The National Labor Relations Board’s decision to consider McDonald’s a joint employer of its franchisees’ workers was top of mind this month as several hundred gathered for the annual International Franchise Association’s Public Affairs conference in Washington, D.C.
“This joint employee-employer thing, if that goes through, that’s a hand grenade in the middle of the [franchising] business model,” said Bill Bass, a franchisee who owns Two Men and a Truck and BrightStar Care locations.
“It would completely change everything about the franchising model, to the point where we probably wouldn’t be in franchising.” – Read more about this issue in Entrepreneur
Although this has been widely reported as an NLRB “decision”, the joint-employer status was voiced as a possibility in a memo to McDonald’s urging it to resolve certain labor disputes without NLRB involvement.
In related franchise news, U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell introduced a bill this month to reform the National Labor Relations Board. Alexander said the legislation aims to make the NLRB “an umpire rather than an advocate” in labor disputes.
– Read more in the Nashville Business Journal