- Arbitrator: felonious Montgomery County, Maryland cops should keep disability pay [Examiner] “Cop who took naked photos of rape victim can keep pension” [NY Post] Cop who pepper-sprayed UC Davis protesters is still on job, and maybe that’s how they’d have it [Radley Balko]
- “Billions in retroactive liability” in pharma detailer wage/hour action before SCOTUS [Marcia Coyle, NLJ] And USA Today chose a faulty “worker discontent” theme on wage/hour case, since as class actions these suits are lawyer-driven;
- Australia: “Worker injured during sex gets compensation payout” [News.com.au]
- “Courts are finally starting to apply ADAAA—and it ain’t pretty” [Jon Hyman] ADA: “Judge Rules In Favor of Fired Employee With Bipolar Disorder” [ABC]
- NLRB goes after Hyatt on employee handbook language [Gary Shapiro, Examiner] Union claims Indiana right-to-work law violates Thirteenth Amendment ban on slavery [James Sherk, NRO]
- EEOC: sex discrimination law bars bias against transgender employees [AP, Hyman] “EEOC Obtains Substantial Settlement in Obesity Discrimination Suit” [Disabilities Law]
- Law journal prediction: adherents of racism will claim Title VII protection [Lawrence D. Rosenthal, Temple L. Rev. via Workplace Prof]
Posts Tagged ‘obesity’
Debunking the “food desert” myth
No, this isn’t the first time the fashionable, First-Lady-approved theory has been debunked — see posts here, here, and here — but it’s gratifying to see the NYT’s formidable Gina Kolata get front-page space for a thorough treatment. One study found poor neighborhoods “had nearly twice as many supermarkets and large-scale grocers per square mile” as wealthier ones; another “found no relationship between what type of food students said they ate, what they weighed, and the type of food within a mile and a half of their homes.” [Tyler Cowen, Jacob Sullum] And Katherine Mangu-Ward notes the juxtaposition of Kolata’s piece with an opinion piece in the paper the very same day: “Food Deserts Are Not Real. Also, We Can Fix Them.”
Judge tosses Happy Meal lawsuit
Bloomberg: no food donations to homeless shelters
“[Glenn] Richter has been collecting food from places like the Ohav Zedek synagogue and bringing it to homeless shelters for more than 20 years, but recently his donation, including a ‘cholent‘ or carrot stew, was turned away because the Bloomberg administration wants to monitor the salt, fat and fiber eaten by the homeless. … Richter said that over the years he’s delivered more than two tons of food to the homeless.” The NYC mayor says he’s not planning to reconsider the recently adopted policy. [CBS-NY] Earlier here (Connecticut), here (N.J.: “retail food establishment”), here, etc.
Using federal bucks to lobby for food nannyism
Secretary Kathleen Sebelius offers no apologies for what might seem a disturbing breach of the principle that taxpayer funds should not go to lobbying [Caroline May, Daily Caller] Earlier on the oughta-be-controversial federal food-policy grant program here, here, etc. More: Abby Schachter on CDC’s Thomas Frieden [NY Post].
March 12 roundup
- How ObamaCare will drive up cost of contraception [Avik Roy] Better idea: sell Pill over the counter [Virginia Postrel, Bloomberg]
- Had been seized by authorities: obese 9-year-old returns home after dropping 50 pounds [Cleveland Plain Dealer, earlier]
- Best campaign funding mechanism ever? [Ron Paul Forums, JPG, more explanation; but is it lawful?]
- More appreciations of Bill Stuntz crimlaw book [Leon Neyfakh, Boston Globe, Stephen Smith and Jonathan Jacobs, Liberty and Law]
- Changes in court rules could curb Philadelphia’s allure for mass tort forum-shoppers [Alison Frankel, Reuters] “Further Empirical Evidence on Forum Shopping in Philadelphia Civil Courts” [Josh Wright, earlier]
- Coming: federal authority over private firms’ IT-security departments? [Jim Harper/Cato; Constantine von Hoffman/CIO]
- “0.1% claim rate in ‘successful’ class action” [Ted Frank/PoL, AT&T case]
Kids’ food-ad regulations and the FTC
In the face of substantial Congressional opposition (although an earlier Congress had helped push for the idea in the first place) the Federal Trade Commission may be easing off its zeal for tougher federal oversight of cereal ads and the like. [Glenn Lammi, Washington Legal Foundation]
Sacramento’s Bad Humor Man
Assemblyman William Monning (D-Carmel) wants to ban food trucks from parking anywhere near where schoolkids might be; under legislation he has proposed, they would need to keep even farther away from schools than medical marijuana dispensaries. Since schools dot the urban scene, a side effect would be to seriously curtail adult access to the trucks, which serve a large population of working adults and have lately found new popularity among foodies. [L.A. Times via Heather Mac Donald, Secular Right, earlier]
Sugar: the moral equivalent of war
At the New York Times, Mark Bittman has proved a durable source of entertainment twice over, first as a purveyor of recipes with a high hit rate of being worth trying, and more recently with a laughably paternalistic opinion column. [David Boaz/Cato, Damon Root/Reason, earlier]
C.S. Lewis and the food police
“It may be better to live under robber barons,” wrote the British author, “than under omnipotent moral busybodies.” [Barton Hinkle, Richmond Times-Dispatch] The federal government is preparing new rules restricting snack foods available through local schools, “which could include banning the candy sold for school fund-raisers,” notwithstanding a recent study finding no link between vending machine availability and child obesity [New York Times] And a blog supporter of bans on birthday cupcakes and soda machines in schools responds to her critics [Bettina Elias Siegel, “The Lunch Tray” and more]
P.S. And thanks to Pete Warden in comments for the relevant George Orwell quote.