Labor and Employment Law Commons^™

Unbundling Social Security From The Payroll Tax, Henry Ordower

All Faculty Scholarship

To preserve social security as a welfare program primarily for older individuals and to ameliorate the distributional inequity of funding social security across income and wealth levels, this article recommends unbundling the benefit side of social security from its longstanding payroll tax funding mechanism. The article recommends replacing the payroll tax revenue with a budget allocation from general revenues accompanied by both revenue raisers and benefit limitations. Income tax rate increases linked to repeal of the FICA tax and tax expenditure limitations would enhance income tax revenue. Modifying social security benefits from their current overinclusive, entitlement structure for all to …

Individuals As "Employees" Or "Contractors": Why It Matters What You Are Called When It Comes To Federal Taxes, Robert Eisentrout

Michigan Business & Entrepreneurial Law Review

When we file federal taxes, our individual tax burdens are affected by whether our employers and the IRS classify us as “employees” or “contractors.” Today, that distinction is not a neat one. Classifying workers as “employees” or “contractors” belies increasing similarities—like the ability to work remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic—between those classifications. With those increasing similarities in mind, this Note makes two arguments about the employee / contractor distinction in federal tax law. First, federal tax law draws an increasingly arbitrary and unfair line between employees and contractors given the modern substantive convergence of work done as an “employee” or …

Modernizing Disability Income For Cancer Survivors, Ann C. Hodges

Hofstra Labor & Employment Law Journal

The medical progress in cancer treatment is worthy of celebration, as survivors of many cancers are living longer. This good news, however, comes with challenges for those survivors. Empirical evidence from researchers at cancer centers demonstrates the devastating impact that cancer has on employment, resulting in serious financial stress for survivors and their families. My previous research used this empirical data to recommend changes in employment laws to meet the need of survivors to maintain employment. This article builds on the prior research by using the empirical evidence of the employment effects of cancer to recommend changes in the disability …

Modernizing Disability Income For Cancer Survivors, Ann C. Hodges

Law Faculty Publications

The medical progress in cancer treatment is worthy of celebration, as survivors of many cancers are living longer. This good news, however, comes with challenges for those survivors. Empirical evidence from researchers at cancer centers demonstrates the devastating impact that cancer has on employment, resulting in serious financial stress for survivors and their families. My previous research used this empirical data to recommend changes in employment laws to meet the need of survivors to maintain employment. This article builds on the prior research by using the empirical evidence of the employment effects of cancer to recommend changes in the disability …

Mr. Dooley And Mr. Gallup: Public Opinion And Constitutional Change In The 1930s, Barry Cushman

Barry Cushman

Scholars interested in the development of political and constitutional culture during the 1930s sometimes draw inferences about popular preferences on various issues of social and economic policy from the results of presidential and congressional elections. A review of contemporary public opinion polls taken by George Gallup for the American Institute of Public Opinion and by Elmo Roper for the Fortune Magazine survey offers a more granular understanding of popular views on the public policy issues of the day. This article canvasses all of the public opinion polls taken by Gallup and Roper between 1935, when they began publishing their results, …

Sistema Pensionistico Enasarco, Michele Faioli

Michele Faioli

La Fondazione Giacomo Brodolini e la SERI - Scuola Europea di Relazioni Industriali hanno svolto per conto di FIARC una ricerca sul sistema pensionistico ENASARCO. La ricerca sarà presentata al convengo che si terrà il 4 ottobre p.v. , a Roma, presso la Sapienza, Università di Roma. In occasione di tale Convegno, saremmo onorati della Sua autorevole presenza presenza in qualità di discussant alla tavola rotonda.

Social Protection Afforded To Irregular Migrant Workers: Thoughts On International Norms, The Southern African Development Community, Botswana And South Africa, Bruno Ps Van Eck, Felicia Snyman

Bruno PS Van Eck

The majority of migrant workers target those countries in southern Africa that have stronger economies. Irregular migrants are in a particularly vulnerable position, and this article discusses the protection that this category of persons may expect to experience in the southern African region. The authors recommend that the broad notion of “social protection”, rather than the narrower concept “social security” should be emphasized. International, continental and regional instruments providing protection to irregular migrants are traversed and the constitutional and legislative frameworks in relation to social protection in Botswana and South Africa are compared. The article concludes that there are significant …

An Overview Of The U.S. Retirement Income Security System And The Principles And Values It Reflects, Kathryn L. Moore

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This article is designed to provide an overview of the U.S. retirement income security system from a comparative law perspective. Like many countries, the U.S. has a three tier pension or retirement income system, with the three tiers consisting of (1) Social Security, (2) employment-based pensions, and (3) individual savings. Thus, superficially, the U.S. retirement income security system resembles that of many around the world. Yet, in other ways, such as its focus on individual rights and responsibility, the U.S. system is unique.

The article begins by discussing the nine guiding principles of the U.S. Social Security system as identified …

Riforma Fiscale E Redditi Di Lavoro Dipendente: Per Una Fiscalità Volta Verso Il Nuovo Millennio, Michele Faioli

Michele Faioli

No abstract provided.

The "No-Match" Letter Rule: A Mismatch Between The Department Of Homeland Security And The Social Security Administration In Worksite Immigration Law Enforcement, Michael Gibek, Joshua Shteierman

Hofstra Labor & Employment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The Four Pillars Of Work Law, Orly Lobel

Michigan Law Review

In our contemporary legal landscape, a student wishing to study the law of the workplace has scarce opportunity to encounter an integrated body of scholarship that analyzes the labor market as the subject of government regulation, contractual duties, collective action, and individual rights. Work law developed in the American legal system as a patchwork of common law doctrine, federal and state statutes, and evolving social norms. Typical law school curricula often include courses relating to the four pillars of work law: "employment law," "labor law," "employment discrimination," and some variation of a tax-oriented "employee-benefits law." Employment law, in most categorizations, …

Labor Standards On Cypriot Ships: Myth And Reality, Iliana Christodoulou-Varotsi, Dmitri A. Pentsov

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

This Article offers a comprehensive comparative analysis of labor and social security standards on Cypriot and Greek ships. Potential cost savings for shipowners who register their ships in one country rather than the other may result from the absence of a given standard in the country of registration, or a lower or more flexible standard in that country than in the other. The authors conclude that the registration of ships in Cyprus does not provide overall advantages (in terms of "inferior" labor standards) over registration in Greece. Broadly speaking, shipowners may gain certain advantages by registering their ships in Cyprus …

Mr. Dooley And Mr. Gallup: Public Opinion And Constitutional Change In The 1930s, Barry Cushman

Journal Articles

Scholars interested in the development of political and constitutional culture during the 1930s sometimes draw inferences about popular preferences on various issues of social and economic policy from the results of presidential and congressional elections. A review of contemporary public opinion polls taken by George Gallup for the American Institute of Public Opinion and by Elmo Roper for the Fortune Magazine survey offers a more granular understanding of popular views on the public policy issues of the day. This article canvasses all of the public opinion polls taken by Gallup and Roper between 1935, when they began publishing their results, …

The United States Supreme Court Resolves The Effect Of Disability Benefit Claims Upon Americans With Disabilities Act Complaints In Cleveland V. Policy Management Systems Corporation, Christine Neylon O'Brien

Hofstra Labor & Employment Law Journal

Federal courts have grappled with the issue of whether claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act should be barred, or judicially estopped, by the plaintiff's earlier application for or receipt of disability benefits. This is a particularly vexing problem since recipients of disability benefits are presumed to be disabled even though they are not disabled for a particular job. These individuals, who are social security recipients and still, are qualified for a job yet they suffer adverse employment decisions in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. This article clarifies the law based on the Supreme Court decision, Cleveland v. …

The Burdens Of Benefits, Edward J. Mccaffery

Villanova Law Review

No abstract provided.

Counseling The Coal Miner Suffering From Respiratory Disease, Gail Falk

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

General Rules Determining The Employment Relationship Under Social Laws: After Twenty Years An Unsolved Problem, Thomas F. Broden

Journal Articles

Twenty-four years ago the Social Security Act was adopted. Whereas in its inception it covered about half the labor force, now it applies to nearly 90% of American workers. One would expect that the basic rules of law applicable to such a vast program would, by now a generation later, be rather well settled. Yet, in one very important area of Social Security law, this is not true. This article discusses that unsettled part of the law. It deals with the general rules applicable in determining the employer-employee relationship under the Federal Social Security laws, with greatest emphasis on the …

General Rules Determining The Employment Relationship Under Social Security Laws: After Twenty Years An Unsolved Problem, Thomas F. Broden

Journal Articles

The present statutory language—"the usual common law rules"—is based upon the Status Quo Resolution of 1948. The relevant part of that Resolution provided that the term "employee" in the social security laws should not include "(1) any individual who, under the usual common-law rules applicable in determining the employer-employee relationship, has the status of an independent contractor or (2) any individual (except an officer of a corporation) who is not an employee under such common-law rules." To understand the meaning of the present statutory language one must study the governmental battle from which the Status Quo Resolution emerged. This battle …

Interstate Aspects Of Unemployment Insurance, Emmett Conner, Charles K. Cosner

Vanderbilt Law Review

State-operated systems of unemployment insurance, first instituted in the United States in Wisconsin in 1932, were set up in all of the states, and in the District of Columbia, Hawaii and Alaska within the two years following the enactment in 1935 of Titles III and IX of the Social Security Act.' Mutual problems of administration and of coordination among the various state programs led to a series of conferences of state officials charged with the operation of the systems. These early conferences were informal in nature, but steps were taken looking toward the creation of a formal organization. With the …

The Problem Of Coverage, Charles J. Barnhill, William M. Bloom, W. Daniel Bretz Jr., John R. Danch

Indiana Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The Uncompensated Industrial Injury, Stanley Law Sabel

Michigan Law Review

Workmen's compensation laws as means by which industry shares part of the burden of the human toll incident to the cost of production are reaching the maturity of their development. The adoption of such laws has been wide; all but two states in the union now have some provision by which employees engaged in most lines of work are compensated without regard to fault for injuries caused by their work.