Controversy has swirled around the National Rifle Association of late.
Infighting that led to the ouster of Oliver North as the group’s president, its tenuous financial landscape and an investigation launched by the New York attorney general are just a few of the problems that have recently garnered attention.
While not as headline worthy, the NRA has also been grappling with the California Department of Insurance.
There’s trouble facing businesses nationwide, including those in the insurance space, coming in the form of lawsuits on behalf of visually impaired individuals against the owners and operators of websites not optimized for screen-reader technology.
No industry seems to be immune from the wave of complaints and demand letters from plaintiffs’ attorneys claiming violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act, a federal law requiring that public places – this includes hotels, restaurants, shops and, yes, insurance-related establishments – be accessible to people with disabilities.
An article by Mark Robinson, “What About Your Exposure,” was published in Insurance Journal on January 27, 2020.
The drumbeat of the #MeToo movement continues to shine a critically bright light on sexual misconduct and its shocking prevalence in the workplace. Without question, no industry is immune from incidents of sexual assault, and that includes the hospitality space. Indeed, given the unique nature of their operations, hoteliers must address the specter of sexual misconduct on their premises on multiple fronts. Call it a triple threat: sexual assaults of staff by guests; sexual harassment of hotel and resort employees by coworkers and supervisors; and sexual violence in guest rooms involving customers and third parties.
For many, just the mention of the word is enough for eyes to glaze over and minds to wander. Bring it up as fodder for cocktail party conversation, and the universal response is oftentimes a collective yawn. But insurance, though much maligned and not the sexiest of topics, is a critical cog in the wheel of commerce, and one that cannot be ignored. And that is because this intangible product is an invaluable tool that allows businesses, including those in the hospitality space, to manage the risk of financial loss – catastrophic and otherwise – by transferring it to third parties (read: insurance companies).
Big news recently came out of the California Supreme Court that impacts every hospitality employer in the Golden State.
At the very least, the decision in Dynamex Operations West Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles County is something that should grab the attention of hoteliers with California properties. And that’s because for the first time in nearly three decades, the standard to classify an individual as an employee or independent contractor has been altered.
This year marks Airbnb’s 10th anniversary. That’s right, for a decade now, the hospitality industry maverick has been eating away at something that hoteliers hold dear – market share of lodging worldwide. And it has done so with abandon, finding a seat at the table amongst hotels and resorts in a space that was clearly ripe for disruption in the age of the sharing economy.
Thirty years ago – nearly a decade before I was sworn in as a member of the bar – I had a job bussing tables at a swanky restaurant in beautiful Del Mar, California. I showed up for work on Friday and Saturday nights – and Sundays for brunch – and made myself busy clearing plates, utensils, wine glasses and anything else diners wanted out of their way. The tips were nothing to sneeze at, and I couldn’t have asked for a better part-time gig while in college in San Diego.
But there was something about the job that makes me scratch my head all these years later. On my night shifts, I closed the restaurant and was the last to leave. Yet before heading home, my responsibilities included bundling up trash from the kitchen and hauling the bags to dumpsters located on the opposite end of the building. Separately, I had to spray off the rubber mats that covered the kitchen floor and hang them over an outside railing to dry overnight. Here’s the rub. I wasn’t to do any of these tasks – which took me about 10 minutes, max – without first clocking out, setting the restaurant’s alarm and locking up.
No matter how you parse them, the numbers are staggering. On average, females in the U.S. workforce are paid $0.80 for every dollar earned by their male counterparts—this according to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR). The news is even worse for women of color, with African Americans making $0.63 and Latinas $0.54 compared to each dollar paid to white men—figures that make it hard to imagine the Equal Pay Act was passed more than 55 years ago.
The aggregate statistics are even more mind-blowing. According to the National Committee on Pay Equity, the total estimated earnings lost by a woman compared to a man over the span of a nearly 50-year career are $700,000 for a high school graduate, $1.2 million for a college graduate, and $2 million for a professional school graduate. There is more. Research by the IWPR suggests that if the sexes were compensated equally, the poverty level in this country would be cut in half and women would add $513 billion to the nation’s economy.
Call it what you will – the gig economy, sharing economy, freelance economy, on-demand economy, platform economy, [fill-in-the-blank] economy – the nuts and bolts of how we go about accessing people and services has changed dramatically in recent years. Want a ride? Grab an Uber. Hungry? DoorDash delivers. Need groceries? Instacart to the rescue. With just a couple of taps on a smart device, our every wish can seemingly be granted.
This genie-in-a-bottle approach to commerce extends beyond everyday consumers and into the corporate sphere as well, especially when it comes to staffing. Worldwide, an ever-growing force of independent workers available for short-term engagements is just a few clicks away. No doubt about it, the phenomenon most commonly referred to as the gig economy is shaking up “business as usual” across industries as technology transforms the manner in which companies – hotels and resorts included – fill vacant positions. And while this can certainly be a boon for hoteliers, the shifting employment paradigm is not without potential pitfalls.