Democrats begin the process of adopting the administration’s national goals. It took good old-fashioned political politics, but earlier this week the US House of Representatives approved a $ 3.5 trillion budget resolution that will kick off the process of reconciliation in the US Senate and House. . Democrats intend to use this filibuster-proof process to enact provisions of the US Jobs Plan and the US Plan for the Families of President Joe Biden. These provisions could include paid family and medical leave, increased penalties for employers who violate federal labor laws, and legal permanent status for dreamers and beneficiaries of temporary protective status.

House Democrats hope to have this legislative package drafted by the end of September and vote on it soon after. This timeline roughly coincides with a pledge to vote in the House on the bipartisan “hard” infrastructure bill (funding construction of things like roads and bridges) that was passed by the Senate earlier in. August 2021. Of course, in Congress, you need two (rooms) for tango. So even if the reconciliation bill reaches the House, it still has to be passed by the Senate, where Senator Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) has already indicated that she is not in favor of the bill, or at least at its $ 3.5 trillion price tag. Stay tuned.

NLRB: Changes to come. Today, August 27, 2021, is the last day of the mandate of William Emanuel, member of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). David Prouty, who has already been confirmed by the US Senate to replace Emanuel, is expected to be sworn in shortly. At that point, Democrats (President Lauren McFerran and Members Gwynne Wilcox and Prouty) will outnumber Republicans (Members John Ring and Marvin Kaplan) and thus overthrow the majority on the board. Employers can therefore expect the Commission’s political pendulum to start to shift this fall.

Deadline for submitting salary and hour proposals. Comment periods for two of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) wage and hour regulatory proposals ended this week.

• First, August 23, 2021 was the deadline for submitting comments in response to the DOL’s proposal to codify in its regulations the so-called “80/20” rule for tip employees. Among those who filed comments was the S. Chamber of Commerce, which encouraged the DOL to withdraw the proposal because it “inappropriately gutted the [Fair Labor Standards Act] the tip credit as prescribed by Congress would increase compliance costs for employers by making the tip credit almost impossible to administer, and could potentially result in lower take-home pay for employees in tipping occupations.

• Second, August 23, 2021 was also the deadline for interested stakeholders to submit comments in response to the DOL’s regulatory proposal implementing the Presidential Decree requiring a minimum wage increase for certain employees of federal contractors.

The next step in the process for both proposals (after a shutdown at the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs) is finalization, but there is no indication of when that might happen for either. proposal.

Will the SEC Require Employers to Disclose HR Information? The Buzz doesn’t often talk about the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), but a recent development has caught our attention. SEC Chairman Gary Gensler tweeted that he had asked his staff “to come up with recommendations for consideration by the Commission on Human Capital Disclosure.” In a subsequent tweet, he said the recommendations “could include a number of measures, such as workforce turnover, skills and development training, compensation, benefits, demographics of the workforce. the workforce, including diversity, and health and safety “. Gensler’s statements appear to align with the SEC’s entry into the spring regulatory agenda to propose a human capital management disclosure rule in October 2021 “to improve filer disclosures regarding human capital management.” .

USCIS will define “public charge”. On August 23, 2021, US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) published an Advance Notice of Proposed Regulatory Proposal (ANPRM) “to obtain broad public feedback on the grounds of public office inadmissibility that will inform its development. of a future regulatory proposal ”. Specifically, and in anticipation of future regulation, the proposal invites comments on the data and factors that USCIS should use to define the term “public office” as used in prohibition determinations. of territory. Comments are due by October 22, 2021.

Franklin State. Two hundred and thirty-seven years ago this week, the State of Franklin was born. In August 1784, the state of North Carolina ceded parts of its western territory to the United States Congress in order to reduce the large debt North Carolina incurred during the War of Independence. But when Congress hesitated to accept the surrender, North Carolina rescinded the offer, leaving its western territory rather undesirable. As a result, on August 23, 1784, four counties located in western North Carolina (all now located in Tennessee) declared their independence as the state of Frankland.

Although seven states voted to approve Frankland’s petition to become the 14th state, it was less than the two-thirds majority needed to add states in accordance with the Articles of Confederation. The citizens of Frankland then changed the name of their region to “Franklin” to gain the favor of Benjamin Franklin, in the hope that the association would benefit their cause of state. (It was not.) For about four years thereafter, Franklin existed as an independent state; it had its own constitution, made treaties with Native American tribes in the region, and established barter as an economic system. Eventually, border hostilities brought Franklin back to North Carolina for protection. While its state bet failed, Franklin State played an important role in the country’s expansion and the admission of states into the Union. With the Franklin situation in mind, when drafting the Constitution of the United States a few years later, the drafters included Article 4, Section 3, sometimes referred to as the “admission clause,” which states that “No new state should be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state.