After the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) ruling in 2015 that temporary workers are “joint employees” of both their staffing agency and the company where they work, employers feared that the next step would be to include such joint employees automatically in workplace bargaining units during unionization proceedings.
As the National Law Review notes on its website, that shoe has now dropped.
Previously, employers and staffing agencies had veto rights over allowing temporary workers to be included in bargaining units, but the NLRB on July 11 — in its Miller & Anderson Inc. decision — ruled that joint employees are to be included in the workforce for bargaining and organizing purposes.
The decision actually represents a return to the standard employed by the NLRB under Bill Clinton. The George W. Bush board then restored employer/agency veto rights. Now it’s come full circle.