and the neighboring areas Tensta and Bromsten. 38 respondents were surveyed regarding their perception of how the enterprise zone proposal would influence factors such as employment and entrepreneurial start-ups. The results show that many of the entrepreneurs in the North Rinkeby area are in favor of a proposal such as the Enterprise zone program which the government have suggested. Many of the respondents had little or no knowledge of the proposal of the enterprise zone program. Many of entrepreneurs found that the proposal to be unfair in terms of competition between firms in North Rinkey and its neighboring areas. At a regional level many of the entrepreneurs welcomed the proposal and agreed that if it were to be implemented, it would have a growth enhancing effect for many firms. This in turn, would lead to a positive change in firm’s employability and profitability. The respondents also thought that the proposal would increase the amount of start-ups in North Rinkeby if it were to be implemented. The investigators of this proposal have argued that relocation to the chosen area would be large from the neighboring areas. The result were mixed among entrepreneurs in the neighboring areas as how they view the relocation factor.  Even though the enterprise zone program was recently rejected, many of the entrepreneurs in all of the three areas perceived this proposal as welfare enhancing

Employment-at-Will: Too Simple for a Complex World

For Professor Epstein, the distinctively American rule of employment-at-will (“EAW”) in its original, harsh form—which allowed either party to terminate employment at any time for good reason, bad reason, or no reason at all—is an exemplar of “simple rules for a complex world.” This Essay will reflect on a few ways in which EAW, plain and simple, is too simple for our complex world—too simple in light of the complexities of labor markets and of human and organizational behavior, and too simple in light of evolving societal conceptions of justice. As things now stand, given the legal complexity that has been layered atop the EAW rule in this complex world, the “just cause” rival of EAW would bring greater simplicity along with its primary virtues of fairness, economic security, and dignity for workers

Are Unions a Constitutional Anomaly?

This term in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Ass’n, the Supreme Court will consider whether ordinary public employees may constitutionally be required to pay an “agency fee,” as a condition of employment, to the union that represents them in collective bargaining. The Court established the terms of engagement in the 2014 decision Harris v. Quinn, which struck down an agency fee on narrower grounds while describing the current doctrine approving agency fees, blessed many times by the Court itself, as an “anomaly.” This Article asks whether labor unions are themselves anomalies in our legal system, particularly in their constitutional entitlements. Its answer is a qualified and complicated “yes.” Unions are indeed distinct in our legal system—distinct even among private entities with public regulatory functions, which have frequently provoked constitutional controversy. On the one hand, unions are voluntary associations of workers with constitutional entitlements to freedom of expression and associational autonomy. On the other hand, unions are both regulated and regulatory actors within a statutory scheme that sets them far apart from other voluntary associations. They are subject to a sui generis constellation of rights, powers, restrictions, and duties—a quid pro quo that both constrains and empowers unions, and that is embodied in the paradigmatic case that is the central focus here, in the National Labor Relations Act, the Taft-Hartley Act, and the Landrum-Griffin Act. Whatever the wisdom of that quid pro quo— and it has been criticized from both ends of the political spectrum—it provides an essential context for adjudicating constitutional claims by and against unions. This Article calls for reframing those constitutional claims to include both the quid and the quo of labor law—not only the alleged burdens that the labor laws impose on unions or individuals, but also any logically linked benefits or powers it confers on the claimant. If the alleged burden is logically linked to some corresponding benefit or power, the latter may offset or justify the former, and lower the level of constitutional scrutiny required. Rigorous attention to both the additions to and subtractions from unions’ entitlements under the labor laws, along with a cautious approach to the threshold question of state action, is necessary to preserve the residual yet fundamental autonomy interests of unions. The proposed analysis recasts not only the agency fee controversy and the related puzzle posed by state “right-to-work” laws, but also recurring challenges to the constitutionality of restrictions on union expression and recent efforts to bring “worker centers” under the umbrella of labor law. At the same time, it offers clues to the future of unions and labor law if the Court continues down the path foreshadowed in Harris

Corporate Self-Regulation and the Future of Workplace Governance

American labor law has largely failed to deliver a viable mechanism for employee representation in workplace governance, while the ever-expanding body of employment law does not even attempt to do so. The resulting democratic deficit in the workplace is a problem in part because, without employee representation, the rights and labor standards mandated by employment law are widely under-enforced. But that very problem could point toward a solution. For while employment law does not aim to give employees a role in workplace governance, it has in fact fostered the growth of new governance mechanisms within firms in the form of internal compliance programs that capitalize on and develop firms\u27 own regulatory capabilities. The law has encouraged this development in part by conferring regulatory advantages on firms that maintain effective self-regulatory structures. Missing, however, is the recognition that, for self-regulation to be effective in the realm of employment law, it must include an organized institutional voice for employees. In other words, there should be no self-regulation, and no self-regulatory privileges, without employee representation. These same mechanisms of regulated self-regulation and employee representation. coupled with an appropriately broad definition of employer liability, could also help to address the problem of widespread noncompliance with labor standards among the small contractors that supply labor to more visible and capable organizations. In short, existing developments within and among firms could and should be steered toward creating new mechanisms for collective employee participation in workplace governance

Corporate Self-Regulation and the Future of Workplace Governance

American labor law has largely failed to deliver a viable mechanism for employee representation in workplace governance, while the ever-expanding body of employment law does not even attempt to do so. The resulting democratic deficit in the workplace is a problem in part because, without employee representation, the rights and labor standards mandated by employment law are widely under-enforced. But that very problem could point toward a solution. For while employment law does not aim to give employees a role in workplace governance, it has in fact fostered the growth of new governance mechanisms within firms in the form of internal compliance programs that capitalize on and develop firms\u27 own regulatory capabilities. The law has encouraged this development in part by conferring regulatory advantages on firms that maintain effective self-regulatory structures. Missing, however, is the recognition that, for self-regulation to be effective in the realm of employment law, it must include an organized institutional voice for employees. In other words, there should be no self-regulation, and no self-regulatory privileges, without employee representation. These same mechanisms of regulated self-regulation and employee representation. coupled with an appropriately broad definition of employer liability, could also help to address the problem of widespread noncompliance with labor standards among the small contractors that supply labor to more visible and capable organizations. In short, existing developments within and among firms could and should be steered toward creating new mechanisms for collective employee participation in workplace governance

Are Unions a Constitutional Anomaly?

This term in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Ass’n, the Supreme Court will consider whether ordinary public employees may constitutionally be required to pay an “agency fee,” as a condition of employment, to the union that represents them in collective bargaining. The Court established the terms of engagement in the 2014 decision Harris v. Quinn, which struck down an agency fee on narrower grounds while describing the current doctrine approving agency fees, blessed many times by the Court itself, as an “anomaly.” This Article asks whether labor unions are themselves anomalies in our legal system, particularly in their constitutional entitlements. Its answer is a qualified and complicated “yes.” Unions are indeed distinct in our legal system—distinct even among private entities with public regulatory functions, which have frequently provoked constitutional controversy. On the one hand, unions are voluntary associations of workers with constitutional entitlements to freedom of expression and associational autonomy. On the other hand, unions are both regulated and regulatory actors within a statutory scheme that sets them far apart from other voluntary associations. They are subject to a sui generis constellation of rights, powers, restrictions, and duties—a quid pro quo that both constrains and empowers unions, and that is embodied in the paradigmatic case that is the central focus here, in the National Labor Relations Act, the Taft-Hartley Act, and the Landrum-Griffin Act. Whatever the wisdom of that quid pro quo— and it has been criticized from both ends of the political spectrum—it provides an essential context for adjudicating constitutional claims by and against unions. This Article calls for reframing those constitutional claims to include both the quid and the quo of labor law—not only the alleged burdens that the labor laws impose on unions or individuals, but also any logically linked benefits or powers it confers on the claimant. If the alleged burden is logically linked to some corresponding benefit or power, the latter may offset or justify the former, and lower the level of constitutional scrutiny required. Rigorous attention to both the additions to and subtractions from unions’ entitlements under the labor laws, along with a cautious approach to the threshold question of state action, is necessary to preserve the residual yet fundamental autonomy interests of unions. The proposed analysis recasts not only the agency fee controversy and the related puzzle posed by state “right-to-work” laws, but also recurring challenges to the constitutionality of restrictions on union expression and recent efforts to bring “worker centers” under the umbrella of labor law. At the same time, it offers clues to the future of unions and labor law if the Court continues down the path foreshadowed in Harris

What Should We Do after Work: Automation and Employment

Will advances in robotics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning put vast swaths of the labor force out of work or into fierce competition for the jobs that remain? Or, as in the past, will new jobs absorb workers displaced by automation? These hotly debated questions have profound implications for the fortress of rights and benefits that has been constructed on the foundation of the employment relationship. This Article charts a path for reforming that body of law in the face of justified anxiety and uncertainty about the future impact of automation on jobs