Cracking Down on Starbucks Unionbusting

This is a good sign if it happens.

Federal labor regulators accused Starbucks on Wednesday of illegally closing 23 stores to suppress organizing activity and sought to force the company to reopen them.

A complaint issued by a regional office of the National Labor Relations Board argued that Starbucks had closed the stores because its employees engaged in union activities or to discourage employees from doing so. At least seven of the 23 stores identified had unionized.

The agency’s move is the latest in a series of accusations by federal officials that Starbucks has broken the law during a two-year labor campaign.

The case is scheduled to go before an administrative judge next summer unless Starbucks settles it earlier. In addition to asking the judge to order the stores reopened, the complaint wants employees to be compensated for the loss of earnings or benefits and for other costs they incurred as a result of the closures.

“This complaint is the latest confirmation of Starbucks’ determination to illegally oppose workers’ organizing,” Mari Cosgrove, a Starbucks employee, said in a statement issued through a spokesperson for the union, Workers United.

I think it’s probably pretty likely given the makeup of the NLRB. But this is still a pretty small price to pay for Starbucks to engage in openly illegal behavior. All they have to do is go back to the status quo, without any real punishment for executives. Until we change labor law to hold these people personally accountable, it still makes all the business sense in the world for companies to attack unionization efforts. There just really isn’t any downside for them. And when Republicans control the board, it’s all upside.