An employment agreement, like other contracts, represents an offer and acceptance of terms that have a mutual benefit to the contracting parties.
For example, an employer agrees to pay compensation in exchange for work services provided by the employee. Yet to be competitive, many employers also offer health benefits, severance packages, retirement accounts, and other benefits.
In the case of many local, state and federal government workplaces, the employees may be members of unions. Dues paying members of the union may be subject to the terms of any collective bargaining agreements between the union and the government employer.
Such employees are common in the Greenbelt and Washington, D.C. area. However, public sector employment and union membership can require additional legal considerations. For example, employment regulations may govern the procedures to be followed in the event of promotions or separations of government employees.
Since government employees benefit from the protections of CBAs that pertain to them, some states require public employees to pay compulsory membership dues to those unions. The rationale is that unions that undertake the cost of collective bargaining with government employers should be compensated for those costs through dues.
However, a recent lawsuit by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is challenging the practice of requiring public employees to pay compulsory union dues. The complaint alleges a violation of the constitutional rights of free speech and free association.
From an employer’s perspective, addressing the issue of union dues can be a sensitive manner. For example, any language breaching the subject might be perceived as biased, due to the apparent conflict of interest. However, an employment attorney might suggest other ways to provide information to new employees. Although the terms of a collective bargaining agreement may need to be included in an employment agreement, the particulars of union information could be left to employee handbooks or perhaps other, less formal publications.
Source: Washington Post, “Supreme Court considers major change in public-employee unions,” Robert Barnes