{ "id": "R44106", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "number": "R44106", "active": true, "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "versions": [ { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 442985, "date": "2015-07-15", "retrieved": "2016-04-06T18:47:14.758273", "title": "Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces Executive Order: Questions and Answers", "summary": "On July 31, 2014, President Obama issued Executive Order 13673, Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces, with the stated intent of \u201cincreas[ing] efficiency and cost savings in the work performed by parties who contract with the Federal Government by ensuring that they understand and comply with labor laws.\u201d The order requires that executive branch procurement contractors disclose information about their compliance with 14 specified federal labor laws and their state equivalents as part of the award process. It also requires that agency contracting officers take these disclosures into consideration when assessing whether prospective vendors have a \u201csatisfactory record of integrity and business ethics\u201d as part of the responsibility determination process. Agencies generally cannot award a procurement contract without determining that the prospective vendor is \u201caffirmatively responsible\u201d for purposes of the contract. In addition, the order imposes certain requirements intended to promote \u201cpaycheck transparency\u201d for contractor employees and limit mandatory arbitration of employee claims. \nSubsequently, on March 6, 2015, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued guidance regarding the roles and responsibilities of the labor compliance advisors whom the order requires to be appointed within procuring agencies. Then, on May 28, 2015, DOL issued proposed guidance regarding the specific labor law violations to be considered when assessing vendors\u2019 responsibility, and the Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council (FAR Council) proposed amendments to the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to implement Executive Order 13673.\nExecutive Order 13673 and its proposed implementing guidance and regulations have prompted debate about both the specific labor and employment policies they seek to promote, as well as the general practice of using the federal procurement process to further social and economic objectives that some have described as \u201conly indirectly related to conventional procurement considerations.\u201d In particular, there have been questions about the President\u2019s authority to impose the requirements of Executive Order 13673; how the requirements of the order compare to preexisting law; and whether the order will result in blacklisting or the de facto debarment of government contractors. The term blacklisting is sometimes used to describe a practice of formally or informally identifying\u2014sometimes through the compilation of lists\u2014disfavored vendors with whom the government will not do business. The term de facto debarment describes the effective exclusion of vendors from the procurement process without the procedural protections afforded to them in formal debarment and suspension proceedings. Depending upon the facts and circumstances of the case, both blacklisting and de facto debarment could, if they occur, be found to have deprived contractors of due process in violation of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. \nThis report provides the answers to these and other questions about Executive Order 13673 and its proposed implementing guidance and regulations. The questions and answers are organized into three sections. The first section provides an overview of the executive order and related materials; the second discusses the order\u2019s relationship to existing law; and the third addresses other questions, including the President\u2019s authority to issue the order. In considering these questions and answers, note that certain DOL guidance and the proposed FAR amendments implementing Executive Order 13673 have not been finalized, and the order is not scheduled to be implemented until 2016, at the earliest.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/R44106", "sha1": "16a07b19909e4e9301885c564c0d2998a185665e", "filename": "files/20150715_R44106_16a07b19909e4e9301885c564c0d2998a185665e.html", "images": null }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R44106", "sha1": "ff0cef56f650cf395e1fb722f2060b2e00a18916", "filename": "files/20150715_R44106_ff0cef56f650cf395e1fb722f2060b2e00a18916.pdf", "images": null } ], "topics": [] } ], "topics": [ "Constitutional Questions", "National Defense" ] }