“Only two of the estimated 232,000 class members claimed the coupons” in a class action led by Edelson McGuire LLP. Defendant Dick’s Sporting Goods “agreed not to oppose the plaintiff’s request for $210,000 in attorney fees and costs and a $3,500 incentive award,” but an Orange County, Calif. judge took away a large chunk of that sum because… why? Because some of the lawyers angling for it had not been admitted to practice in California, that’s why. [Kenneth Ofgang, Metropolitan News-Enterprise; Golba v. Dick’s Sporting Goods, unpublished]
Posts Tagged ‘California’
Labor roundup
- “6 charts that debunk the ‘gig’ economy” [R.J. Lehmann, R Street Institute]
- DOL memo: as far as we’re concerned most of those independent contractors you’re paying are actually employees, see you in court [Shar Bahmani, Squire Patton Boggs; Daniel Schwartz] “Is Your Company On The Independent Contractor Hit List?” [Richard Reibstein, Forbes]
- One big if unstated aim of Obama overtime regs: with more people punching clocks at work, there’ll be fewer with the politically unproductive “management mentality” of salaried types [earlier; related, Coyote]
- Comply with DoL’s new mandate for government contractors to disclose labor law violations, and walk right into a defamation suit [Jason Carey and Brandon Myers, Covington & Burling] “House GOP leaders call for withdrawal of ‘blacklisting rule'” [The Hill]
- Some unionists rally behind Philly ironworkers boss convicted in huge arson/extortion scheme [Philadelphia Daily News, more, earlier]
- SEIU pushing California bill to tie franchisors’ hands in dealings with franchisees, and no its goal isn’t to help the franchisees [Labor Pains]
- “Is the NLRB Planning an End Run Around the State Right to Work Laws?” [Irving Geslewitz, Much Shelist]
July 22 roundup
- Can Uber survive California law? [Brian Doherty on ruling by state administrative law judge over shortcomings in accessibility; Kristian Stout/Truth on the Market on employee classification and compensation class action] The California Labor Commission’s worker-classification ruling has already killed cleaning-services startup Homejoy [Re/Code via @andrewmgrossman] Plus: Uber communicates satirically with its NYC customers in its battle with Mayor Bill de Blasio [Issie Lapowsky, Wired; related, Josh Greenman; and a new study of Los Angeles users finds Uber X twice as fast and half as expensive as taxis (Mark Kleiman)]
- Needed: RFRA for the prepared-foods aisle? “The Trans-Fat Ban Deals A Blow To Kosher Keepers” [Bethany Mandel, Federalist] Consumption of trans fats has already dropped by 85 percent, and “government doesn’t always know best” [me, Arizona PBS]
- “The U.S. Attorney’s Office might has well have a macro that generates gag orders” [Ken at Popehat on Reason subpoena, earlier here, etc.]
- SCOTUS struck down Ohio’s law banning false campaign speech, Massachusetts’s should fall next [Ilya Shapiro and Gabriel Latner, Cato]
- Roger Pilon on church, gays, and “simple idea that people are free to associate or not as they wish” [now un-gated, Cato/WSJ; related, Ilya Shapiro/Washington Times] More on EEOC’s ENDA-by-fiat attempt [Kent Hoover/Business Journals, Nicandro Iannacci, National Constitution Center/Yahoo (thanks for quoting in both cases); Laura Maechtlen and Sam Schwartz-Fenwick, Seyfarth Shaw; and a Washington Blade interview with EEOC member Chai Feldblum, who supported the ruling]
- More reactions to HUD’s ambitious local-neighborhood-diversity scheme, “Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing” [Hans Bader, Michael Barone, earlier]
- “Star Of Viral Catcalling Video Is Reportedly Suing For Compensation” [Emma Whitford, Gothamist]
Restaurant found 55 percent responsible, actual attackers 45 percent
Adventures in negligent security: “A Southern California jury awarded $40 million to the parents of a man who was stabbed to death in a TGI Friday’s restaurant. The panel found [last month] that the restaurant’s operator was 55 percent responsible for the January 2009 death at a TGI Friday’s in Riverside.” The attackers, who “pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon” and were sentenced to three and four years in prison respectively, “were found to be 45 percent responsible.” [Orange County Register]
Labor roundup
- As intended: union win rate rises sharply under new ambush election rule [Adam Abrahms/Epstein Becker Green, Tim McConville/National Law Review, earlier] Effect on management’s rights of speech [W$J]
- Transparency in public labor agreements is partisan issue in Pennsylvania [Charles Thompson, Harrisburg Patriot-News]
- California agricultural labor board is anything but neutral on United Farm Workers [Katy Grimes, Flash Report via Daily Caller]
- On fast food unionization, it’s just Department of Labor and SEIU, sitting in a tree [Labor Union Report; related, Josh Eidelson/Business Week]
- GOP funding riders would block “activist” NLRB from enforcing slew of new rules [The Hill]
- Depoliticizing the NLRB through administrative steps [Samuel Estreicher, Emory Law Journal via Workplace Prof]
- “In a World Where Talking to Yourself May Now Qualify as ‘Concerted’ Activity…” [Alison Loomis, Seyfarth Shaw]
California lawmakers move against arbitration
By cutting off contractual freedom for pre-dispute arbitration agreements in the workplace, trial lawyers and unions in California intend to pave the way for more and bigger class actions [Dave Roberts, Fox and Hounds] More: Coyote (“Here is how you should think about this proposed law: Attorneys are the taxi cartels, and arbitration is Uber. And the incumbents want their competitor banned.”)
Update: Gov. Jerry Brown vetoes the anti-arbitration bill.
California regulators: Uber driver is employee
And there goes the Uber business model, if the ruling is upheld and extends to other drivers. Coyote predicts that if subject to the burdens now heaped on employers, ride-sharing services will have a hard time of it.
Or, to put it differently: yes, the authorities are prepared to kill any and all innovations that threaten their New Deal fantasy of perfect control. More: Matthew Feeney, Cato; Megan McArdle (“‘Employee’ Label Would End Uber as We Know It”); Timothy Lee [slightly edited Wednesday to reflect clarification in news reports]
Orange County lowers the boom on Axe
“Recently, the consumer protection unit of the Orange County (CA) District Attorney’s Office filed suit against Unilever, parent company of AXE, accusing the company of fudging the packaging of its male grooming products.” The charges, which were filed concomitantly with a proposed settlement the same day, do not claim that Axe misstated the quantity of product contained by weight, but say its packaging employed “false bottoms, false sidewalls, false lids or false coverings” which “serve no legitimate purpose and mislead consumers as to the amount of product contained in the containers. …Apparently, the DA has never purchased a bag of potato chips.” It is unclear from the coverage whether Orange County consumers were constrained from ascertaining how much product was in one of the packages by, say, lifting it to see how heavy it was, or looking at the number of ounces on the label. In settlement (the same day) of the charges, the company agreed to pay $750,000 to Orange County and $24,000 to its D.A.’s office, and to take out ads in various California newspapers with $3 coupons good off a consumer purchase of Axe. [Nick Farr, Abnormal Use; Orange County Register]
The Orange County district attorney’s office under Tony Rackauckas is emerging as an Overlawyered favorite, having knocked an impressive $16 million out of Toyota in the sudden-acceleration affair even though the cars in question do not suddenly accelerate, of which $4 million went to a locally influential tort attorney; the office has also kept mum about arrangements it has with tort attorneys. And of course Rackauckas’s office has lately been embroiled in one of the nation’s most prominent scandals of prosecutorial abuse (with retaliation angle).
P.S. Oh, and here is coverage of “slack fill” class action suits organized by private lawyers against both Unilever/Axe and competitor Procter & Gamble, confirming that this wasn’t exactly a solitary frolic on the county’s part. More: Amy Alkon.
“Legal profession admits undocumented immigrants”
At least in New York and California, if not every state. [John Steele, Legal Ethics Forum] Curiously uncontroversial, no? In 2012 we noted: “Among the trip-ups are that lawyers are sworn by oath to uphold the laws of the land; that federal law bars the granting of state professional licenses to illegals; that federal law makes it unlawful to offer employment to them; and that clients might find themselves in a pickle were their attorneys whisked away on zero notice to face deporation.” More: Scott Greenfield.
Environment roundup
- Coming this Thursday, June 11: Cato conference marks tenth anniversary of eminent domain/property rights case Kelo v. New London, with Ilya Somin, author of new book The Grasping Hand [register or watch online, David Lat interview and more on Somin’s book here, here (with link to full post series at end)]
- EPA spent tax money on social media campaign to generate public comments supporting its planned regs [Eric Lipton and Coral Davenport/New York Times (“The Obama administration is the first to give the E.P.A. a mandate to create broad public outreach campaigns, using the tactics of elections, in support of federal environmental regulations before they are final,” despite series of DoJ opinions deeming similar efforts unlawful), Nicole Kaeding/Cato, D.C. Examiner] Agency has used its Clean Water Act authority to grab power “over just about any creek, pond, prairie pothole or muddy farm field that EPA says has a ‘significant nexus’ to a navigable waterway.”[WSJ/Kitsap Alliance, also M. Reed Hopper/Todd Gaziano background; Karen Bennett and John Henson, Federalist Society “Engage” on federalism angle]
- Advances against Ebola, cancer, blindness: “Animal Testing and Its Gifts To Humans” [Frankie Trull, WSJ/Emory Yerkes Primate Center]
- “Tax Increment Financing Is The New Urban Renewal” [Scott Beyer]
- Cato files amicus brief supporting property owners who say restrictions on prairie dog habitat exceed Congress’s powers under Interstate Commerce Clause [Trevor Burrus and Roger Pilon, Cato]
- Former hunt saboteur and director of the League Against Cruel Sports: U.K.’s “ban on hunting with dogs has done nothing for animal welfare and should be repealed.” [Jim Barrington, Our Kingdom]
- Drought forced Australia to develop a sophisticated water market. When will California learn? [David Henderson]