NO MEAL INCLUDED

FMLA, Flight Delays, and the Quiet Dismantling of Worker Rights

I run a Patreon where, for $15 a month, I’ll answer one high level HR question. Simple, right? Yesterday, I got one that hit me sideways. An employee told me her HR Manager warned against filing for FMLA, saying it might cost her job. Not in so many words — but enough. Here’s the thing: legally, under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), an employer can’t fire you because you take leave. They can restructure — but you’re owed a lateral role with no loss in pay. Yes, loopholes exist. That’s why we have lawyers. But this wasn’t legal — it was personal. And the kicker? The HR lady telling her not to take FMLA had taken her own leave two weeks later.

Just as I was mulling this over, the headlines screamed: flight delays at Newark. Hundreds grounded. My heart didn’t go to the stranded passengers. It went to the HR team inside that air traffic control center — probably being ripped to shreds while trying to explain Family Medical Leave Act — a federal law to a stressed-out workforce and a CEO on the warpath.

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This all took me back. Way back. I was a Jersey kid during the Reagan years, raised in poverty but trained to see education as a ladder out. I didn’t have the right clothes. I didn’t have a phone. But I had a family who taught me the most American thing of all: read, think, rise. So I became the HR lady — the one who knows the difference between protection and punishment.

And if you know HR, you should know the story of 1981. Reagan busted the air traffic controllers’ union — PATCO — firing 11,000 employees who were mostly veterans. He barred them from federal work. The union that endorsed him got kneecapped. Corporate America took notes. Within a year, Wharton business school released strikebreaking how-to guides. Unions crumbled. Worker protections slipped quietly into history.

Now, fast forward. I moved to California just in time for the O.J. chase. People keep asking: why was that trial such a powder keg? Because injustice cuts both ways. For many in the Black community, O.J.’s acquittal was the only moment the system bent in their favor. And then, in a silent counter-punch, white America rioted — in voting booths. Affirmative action? Gone. Services slashed. Programs gutted. As Roger Boesche wrote in the Los Angeles Times, white America doesn’t riot in the streets. We riot at the polls.

Now here we are again. The FAA is flailing. Air traffic technology runs on floppy disks. Staffing shortages are pushing people past the brink. The job is so stressful that mandatory retirement kicks in at 56. Mental health leave is up. And what are the headlines? Delays. Inconvenience. Poor planning. Not one headline about the people. Just the performance.

In the Jan. 29 fatal crash between a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines passenger jet, which is still under investigation, one controller was handling both commercial airline and helicopter traffic at the busy airport.

Just days before the collision, President Trump disbanded the FAA’s Aviation Security Advisory Committee — a panel formed after the 1988 Pan Am 103 bombing. Its job was to examine national safety standards. Then came Newark.

FMLA is a legal protection for workers. I think this workers right will be on the chopping block — call it a gut instinct. But let’s be honest — it’s in the crosshairs. If the government wants to quietly dismantle labor rights again, FMLA is low-hanging fruit. First, they’ll say it’s being abused. Then they’ll call it outdated. Then they’ll leave it on the books but stop enforcing it when employees are fired for taking FMLA. That’s how it works.

I’m not psychic. I’m just good at pattern recognition. Reagan gave us privatization. O.J. gave us backlash. Trump gave us deregulation. Biden gave us silence. Each administration inherits the same chess board. Only the pieces move.

Meanwhile, look at the Kardashians — yes, them. The patriarch defended O.J. The daughter built an empire on filtered perfection and a sex tape. She became America’s cultural export, then wore Marilyn Monroe’s dress like a costume and ruined it. It didn’t fit, so they cut to fit. A piece of mythic America, tailored for a billionaire’s Instagram post. It’s all connected. Justice. Image. Value. Who gets protected — and who gets paraded.

So what’s next? Will HR disappear as AI is handling the paperwork. Middle managers are vanishing. Employees are liabilities again. Hell, they all want to go out on FMLA. But here’s the question for companies: would you rather deal with fair labor laws — or with a union resurgence that doesn’t play by your rules?

We are not children of Silicon Valley or Wall Street. We are children of steel, soot, and grit. If we lose FMLA — if we lose even one more legal right — we lose the last thread holding the American worker together. HR was the buffer. If the buffer’s gone, don’t be surprised when people stop playing nice.

So yes, I see a dangerous pattern. And no — I can’t bend the knee. My Irish ancestors would kill me dead. Besides, I need a knee replacement.

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