- Study: doctors who use more resources are less likely to face malpractice claims [British Medical Journal]
- “Obesity is not in fact a public health problem. It may be a widespread health problem, but you can’t catch obesity from doorknobs or molecules in the air. [David Boaz, Cato]
- Contingency-fee law enforcement creates bad incentives, part MCXXXVI, health outlay recoupment division [W$J on Medicare auditors]
- Welcome to Canada, skilled one, unless your spouse is ill. What that says about the welfare state [Bryan Caplan]
- “Jury awards $16.7 million in swine flu death of pregnant Puyallup mother” [Tacoma News-Tribune]
- Doc convicted of murder after patient overdoses: “Some experts worried that a conviction would have a chilling effect on worried doctors and keep powerful painkillers from patients who need them.” [L.A. Times via Jacob Sullum]
Posts Tagged ‘immigration law’
Labor and employment roundup
- “May employer fire employees for defending themselves (or others) against violent customers?” Dissenting Judge Lee has better view in Utah case [Eugene Volokh]
- “You have to ignore many variables to think women are paid less than men. California is happy to try.” [Sarah Ketterer, WSJ]
- U.S. Department of Labor has agreements with eleven countries to teach immigrant workers about U.S. labor laws “prior to and after their arrival” [Sean Higgins, Washington Examiner]
- “Why is Harrisburg paying a police officer who hasn’t shown up for work in 25 years?” [PennLive] Cf. Former Nashville cop says he “didn’t really want to” go on disability pension 27 years ago, “but it was either that or get fired” [Nashville City Paper back in 2010]
- “A White House forum for your whiny employees? Yup, this is a real thing, and you should pay attention.” [Jon Hyman]
- Minneapolis charity canvassers: “The Wobblies just won a big independent contractor case at the NLRB” [Politico “Morning Shift”, Jon Hyman]
- On widely reported decline in labor share of U.S. income, mind this little-reported asterisk [David Henderson, Timothy Taylor]
Discrimination law roundup
- Another web accessibility settlement from the U.S. Department of Justice, this time Carnival cruise lines [Minh Vu and Paul H. Kehoe, Seyfarth Shaw, my warnings on legally prescribed web accessibility]
- A topic I’ve often discussed: “Has The ADA Broken Its Economic Promises To People With Disabilities?” [Amelia Thomson-Deveaux, Five Thirty-Eight]
- Nebraska meat-packer tried too hard to hire only legal workers, will now pay dearly for asking for too many documents [Department of Justice press release]
- Owing to discrimination, a Colorado couple had to drive a few extra miles to get a cake, and fly 2000 extra miles to get a marriage license. So guess who’s now in legal trouble for inconveniencing them [Jacob Sullum, New York Post] Sen. Ted Cruz sounds as if he might be skeptical of religious discrimination laws as applied to public accommodation, and down that path might be found libertarian wisdom [Scott Shackford, Reason]
- EEOC says University of Denver Law School must pay its female faculty more [Denver Post, TaxProf]
- “Court Rejects The EEOC’s Novel Attempt To Impose Disparate Treatment Liability Without Any Injury” [Seyfarth Shaw; EEOC v. AutoZone, N.D. Ill.]
- Because more coercion is always the answer: France considers ban on “discrimination” against poor [Frances Ryan, The Guardian]
August 19 roundup
- “Photos of Your Meal Could be Copyright Infringement in Germany” [Petapixel]
- National Labor Relations Board opts to dodge a fight with college football [Daniel Fisher, Forbes]
- Governor’s commission charged with recommending new redistricting system in Maryland includes possibly recognizable name [Washington Post, Southern Maryland Newspapers; thanks to Jen Fifield for nice profile at Frederick News-Post]
- Trial bar’s assault on arbitration falls short: California Supreme Court won’t overturn auto dealers’ standard arbitration clause [Cal Biz Lit]
- Ontario lawyer on trial after prosecutors say sting operation revealed willingness to draft false refugee application [Windsor Star, more]
- “Vaping shops say FDA regulation could put them out of business” [L.A. Times, The Hill] Meanwhile: “e-cigarettes safer than smoking, says Public Health England” [Guardian]
- I was honored to be a panelist last month in NYC at the 15th annual Michael R. Diehl Civil Rights Forum, sponsored by the law firm of Fried, Frank, alongside Prof. Marci Hamilton (Cardozo) and Rose Saxe (ACLU) discussing the intersection of religious accommodation and gay rights [Fried, Frank] Also related to that very current topic, the Southern California Law Review has a symposium on “Religious Accommodation in the Age of Civil Rights” [Paul Horwitz, PrawfsBlawg]
August 12 roundup
- “‘Game Of Thrones’ Fan Demands Trial By Combat” [Lowering the Bar]
- One way to lose your city job in NYC: “An administrative-law judge then agreed to his firing, noting [the deceased] didn’t show up at his hearing.” [New York Post]
- International Trade Commission asked to curb improper “imports,” i.e. transmissions, of data into the US, and yes, that could create quite a precedent [WSJ, R Street Institute, Niskanen Center, FreedomWorks letter] More: K. William Watson, Cato;
- Sixth Circuit panel explains in cement case why some towns (e.g. St. Marys) have no apostrophes, others do [St. Marys Cement v. EPA opinion via Institute for Justice “Short Circuit“]
- Proposed ban on export of some fine art from Germany stirs discontent [New York Times via Tyler Cowen]
- With its SEO budget already committed to “Oliver Wendell Holmes = doofus” keywords and the like, Volokh Conspiracy must rely on organic content to boost Brazilian apartment seeker clicks [David Kopel]
- But federal law forbids paying them, so the city won’t do that: “2 immigrants in U.S. illegally are named to Huntington Park commissions” [L.A. Times]
Crime and punishment roundup
- “Regulatory Crimes and the Mistake of Law Defense” [Paul Larkin, Heritage]
- Victims of sex offender registry laws, cont’d [Lenore Skenazy]
- James Forman, Jr.: case against mass incarceration can stand on its own without flawed Jim Crow analogy [Boston Review and N.Y.U. Law Review, 2011-12]
- “For-profit immigration jails, where the inmates — convicted of nothing — work for less than peanuts.” [@dangillmor on Los Angeles Times]
- “The New Science of Sentencing: Should prison sentences be based on crimes that haven’t been committed yet?” [Marshall Project on statistically derived risk assessments in sentencing]
- Group of 600 New England United Methodist churches issues resolution calling for an end to Drug War [Alex Tabarrok, who was also profiled the other day]
- Prison guard in Florida speaks up about witnessing abuse of inmate, and pays a price [disturbing content, Miami Herald]
You’re too attractive, that’s it. You’re an attractive nuisance
“Calais, France to sue Britain for being a magnet for migrants that are destroying Calais before they cross channel.” [Associated Press]
A battle plan against “regressive regulation”
In a new Cato white paper, Brink Lindsey considers the possibilities of assembling a political coalition aimed at trimming at least some kinds of excessive regulation [Arnold Kling, Coyote]:
Despite today’s polarized political atmosphere, it is possible to construct an ambitious and highly promising agenda of pro-growth policy reform that can command support across the ideological spectrum. Such an agenda would focus on policies whose primary effect is to inflate the incomes and wealth of the rich, the powerful, and the well-established by shielding them from market competition. A convenient label for these policies is “regressive regulation” — regulatory barriers to entry and competition that work to redistribute income and wealth up the socioeconomic scale. This paper identifies four major examples of regressive regulation: excessive monopoly privileges granted under copyright and patent law; restrictions on high-skilled immigration; protection of incumbent service providers under occupational licensing; and artificial scarcity created by land-use regulation.
“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.
Labor and employment roundup
- NLRB ruling: calling one’s boss “nasty m___f___” can be protected labor advocacy for which dismissal is unlawful [Pier Sixty LLC; Michael Schmidt, Cozen O’Connor, Jon Hyman]
- “Declining Desire to Work and Downward Trends in Unemployment and Participation” [Tyler Cowen]
- Public sector union negotiations need sunlight [Trey Kovacs, Workplace Choice]
- “Is Non-Pregnancy a BFOQ [Bona Fide Occupational Qualification] for Exotic Dancers?” [Philip K. Miles III, Lawffice Space]
- “EEOC Issues Long-Awaited Wellness Program Rules” [Daniel Schwartz]
- Following New York Times investigation, Gov. Andrew Cuomo cracks down on employment at nail salons, and that will hurt immigrant workers [Alex Nowrasteh, New York Post; Elizabeth Nolan Brown/Reason and more, New York Times “Room for Debate”]
- President Obama keeps promoting myths about Lilly Ledbetter case [Hans Bader, CEI; Glenn Kessler, Washington Post; earlier]