Although unions represent less than 7 percent of all private-sector workers today, President Barack Obama’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has aggressively pursued multiple initiatives to expand the reach of the NLRB to all private-sector corporations—without regard to the presence or absence of unions. Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) grants employees broad rights to discuss wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment not only with each other but also with the public at large. The rights apply even if no union is organizing or representing employees.
One current NLRB initiative piggybacks on the massive expansion in the use of online “social media” by employees, including the growth of Facebook, Twitter, and other online venues allowing employees to communicate both at work and outside the workplace. Less than six months after publishing his first report on social media issues in August 2011, the NLRB’s acting general counsel issued his second report on January 24, 2012, outlining 14 cases in which he interprets both the language of social media policies and specific disciplinary situations. He finds many statutory violations that might surprise even labor lawyers who have practiced for decades.
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