The annual “job-creator” and “job-killer” lists are out — 31 top priorities of the California Chamber of Commerce.

The pro-business group, which spent nearly $4.3 million in 2015 on lobbying in the Capitol, is primarily focused on reducing “meritless” litigation for job creation. And there are a range of bills spanning oil production barriers, increased labor costs and barriers to affordable housing considered “job killers.”

CalChamber announced the 13th “job-creator” bill on Monday, having introduced the other 12 earlier this month. SB 1228 would help small businesses comply with state-mandated regulations and give a little relief from fines for failure to comply.

“The growth of small businesses in California is a key component to maintaining a strong economy,” Jennifer Barrera, a policy advocate for CalChamber, wrote in a letter of support for the measure. “SB 1228 will help ensure such growth by providing small businesses with the tools and resources needed to comply with California’s regulations.”

Track record

CalChamber didn’t fare very well with its job-creator list in 2015, going 2-12 with one more bill still bouncing around the legislature. Three bills suffered death by veto.

The “job-killer” list has not gotten off to a good start. It was introduced late last month and already one of the bills, an increase in the minimum wage, has been signed into law.

The 2015 “job-killer” list fared much better, as only one of the bills was signed into law. The “job-killer” tag was removed from one bill, but CalChamber remained opposed.

Partisan divide

While all of the 2016 “job killers” are sponsored by Democrats, four “job creator” bills are sponsored by Democrats.

Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego, author of Assembly Bill 67, argued that it’s simply a matter of economic justice for workers and their families.

“The act seeks to guarantee that employees are fairly and justly compensated for undue hardships associated with working during time that is commonly spent with family on Thanksgiving and Christmas,” she said. “This past November and December millions of Americans sacrificed time with their family on these federally recognized holidays to work for retailers and food outlets like Walmart, Staples, Gap, Starbucks and much more.

“In many cases working shifts that creep into this family time has become mandatory, with threats of being fired if you even take a sick day, which forces workers to make an unfair choice between their economic livelihood and their family. … This is not an exchange for time spent with the family. But there is compensation for having to miss something that’s special. That’s why today as we see more and more stores, more and more retails outlets, more and more restaurants opening up on these days, we want to ensure that the workers that are forced to work on those day are compensated fairly.”

Several women testified about the hardships of working in retail. Julie Fisher works at Macy’s, which she said used to open at midnight on Thanksgiving, then opened at 8 p.m. and now opens at 4 p.m. “It’s an exhausting event,” she said. “And then you turn around and the next day is the Black Friday after Thanksgiving or the day after Christmas.”

Said a woman who has worked for Walmart for four years during which time she said she’s been on strike seven times, “People who work for Walmart, we are the working poor. We need as much help as we possibly can get.”

Constitution

Gonzalez has a law degree and is the first female minority CEO for the San Diego and Imperial Counties Labor Council, AFL-CIO. Her testimony included the disparagement of free-market capitalism and chiding the California Chamber of Commerce for opposing the bill on constitutional grounds.

Chamber representative Jennifer Barrera, who also has a law degree, told the committee, “We believe this is a violation of the First Amendment for a lot of business owners who do not recognize Christmas as a holiday, much less as a family holiday, where they will be mandated to either shut down their business or pay their employees double compensation.”

Barrera said that although Thanksgiving and Christmas are government-recognized holidays, private businesses are not required also to recognize those days as holidays. She also pointed out that the trend in state legislation has been toward secularizing religious-based holidays such as the once prevalent “blue laws” that forced businesses to close on Sundays.

“In 2004 New York struck down their blue law as unconstitutional,” she said. “And I quote, ‘In view of the acknowledgment that Sabbath laws are founded in religious beliefs, it’s time to declare all such laws unconstitutional. The substitution of secular concerns, such as protecting mom and pop from being overworked for their earlier concern that the religious nature of the day be observed, does not make the statute in question less reprehensible.’

“Similarly, here it is unconstitutional for the state to be dictating what day is a family day for business owners to recognize and either shut down or pay their employees double compensation.”

However, the 2004 New York case was decided by “a lower-court judge in Brooklyn,” the New York Times reported. So it would have little precedential value in California.

Special holidays

Barrera also cited a 2007 Vanderbilt Law Review article she said concludes the U.S. Supreme Court would deem blue laws to be unconstitutional if they were challenged in court. Those laws amount to state government “dictating to private-sector employers that you have to recognize a special holiday as a family day as aside from any other holiday that the state either recognizes or the federal government recognizes,” she said.

In addition to the constitutional question, she said the Chamber is opposed to AB67 because it:

• Places brick-and-mortar stores at a competitive disadvantage against online retailers that are not required to provide double pay.
• Includes non-hourly, salaried employees, which forces employers to provide double pay for the entire day even if an employee only worked an hour.
• Creates “another litigation opportunity against our employers in California.”

‘War on Christmas’

Gonzalez prefaced her response to the constitutionality argument with a slap at the Chamber.

“I didn’t know that there was in fact, as the other side will often say, that there was a war on Christmas,” she said. “The difference is that it’s being waged by the Chamber of Commerce. So I want to very seriously take on what I think are their ludicrous claims that this in any way violates the First Amendment by way of the Establishment Clause.

“In its letter the Chamber quotes convenient lines from cases, yet ignores the Supreme Court’s generally relied upon test of the Establishment Clause first articulated in Lemon v. Kurtzman. The application of the three-prong test from Lemon clearly shows that this law would not violate the Establishment Clause, as the legislation has the secular purpose of promoting the family and increasing pay.

“In no way does it advance or inhibit religion. Unless the Chamber is arguing that it’s a religious principle to force people to work for minimum pay on every day of the year. I don’t think that’s a religious principle. And finally, this in no way is an excessive entanglement of church and state.”

Gonzalez also cited the County of Allegheny v. the ACLU, in which the Supreme Court struck down a crèche display but upheld a menorah display at a county courthouse. She quoted Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s ruling that “as observed in this nation Christmas has a secular as well as religious dimension… [A]nd the celebration of Thanksgiving as a public holiday, despite its religious origins, is now generally understood as a celebration of patriotic values rather than particularly religious beliefs.”

Gonzalez concluded her response by admonishing the Chamber.

“I think there is no case law that suggests this would be violating our First Amendment rights,” she said. “I hope in the future the Chamber will limit its opposition to the merits of the bill, instead of attempting to elicit support based on erroneous readings of the law and misguided arguments about the separation of church and state.

“Or if they prefer to continue down that line of opposition, perhaps they should concede that we pay double time on every single federal holiday. I wouldn’t be opposed to that amendment if they would like to suggest it.”

Response

At that point Barrera asked committee Chairman Roger Hernandez, D-West Covina, “May I respond to those comments since they were directed right at the Chamber of Commerce?”

Hernandez said, “I’m going to defer to my colleagues on that one since I have not given that opportunity on any other bill.”

One of his colleagues, Assemblyman Jim Patterson, R-Fresno, who had the floor and was in the midst of questioning Gonzalez, asked that Barrera be allowed to respond. “There is a request by the Chamber to clarify this,” he said. “I think that’s a reasonable request, and I would like the prerogative of asking the Chamber to respond.”

But Hernandez shot him down, saying, “I’m not going to give you that opportunity at this time.”

Earlier questioning by Assemblyman Matthew Harper, R-Huntington Beach, focused on how the legislation might hurt California businesses. “My understanding is Chief Executive Magazine rated California as the 50th in rank in terms of being able to do business,” he said. “Do you think this would help or hurt our ranking in terms of our employers’ ability to do business in the state of California?”

Gonzalez responded, “I think there was a study that just said in fact we were the best place to do business. So, quite frankly, when you talk about doing business, we want to make sure that our middle and working class folks have expendable income and can actually spend the money in our small business and retail establishments. And this actually helps that.”

Gonzalez discussed her negative view of free-market capitalism when Harper pointed out that many businesses already pay extra for working on holidays as well as provide amenities such as holiday meals for employees.

“They just recognize under the free market that you really need to make sure people are compensated enough to show up,” he said. “Is your thinking that the free market doesn’t meet the ability for employers and employees to make that decision already?”

Reasonable wage

Gonzalez said, “Quite frankly, I don’t think we operate in a free market. If we want to take the NFL as an example, it’s a highly subsidized, so-called nonprofit where the owners are making millions of dollars. And I think they can pay their employees a reasonable wage. And we, unfortunately, have to require what that is.

“If left to its own devices in the free market, we would still have slavery, child labor … and no minimum wage. So no, I think we have very different ideological beliefs about how employers should be dealt with.”

Gonzalez elicited laughter in the chamber when, after Harper finished his questioning and Hernandez called on Patterson, she said with a smile, “Just keep it coming.”

Patterson asked whether her bill might create a slippery slope in which every religious group demands double pay for working on its holidays.

“It may or may not become an issue, Gonzalez said. “But I think we’ve picked the two most compelling holidays and times when traditionally as a country we have slowed down and spent time with our families. Whether or not we celebrate any religious tradition is irrelevant. … So I’m personally less concerned with the rest of the holidays. But I’m also not concerned if somebody in the future wanted to address premium pay for those holidays for hourly employees as well.”

The committee voted 5-2 to approve AB67. It will next be considered by the Assembly Appropriations Committee.

Senate Bill 1021, introduced by state Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, would allow school districts to impose different parcel tax rates on different types of property. That means commercial, industrial, residential and multifamily residential could see different tax bills for properties of equal value.

SB1021 is essentially split-roll at the local level, Jennifer Barrera, a policy advocate for the California Chamber of Commerce, explained on CalChamber’s website. It would allow school districts to pass parcel taxes just against commercial property.

Alameda County’s parcel tax overturned by courts

The bill comes in response to a controversial parcel tax adopted in Alameda County that was ultimately thrown out by the courts. In 2008, more than two-thirds of Alameda County voters approved Measure H, which imposed a $120 parcel tax on residential and small commercial properties and a substantially higher parcel tax — up to $9,500 a year — on large commercial parcels.

Last June, a unanimous state appeals court overturned the parcel tax. In Borikas v. Alameda Unified School District, the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco found that the parcel tax violated the requirement that taxes “apply uniformly to all taxpayers or all real property within the district.”

The bill’s author said that the issue is one of local control, granting local districts the power to set different tax rates for each community’s needs.

“Under the recent court decision, school districts can no longer apply higher or lower rates to parcels based on commercial, industrial, or residential classification of the parcel,” Wolk’s office argued, according to the Senate’s legislative analysis. “SB1021 restores this needed local control by allowing school district boards to structure its tax according to local values and priorities.”

CalChamber: Unfair job-killer bill

Opponents of the bill include CalChamber, the California Business Properties Association, the California Association of Realtors, the California Grocers Association, the California Mortgage Bankers Association, the Family Winemakers of California, the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, the California Manufacturers and Technology Association and the California Building Industry Association. The opponents are worried SB1021 will lead to school districts targeting parcel taxes on businesses and commercial property owners.

“At a time when California officials should be doing everything in their power to attract and retain jobs, this legislation takes exactly the opposite approach by targeting employers for even higher taxes if they stay here,” said David Kline, vice-president of the California Taxpayers Association. “This bill would allow a free-for-all parcel tax system, with no limits on what rates school districts could levy, and would create opportunities for massive tax hikes targeted at businesses of all sizes.”

The state’s business leaders and taxpayer advocates also say the bill is an end run around Proposition 13, the state’s landmark 1978 initiative that placed a cap on property taxes. With other “add-on” property taxes and fees, such as parcel taxes, Mello-Roos fees, and assessment districts, many property owners pay substantially more than Prop. 13’s base rate of 1 percent of the property’s value.

Higher rate applied to different properties

In addition to applying different tax rates to commercial and residential properties, SB1021 authorizes school districts to target individual owners for higher tax rates. Under the bill, school districts would be allowed to treat multiple parcels of real property as one parcel for tax purposes.

“Under this provision, a school district could aggregate multiple, smaller parcels owned by one owner to capture all the properties under a square footage parcel tax,” CalChamber warned in a recent legislative alert. “Additionally, a school district could impose a parcel tax based upon the use of one parcel within multiple parcels owned by the same owner, even if those other parcels are not used for the same purpose.”

Despite recent national headlines of the state’s declining business climate, the legislature is expected to pass the bill, in part because it only requires majority approval of the Legislature. Traditionally, most tax increases are subject to two-thirds approval. However, SB1021 isn’t technically a tax increase, according to the legislature’s attorneys.

However, Gov. Jerry Brown is running for re-election and likely would veto the tax increase. In his 2010 campaign, he promised that no new taxes would be imposed without voter approval. And when he campaigned for Proposition 30, which increased taxes $7 billion, he insisted it would be temporary. SB1021 would allow permanent tax increases.

By Dave Roberts

California business owners have plenty to worry about with the weak economy, high taxes, complex regulations and susceptibility to costly litigation. But rather than reducing those burdens in order to strengthen the state’s economy, Democratic politicians continue to pile on the obstacles to doing business in California.

On Tuesday the Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill that would add family caregivers to the list of protected classes against job discrimination. While that sounds like a compassionate measure — who wouldn’t sympathize with someone discriminated against for taking care of their sick mother? — SB 404 is written so broadly that it essentially places every worker in this protected classification and thus able to sue for discrimination if something is not to their liking in the work place, according to the California Chamber of Commerce.

“We are concerned with the expansion of litigation that this bill will create,” Chamber policy advocate Jennifer Barrera told the committee. “‘Familial status’ as set forth in the bill is anyone who is, who is perceived to be, or who is associated with somebody who provides medical or supervisory care to a family member. That’s pretty broad. I don’t know who that doesn’t cover in the workplace. So the fact that we’re essentially protecting everyone in the workplace means that we’re not protecting anyone.

“All we’re doing is providing new avenues of litigation on which to file a claim…. Any time an employer tries to make a management decision in the workplace that’s adverse, it will automatically be susceptible to being challenged based on familial status. [Workers sill claim,] ‘That you must have demoted me or disciplined me not because of the objective basis that the employer states but because of my actual, perceived or associated familial status.’ Which makes it extremely difficult for an employer, especially a small employer, to manage their work place.”

Protected class

Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, argued that family caregivers deserve to be in a protected class against discrimination under the provisions of the Fair Employment and Housing Act, just as there are protections based on sex, race, color, national origin, religion, disability, marital status and sexual orientation.

“Real people are suffering in real ways,” Leno said. “And we are trying to find a way to end that and give them some protection so they can go about their lives.”

Barrera responded, “It would be a different perspective from business if only those cases that have merit are filed. But the problem is that from the business perspective we see a lot of frivolous litigation around these types of classifications just to challenge any decision we make.”

Leno was skeptical that frivolous lawsuits are filed by employees against employers, arguing that neither the employees nor their lawyers would benefit by doing so.

Barrera countered that businesses need to look out for the bottom line when deciding whether to contest lawsuits in court, whether or not they are frivolous.

“From our perspective, the plaintiff and attorney do benefit because in a lot of the cases — and I don’t have the specific percentage, I would say it’s in the 90 percent that cases settle — once a case is filed a lot of businesses see it as a business decision,” she said. “It’s not necessarily, ‘Hey, we were right, and I’m going to spend all of the money to prove that at trial.’ Because it’s costly. It’s more, ‘How can I resolve this at the cheapest cost, because I don’t want to impose a higher cost on my business.’ It’s more expensive to go all the way to trial and have your day in court to show that you were right than it is to just get rid of it and settle it immediately.”

‘The system works’

The bill’s author, Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson, D-Santa Barbara, was not convinced.

“I would respectfully disagree that it creates frivolous lawsuits,” she said. “I don’t think there’s any documentation that demonstrates that. We do have a Fair Employment and Housing Agency that does take a look at these claims before they are allowed to go to litigation. And I believe the Chamber just indicated that many of them, probably at least half of them, are rejected. So the system works that we have today.

“But I don’t think this is a claim that has historic accuracy to it that we will then end up with frivolous lawsuits. We will end up with this clarity as to what the expectations are for both employers and employees. This measure doesn’t give any additional rights to family caregivers. It just gives them equal footing. In today’s world, we just see more and more people doing this kind of care. I think it’s about time after three cracks at it that we put this into law so that everybody knows what’s expected of them, and people who are caregivers are simply treated equally by their employers.”

This is actually the fourth crack at giving protected status to caregivers. SB 836 was vetoed by then-Gov. Schwarzenegger in 2007. He wrote in his veto message:

“California has the strongest workplace laws against discrimination and harassment in the country. These laws provide workers necessary protections from unfair retaliation, discipline, and termination for matters unrelated to job performance. Although I support these laws, expanding workplace protections to include something as ambiguous as ‘familial status’ is not appropriate. This bill will not only result in endless litigation to try and define what discrimination on the basis of ‘familial status’ means, it will also unnecessarily restrict employers’ ability to make personnel decisions.”

In 2009, AB 1001 died in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. And last year, AB 1999 was held on suspense in the Senate Appropriations Committee.

Schwarzenegger’s concern about the ambiguity of “familial status” was echoed at Tuesday’s hearing by Chris Mullahy, representing the California Grocers Association, which is also concerned about SB 404 leading to more lawsuits. He noted that the bill’s definition of protected classes, including familial status, includes the “perception that the person has any of those characteristics or that the person is associated with a person who has, or is perceived to have, any of those characteristics.”

Mullahy observed, “The language is extremely broad, clearly would cover just about anyone.”

Confusing language

Sen. Mimi Walters, R-Irvine, noting that she’s one of the few committee members who is not a lawyer, said, “I’m confused about this language.” She asked Jackson to clarify what it means that there is a “perception” that someone has familial status.

Responded Jackson, a former district attorney:

“This is terminology that applies to all characteristics in the Fair Employment and Housing Act. We are modeling it and paralleling all the terminology within the Fair Employment and Housing Act. It’s not added. It’s what’s already in existence. It’s what’s used in all instances under fair employment and housing limitations and specifications. It’s not a new phrase.”

That non-explanation further confused Walters, who joked, “And that is why I’m not a lawyer,” as many laughed.

Barrera concluded her testimony by noting that there are already 17 laws on the books protecting employees against discrimination.

“Here in California, we have the California Family Rights Act,” she said. “It allows you to file litigation if you’re discriminated against for taking leave for a family member with a serious medical condition. We have the Kin Care law in California that requires an employer to allow an employee to take up to 50 percent of their sick leave to care for a family member. And you can file litigation if you’re discriminated on that basis. We have pregnancy disability leave. We have sex discrimination, gender discrimination, marital status discrimination laws. We also have the federal laws, the Equal Pay Act, the Title VII discrimination laws.

“So there’s a host of litigation avenues already available if discrimination like this occurs. The average verdict or settlement is $500,000 for these cases. Employers are already being sued when this type of discrimination occurs. So from the Chamber’s perspective, we’re very concerned with including a classification where protection already exists and just opening up new avenues of litigation that could seriously hamper an employer’s ability to grow and create jobs here in California if they are being struck with frivolous litigation under this bill.”

The committee passed SB 404 on a 5-2 vote with Walters and the other Republican, Sen. Joel Anderson, opposed. It has been referred to the Appropriations Committee.

By Dave Roberts

California’s official unemployment rate in June was 10.7 percent, third highest in the country. It’s been in double digits for 42 straight months. When those who have stopped looking for work or are underemployed are included, California’s real unemployment rate skyrockets to 20.3 percent.

One of the reasons that one out of five Californians is in such dire straits is due to the job-killing legislation coming out of Sacramento. The California Chamber of Commerce has identified three Democratic bills currently moving through the Legislature that will likely lead to even more job losses: AB 1450, AB 1999 and AB 2039. The bills purport to help job applicants and employees, but in doing so they will increase the burdens on already over-burdened businesses.

Criminalizing Background Checks

AB 1450, by Assemblyman Michael Allen, D-Santa Rosa, subjects employers to charges of discrimination for inquiring into an applicant’s most recent employment history.

“Today millions of Californians are out of work and struggling to find jobs,” said Allen, as he introduced the bill on the Assembly floor on May 30. “The challenge of long-term unemployment is especially severe among older workers who are more likely than any other age group to be unemployed for more than a year. Men and women returning from military service overseas have been hard hit as well.

“Unfortunately, companies, including employment agencies and job-posting websites, have explicitly advertised that they won’t hire someone who is currently unemployed. Thus people who have lost their previous jobs through no fault of their own have been trapped by the cruel Catch 22 situation: if you’re out of work you’re out of luck. AB 1450 seeks to end that Catch 22 by requiring employers and employment agencies, online job-posting sites and contractors doing business for the state from denying employment opportunities to individuals simply because they are out of work through no fault of their own.”

The innocuous-sounding bill passed easily along party lines in the Assembly, and is now working its way through the Senate where it will likely sail through.

But not if California Chamber of Commerce officials can help it. They put together a short video, warning that the bill will create a dilemma for employers in the hiring process: If they do a background check on an applicant, find out he is unemployed and then don’t hire him, it opens up the employer to fees, penalties and a discrimination lawsuit. For example, a hospital couldn’t check whether an anesthesiologist has a history of putting patients at risk, according to the Chamber.

The Chamber’s Policy Advocate Jennifer Barrera said, “Employers want to know who they are bringing into their workplace. And if they can’t properly screen an applicant without the threat of a discrimination claim they could perhaps bring in somebody who’s dangerous into their workplace.”

Cal Chamber President/CEO Allan Zaremberg said, “This is what’s crazy about this legislation: an employer doesn’t have the option. The Legislature in California is preventing an employer from determining whether or not a new employee is going to be dangerous or a hazard. And that is just going to put everybody at risk.”

Diane Miller, an executive recruiter, agreed, saying, “From an employer’s standpoint, I think it’s very scary.”

The analysis of AB 1450 prepared for the Senate Appropriations Committee reveals that the legislation is potentially confusing. First it states that the bill makes it illegal for an employer or recruiter to refuse “to hire a person because of that person’s employment status.” But a little later on it states that the bill does not prevent an employer or recruiter from finding out about an applicant’s employment status and job history, and it does not prevent them from “refusing to offer employment to a person because of the reasons underlying an individual’s employment status.”

Its main import will be to allow anyone who is unemployed and not hired for a job, to file a discrimination complaint and/or a lawsuit against the employer on the suspicion that he did not get the job because he’s unemployed. It’s hard to imagine the complaint or litigation being successful unless an employer were stupid enough to state that the person did not get hired because he’s unemployed. But in the meantime employers will be hit with the time and expense of fighting frivolous complaints and litigation. And the state budget will be hit with the expense of hiring more complaint investigators to deal with an estimated 20 percent increase in their workload, according to the analysis.

Caregivers Added to Protected Class

AB 1999, by Assemblywoman Julia Brownley, D-Santa Monica, makes it easier for an employee who is caring for a family member to sue his employer if he feels he’s not being treated like other employees who are not family caregivers.

“In today’s difficult job market many workers feel pressure to hide the fact that they have family caregiving responsibilities, because they fear that being labeled as a caregiver may make them vulnerable to being laid off or having other adverse actions taken against them,” Brownley told the Senate Judiciary Committee on June 26. “AB 1999 would simply prevent employers from unfairly using an employee’s family caregiver status as a factor in employment decisions.”

Joan Williams, founding director of the Center for WorkLife Law, told the committee that if identical resumes are submitted to employers, except one of them states that the applicant is a mother and the other doesn’t, the mother “is nearly 80 percent less likely to be hired and 100 percent less likely to be promoted. Fathers do great in the workplace so long as they don’t make it clear that they have caregiving responsibilities. If they make it clear they do, then the discrimination against them is even stronger than it is against mothers.”

Also discriminated against are female job applicants who are wearing wedding rings, according to Williams. “The assumption is that she’s going to have a child soon, and she’s not hired,” she said. The bill would also protect an employee who is caring for his father who is on dialysis and doesn’t receive a promotion “because of the assumption that their attention is going to be elsewhere,” she said. “The economy is simply too bad to have people losing their jobs because they’re doing the kind of thing that we would expect any responsible family member to do.”

Mariko Yoshihara, political director for the California Employment Lawyers Association, told the committee about Bakersfield firefighter Derek Tisinger, a single father who was passed over for promotion because he often traded his shifts with other firefighters in order to pick up his three children from school, feed them dinner and get them to bed. Tisinger sued and won $75,000 from a jury, but the award was overturned on appeal.

Barrera led the opposition against AB 1999 at the committee hearing, arguing that it’s poorly written. She cited “the ambiguity this would create because it was not defined as to what ‘family caregiver status’ is. The bill says it’s medical or supervisory care. But what is medical care? To the extent that you’re just providing Tylenol to your child that you’re going to trigger the medical care, then it’s going to broaden who is protected under this classification. It could apply essentially to every person in the workforce. And when we protect everybody, it makes our ability to manage the workforce impossible.”

Barrera added that there is no need for the bill because there are already a plethora of federal and state laws in place protecting the rights of workers from discrimination.

The committee approved the bill 3-1.

Unlimited Leave

AB 2039, authored by Assemblyman Sandré Swanson, D-Alameda, follows the same pattern as the other two job killers. It significantly expands the category of serious health conditions that allow an employee to take a leave of absence.

All three bills are scheduled for review Thursday in the Senate Appropriations Committee.

“We identify job killers because we think they are going to have a negative impact on our job recovery,” said Zaremberg in another Chamber video. “It’s exactly the opposite of what the number one issue is in California and the country: job creation, economy recovery. These kinds of [job-killing] situations don’t appear anywhere else in the country. And when you have increased exposure of liability you think twice before you invest in California. We need to change that attitude.”