The US National Labor Relations Board on Jan. 3 issued a decision rejecting Google’s assertion that it is not a joint employer of contractors on its YouTube music content operations team provided by IT services firm Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp.
The Cognizant contractors, based in Austin, Texas, last spring voted to join the Alphabet Workers Union, which represents directly employed and contingent workers at Google; however, the union claims Google has refused to engage in collective bargaining.
The election followed a March decision by an NLRB regional director holding that Google exerted the direct and immediate control necessary to be deemed their joint employer, Bloomberg Law reported. The NLRB upheld the regional director’s decision last summer.
The initial joint employer finding was based on the Trump-era rule for determining when multiple businesses share liability and bargaining obligations under federal labor law, which is considered to be a more employer-friendly legal test. That standard is being replaced with a multifactor “economic reality” test to confirm when a worker is or is not an independent contractor.
Google plans to appeal the new decision.
“As we’ve said before, we have no objection to these Cognizant employees electing to form a union,” Google spokesperson Courtenay Mencini told The Register. “We simply believe it’s only appropriate for Cognizant, as their employer, to engage in collective bargaining.”
“We’re appealing the NLRB’s joint employer decision to federal court, as Google does not control the employment terms or conditions of these Cognizant workers,” Mencini added.
The company could file its appeal in the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, which is known for its conservative judges and has jurisdiction over Texas, where the unionized YouTube workers are located, according to The Register.
Google has faced an uptick in labor organizing in the US and abroad in recent years, including a series of worker protests over the company’s business and employment policies, Reuters reported. In November, a group of about 120 employees of Google contractor Accenture who work on artificial intelligence applications voted to unionize. Google claims it is not the workers’ joint employer and is challenging the results of that election as well.
