Running head: ESSAY - WEEK 3
Essay - Week 3
Hans Arcand
Southwestern College of Professional Studies
BSAD 340
Legal Environment of Business
Doug McNett
September 8, 2013
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Essay - Week 3
Fair Labor Standards Act
The Fair Labor Standards Act, or FLSA, was an act that was passed by Congress in 1938 to set a few American standards on ethical business practices. This Act set a national minimum wage, in which any employer that dealt with interstate commerce must abide. This Act also set up child labor laws to protect children from oppressive work environments, as well as set rules on the amount of hours worked and the type of work that could be done. The FLSA also set up overtime provisions for non-managerial employees as 1.5 their respective base wage, but set exemptions for certain types of employees, such as salespersons and computer programmers
(Miller & Jentz, 2012, p. 626). The Act allows employers to voluntarily pay the employees minimum wage, but do not require it by federal law. Christopher vs SmithKline Beecham Corp is a great example of the explicit definition of “outside salesman” and how it is used to exempt certain personnel from federally-mandated overtime wages. In this case, two workers alleged that their employer, SmithKline Beecham Corp., denied their requests for overtime regardless of the
50-60 hour work weeks (Vicini, 2012). The employees thought they deserved overtime based on their positions in the company but the Supreme Court rules that they were “outside sales”, thus not entitled to mandatory overtime benefits
National Labor Relations Act
The National Labor Relations Act set standards for allowing workers to collectively bargain and unionize to convey their messages to their employers. This Act protected the rights of workers to come together and peacefully rally in support of protesting demonstrations to convey workers needs and desires to their employers; furthermore, it protected the protestors from being penalized for being part of a union and peacefully protesting. The National Labor

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Relations Board has just ruled that employers must notify their employees of their right to collectively bargain and unionize. This notice must be put on all signs that outline personnel rights and responsibilities (Armour, 2011).
Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act
The Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act is basically an outline for regulating the internal business practices of the unions (Miller & Jentz, 2012, p. 643). This Act regulates official elections, as well as election intervals and personnel requirements to hold office in a union organization. The point of this Act is to ensure fair practice among Union-employee relationships and to uphold the main reason for Unions coming about. There is no requirement by the employee or the employer; this Act is solely to regulate the actions of the Unions and their internal business practices. In the news, a story of Labor Secretary Hilda Solis’s resignation has come about after multiple LMRDA violations. 92% of the Union organizations that were audited had committed offenses against labor practices (Sherk & Takala, 2013). This was furthered by the 62% of the organizations committing criminal acts. To top it off, under the current administration, these audits have been cut back by 40% over the past few years; this seems quite contrary to appropriate actions needed from the audit results.
Federal Social Security Act
The Federal Social Security Act grants income security to old-aged, retired and disabled people. The unique property of this Act is that it requires the employee and employer to contribute to the Federal Insurance Contributions Act, or FICA, to partly offset a retired worker’s wages (Miller & Jentz, 2012, p. 632). The Social Security Administration takes the annual contributions and divvies them out to applicable individuals. The era of income security is quickly coming to an end with funds evaporating faster than they are being replenished. An

ESSAY - WEEK 3 4 article states that the fund should be depleted by approximately 2033, 3 years earlier than last years prediction; in addition, the disability benefits could be depleted as early as 2016!
(Kurtzleben, 2012) This mismanagement of funds demands an answer and should be investigated immediately. We the people, are paying into this fraudulent program by federally-mandated law and if we receive nothing in return, we have been deceived by our own government.

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References
Armour, S. (2011, August 25). Employers Must Tell Workers of Rights to Unionize, NLRB
Says. Bloomberg . http://dx.doi.org/http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-
25/employers-must-tell-workers-of-right-to-unionize-nlrb-says-2-.html
Kurtzleben, D. (2012, April 23). Social Security: Time to Panic? No. Time to Act? Yes. US
News . http://dx.doi.org/http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/04/23/social-securitytime-to-panic-no-time-to-act-yes
Miller, R. L., & Jentz, G. A. (2012). Business Law Today (9th ed.). http://dx.doi.org/https://learn.sckans.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=
_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%
26id%3D_7526_1%26url%3D
Sherk, J., & Takala, R. (2013, January 29). Time for More Accountability for Unions—and the
Department of Labor. The Foundry . http://dx.doi.org/http://blog.heritage.org/2013/01/29/time-for-more-accountability-forunions-and-the-department-of-labor/
Vicini, J. (2012, April 16). Supreme Court hears Glaxo overtime pay case. Chicago Tribune . http://dx.doi.org/http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-04-16/news/sns-rt-us-glaxoovertime-salesbre83f0zt-20120416_1_sales-representatives-overtime-requirementsfederal-overtime