We’ve been looking at the principal presidential candidates so far by means of humorous YouTube clips.  Let’s get serious now.  What does each candidate mean for human resources and employment law–for the workplace?

That’s an important question.  The answer affects almost everyone, because almost everyone is an employer or  an employee.  And think about this.  What was the last piece of major labor or employment legislation to be enacted?  I’m pretty sure it was the Family and Medical Leave Act, circa 1993.  Depending on who is elected President in the ‘08 election and what the makeup of Congress is, we could be in store for what some might call “catching up” and others might call “overkill.”   It’s easy to believe that one of the first acts of the new President would be something to do with the workplace.  If nothing else, a 16 year drought of anything all that significant in terms of employment law changes increases the odds of something big in the early part of the next administration.

It’s difficult to know for sure, of course, what it would mean for the labor and employment arena if one candidate or the other is elected, but it’s worth trying to take an educated guess, which is exactly what I’m going to do.

At first, I contemplated doing a post for each candidate with predictions about what his/her administration would mean for the workplace.  Since the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary are so close and since it might be more efficient to have this guesswork in one place, I decided to do a post on all the major candidates.  Yikes!  

I’ll try to be succinct with my thoughts and opinions about each candidate, but this post will necessarily be longer than usual.

My summary by no means includes the candidates’ views on all labor and employment issues.  I couldn’t possibly accomplish that, but then, no one could possibly accomplish that.  Some of the candidates’ views–or alleged views–you already know.  Some of what I say in this post may give you new–or different–insight into their views.  In this post, I will occasionally consider a candidate’s point of view on an issue not directly related to labor and employment but which seems to provide guidance on his/her leanings that could have applicability to workplace issues.  Here goes.

Clinton–She will do all she can to raise the minimum wage.  She has been vocal about this, and as a senator, she introduced a plan to tie the minimum wage to Congressional pay raises.

Clinton supports adding sexual orientation to employment discrimination laws, thus making discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in any aspect of employment illegal.

Clinton is an original sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act, which would, according to her, ”create an atmosphere where workers can choose to form a union free from coercion and bargain collectively.”  It’s more accurate, in my opinion, to say that the proposed Act would dramatically change the way unions can organize workers.  Among other things, the Act would eliminate the secret ballot in union elections.  Union representation would no longer be decided by a private vote of employees but through the collection of union authorization cards signed by employees expressing their desire for a union to represent them.  Thus, the traditional union organization campaign would be quite different.  Indeed, without a secret ballot, it seems reasonable to believe that employees would be subject to considerable coercion, pressure and outright intimidation from both sides.  If a union is certified as bargaining agent for a unit of employees, the employer and the union would have to reach agreement on their first collective bargaining agreement within 90 days.  If not achieved, the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service would be called in to mediate.  If this effort is unsuccessful after 30 days, then the matter would be referred to a panel of arbitrators to decide the terms of the new collective bargaining agreement for the employer, the union and the employees, and the agreement would last for at least two years.  Finally, the proposed Act would implement stiff penalties for violations of the National Labor Relations Act committed by employers during a union organizing campaign.  There would be no similar penalties for unions.  While I come at this from an employer or management perspective, I don’t think anyone could disagree with the assessment that the enactment of this Act would be a big deal.

Clinton has made it clear that she would appoint to the Department of Labor and the National Labor Relations Board individuals who are pro-labor.

Clinton wants to expand the coverage of the Family and Medical Leave Act by lowering the number of employees an employer must have to be covered by the FMLA from 50 to 25.  She has endorsed a plan that would result in paid family leave funded by both the state and federal governments.  In addition, she has expressed support for using unemployment insurance to provide paid paternity and maternity leave.  She is a co-sponsor of the Healthy Families Act, which would guarantee sick leave of seven paid days off.

Clinton wants to establish a public-private partnership program on model workplaces at the Department of Labor to promote businesses that establish innovative workplace flexibility programs by providing federal grants to those businesses.

It’s difficult to know exactly where Clinton stands on immigration, although it’s doubtful she would start deporting illegal workers.

Despite her previous efforts with universal healthcare insurance, she has toned down her rhetoric on this.  However, she surely would support government-funded, if not employer-funded, healthcare insurance for all employees in her perfect world.

Edwards–He has spoken out perhaps more strongly than any other candidate in support of labor unions.  He is a supporter of the Employee Free Choice Act (as described above) and regularly advocates for the need to make it easier for employees to join unions.  He wants to ban the hiring of replacement workers for striking employees and ban the firing of striking employees.  He’s a member of the pro-labor American Rights at Work and was given the highest possible rating by the AFL-CIO.  He was also given the AFL-CIO’s 2007 Paul Wellstone award, recognizing him as a champion of workers’ rights and social and economic justice.  His campaign says that Edwards “has helped 23 national unions organize thousands of workers all across the country,” participated in more than 170 labor events, and has regularly walked picket lines.

Edwards supports an amendment to federal law making it unlawful to discriminate against applicants or employees on the basis of sexual orientation.

Edward is a strong proponent of increasing the present minimum wage to $7.50 per hour.  He also urges stronger legal protection for employees to ensure that they are paid properly for overtime worked.

Edwards wants to change the law to make the treatment of executive pensions and the pensions of other employees the same in all respects.  He argues for eliminating tax cuts for companies that send jobs overseas and for creating tax breaks for companies that keep jobs in the U.S.

Edwards’ stance on immigration is evolving as is the case with other candidates, but given his penchant to support the rights of workers, he would be inclined to find a way to allow illegal workers to stay in the U.S.

Edwards’ healthcare pronouncements are as muddled as those of other candidates.  However, his general approach to social issues makes it likely that he would support some kind of government- or employer-funded health insurance for all employees.

Giuliani–While not openly supporting the inclusion of sexual orientation as a protected class under federal law and while opposing gay marriage, he does support the concept of a legal partnership for homosexual couples.  Therefore,  he’s unlikely to be an obstacle to an amendment that makes sexual orientation discrimination unlawful.

When Giuliani announced his candidacy for President, one of the New York firefighter unions immediately came out against him.  However, he has received support from individual firefighters in New York.  He has a somewhat mixed record on unions.   Although he’s generally supportive of unions, he’s against any law that would compel membership in any kind of union.  Thus, he has expressed opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act, because he believes that it’s misnamed and that it’s enactment would, in fact, help to eliminate free choice on the part of employees.

When Giuliani was Mayor of New York City, he cut the city government workforce by 20% and has promised to do the same thing with the federal workforce.  Although easier said than done, if it happened, there would be fewer employees to enforce government regulations, which would mean that government agencies dealing with the workplace would necessarily have to curtail some of its enforcement actions.

On healthcare, Giuliani has spoken in favor of helping individual families find and purchase insurance form private insurers and doesn’t appear to favor required employer-funded healthcare insurance.

As the campaign has gone on, Giuliani has become increasingly strident about illegal workers in the U.S. and would presumably try to take action that would not only stem the tide of illegal workers flowing into this country but might impose punitive measures on those already here.

Huckabee–He’s perhaps the only candidate that can be described as somewhat of a populist.  Thus, his stands on issues can be more nuanced than other candidates who describe themselves as conservatives.

Though a Republican, Huckabee can’t be described as anti-union in the sense that most Republican candidates are.  As far as I know, he hasn’t taken a position on the Employee Free Choice Act.  When he was Governor of Arkansas, he appointed and reappointed the former business manager of one of the locals of the Electrical Workers Union and a member of the executive board of the state AFL-CIO as the state Director of Labor.  He urges unions to do their part in combating excessive CEO compensation.

He has personally spoken out against excessive CEO compensation and has tied it and executive “golden parachute deals” to too much job exporting by American companies.  In one of the debates, he was direct about this when she said that one of the most important things “a President needs to do is make clear that we’re not going to continue to see jobs shipped overseas, jobs that are lost by American workers, many in their fifties who for twenty and thirty years have worked to make a company rich, and then watch as the CEO takes $100 million bonus to jettison those American jobs somewhere else.  And the worker not only loses his job, but he loses his pension.  That’s criminal.  It’s wrong.”

Huckabee supported raising the minimum wage in Arkansas from $5.15 to $6.25 per hour but said he did this “as a safeguard against a proposed constitutional amendment that would have increased the minimum wage yearly for inflation.”

Huckabee has also complained that international competitors with American businesses are allowed to get away with lower wage structures and safety standards, thus undermining the workplace standards in this country and making it harder to compete internationally.  In particular, he has pointed to the fact that American companies face significant litigation if they don’t treat employees fairly and meet ethical standards.  He argues that the U.S. needs be tougher in negotiating with other countries to ensure that their businesses meet standards comparable to those in the U.S, noting that soft power tariffs and sanctions could be used.

Huckabee’s initial somewhat moderate stance on immigration reform seems to be drifting in a more conservative direction.  It’s likely, however, that compromise would be his inclination on this issue.

According to Huckabee, he would veto legislation that would make sexual orientation a protected class under federal law.

McCain–He would be considered rather anti-union.  He opposes the Employee Free Choice Act.  He has voted to allow employees to choose between overtime and compensatory leave time, something that some employers strongly support and all unions strongly oppose.  He receives a very low rating from the AFL-CIO.

McCain voted against raising the federal minimum wage to $7.25 per hour.

McCain has also voted to allow states to opt out of future federal minimum wage increases, which the AFL-CIO says would “effectively repeal the federal minimum wage.”

McCain often speaks in favor of providing more education opportunities to American workers, particularly as these opportunities relate to new skills required to compete in today’s world.  He would probably support federal funding of a comprehensive education program to get American workers in a postion to compete with workers in other countries where American jobs are going.

McCain has been outspoken about the need for immigration reform.  However, rather than take a hard line against illegal workers already in the U.S., he has proposed a compromise that would give illegal workers the chance to stay in this country while seeking to make themselves legal.  He emphasizes that this approach is simply realistic, given the number of illegal workers we already have in the U.S.

Obama–He’s a union man I’d say.  He supports the Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act, which would provide public safety workers the right to bargain collectively.  He supports the Employee Free Choice Act.  He has joined union efforts to get Wal-Mart and other large corporations to improve working conditions, wages and healthcare insurance coverage.

Obama has announced a plan to provide healthcare for all by 2012.  Under this plan, nearly all employers would be required to share the cost of coverage.  The plan would prevent insurers from withholding coverage because of preexisting conditions.  The plan would also encourage spending healthcare dollars on preventive measures and better maintenance of chronic diseases.

Obama advocates the spending of $1 billion over five years to create a transition jobs/pathways program to make it possible for more workers to join the middle class.

Obama opposes changes to the Fair Labor Standards Act that would allow employers to use compensatory time off as a substitute for overtime for employees who work over 40 hours a week.  (In other words, some businesses would like to be able to offer employees extra time off in lieu of overtime.  In fact, some businesses do that now, though it’s illegal, and some employees prefer the so-called comp time to overtime.)

Obama supports the proposed Healthy Families Act, which would require seven days of paid sick leave.

Obama supports amending bankruptcy laws to prevent companies from avoiding pension obligations.

Obama would support an amendment to federal law making sexual orientation discrimination illegal.

Although Obama has been, at times, as murky as other candidates on immigration, given his background and views on related subjects, he would likely support a way to allow illegal workers already in the U.S. to stay and a way to put some structure around how immigrants can work in the U.S. without draconian restrictions.

Richardson–He has indicated his support for the Employee Free Choice Act, saying that he would be proud to sign it if elected.  He has said he would nominate a person with a strong union background to be the Secretary of Labor.  He has been vocal in saying that it’s important for union membership to grow and that union membership provides a way for workers to join the middle class.  As Governor of New Mexico, he signed a bill giving collective bargaining rights to public or government employees.  He believes his support of unions and collective bargaining has had a lot to do with the creation of jobs in New Mexico. He’s openly antagonistic to state right-to-work laws.

Richardson has expressed support for a healthcare plan similar to that in Massachusetts to facilitate mandatory coverage for employees.

He would support an amendment to federal law making discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation illegal.

Though the governor of a border state, Richardson would surely be inclined to support immigration legislation that would allow illegal workers to remain in the country and obtain some type of certification that would allow their continued work to be on a legal basis.  New Mexico has a heavy Hispanic population, and Richardson believes that continued Hispanic immigration is essential to the health of our economy.

Romney–He has been outspoken against the Employee Free Choice Act.  When he was Governor of Massachusetts, he vetoed a bill that would have allowed public or government employees to form a union in a way similar to that allowed by the Employee Free Choice Act.  He opposes requiring non-union employees to contribute to union dues.  He opposes any type of system for the automatic deduction of union dues from an employee’s paycheck.  He has also challenged the way unions are allowed to use union dues to support union PAC’s.  He’s a strong proponent of state right-to-work laws.

As Governor of Massachusetts, Romney vetoed a bill that would have raised the state minimum wage to $8.00 by 2008.

As Governor of Massachusetts, Romney signed into law the current Massachusetts healthcare system that, among other things, requires employees to have healthcare coverage.  Hailed as a progressive approach to the healthcare insurance problem in this country, Romney hasn’t disavowed it during the current presidential campaign, but he clearly doesn’t like to talk about it.

Romney talks of improving worker retraining by consolidating and streamlining numerous federal programs in an effort to provide American employees the new skills they need to compete in a global economy.

Romney is a stronger and stronger proponent of immigration reform that would end illegal immigration, while streamlining the process to legally recruit and retain highly skilled foreign workers.  He advocates the implementation of an enforceable verification system for foreign workers.  In particular, he believes that a biometrically-enabled and tamper-proof card for non-citizens and the creation of a national database for non-citizens would make it possible for employers to easily verify an applicant’s or employee’s status and for the government to take action against illegal workers if they didn’t take immediate steps to legalize their employment status.

He would oppose an amendment to federal law making sexual orientation a protected class.

Thompson–He opposes the Employee Free Choice Act.  While in the Senate, he opposed legislation to give collective bargaining rights to employees of the Department of Homeland Security.  He has also opposed measures to give collective bargaining rights to police officers, firefighters, and other public safety employees.  He has spoken out against the use by unions of union dues for political purposes.

Thompson would oppose an amendment to federal law making sexual orientation discrimination illegal.

While in the Senate, Thompson voted to repeal President Clinton’s ergonomic regs designed, in theory, to deal with repetitive stress injuries and disorders.

While in the Senate, he voted against increasing the minimum wage.

While in the Senate, he voted in favor of a change to the Fair Labor Standards Act, which would have allowed employees to choose between overtime and compensatory leave time.

On immigration, Thompson seems to be a pragmatist.  He speaks about securing our borders and controlling illegal immigration but would be unlikely to support legislation that would send current illegal workers back home without a plan to allow them to take steps to create a legal working status.

And there you have it.  Certainly not complete but perhaps sufficient to give you a clue about how each candidate would impact the workplace and the labor and employment laws that govern the workplace.

There is, of course, no way to predict whether a candidate will change his/her tune once the nomination is secured or once in office.  I seem to remember that previous candidates have done an about-face after being elected President.  And, let’s face it, a candidate can say anything.  In fact, the candidates do say all sorts of things, depending on the groups they’re talking to. 

Another distinction to make is between what candidates say and how they have actually voted on an issue.  If a candidate has voted one way or another, there’s a little more reason to believe that’s his/her position on the issue as opposed to trying to figure out a candidate’s position based solely on what’s being said from one day to the next.

Finally, remember that I have come at this solely from a labor and employment standpoint.  There are obviously other important issues, but when you’re in HR or employment law, it’s important to try to figure out, as best you can, what the lay of the workplace landscape will be if a particular candidate is elected. 

And now some more specific predictions:

–If a Democrat is elected, an early effort will be made to ensure passage of the amendment making discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation illegal.  In second place is an increase in the minimum wage.

–If a Republican is elected, there will be no early action on a labor and employment issue.  In second place is nothing.

–If a Democrat is elected, a more long term goal will be the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act.  Unless the Democrats significantly increase their majority in both houses of Congress, this will be rough sledding.  In second place is  an expansion of the FMLA.

–If a Republican is elected, a more long term goal will be changing the Fair Labor Standards Act to permit comp time to be substituted for overtime.  Unless the Republicans regain control of Congress, this change is unlikely to happen.  In second place is a bill to encourage the government and business to work together to give American employees new skills to compete with foreign competitors.

–The most pro-union president would be Edwards, hands down.   In second place is Richardson.

–The president most likely to advocate for laws designed to provide greater rights to employees (and this isn’t necessarily the same as being wildly pro-union) is Clinton.  In second place is Obama.

–The president most likely to push for more comprehensive healthcare coverage for employees is Obama.  In second place is Romney.

–The president most likely to be pro-business and the least likely to push for more protection for employee rights is  McCain.  In second place is Thompson.

–The president most likely to be a maverick from start to finish is Huckabee.  In second place is Giuliani.

–The president most likely to be most conservative on immigration is Romney (and in second place, Giuliani); the most liberal, McCain (and in second place, Richardson).

–The biggest employment issue getting the least attention but one that must be addressed sooner rather than later in the next administration is employee privacy, particularly as it relates to the Internet.  In second place is what to do with the Age Discrimination in Employment Act to make it more realistic in light of the boomer stampede about to begin.

One more thing.  If you think what I’ve written about the candidates’ views on labor and employment issues sounds mushy, I hope you won’t think this says something about me.

To adapt a campaign slogan of a former President, it’s the candidates, stupid.  Maybe even better, it’s the stupid candidates.  Perhaps my summary and predictions help a little.  I hope so.