Forced arbitration case tests workers’ access to court

A labor law fight over forced arbitration is back before the U.S. Supreme Court with major implications for delivery drivers and other workers who keep interstate commerce moving. At the center is the question of whether employers can keep steering job disputes into private arbitration systems that are typically individual, confidential and tilted toward limiting public accountability.

Labor lawyer Andrew Strom joined the America’s Work Force Union Podcast to discuss the growing trend of companies forcing private arbitration through onboarding paperwork. Strom discussed when the trend began and what it could mean for workers who deliver goods within a national distribution network.

• Forced arbitration often operates as a barrier to justice by isolating workers and discouraging attorneys from taking smaller-value claims.

• The Supreme Court is being asked to narrow which workers can avoid arbitration under a long-standing transportation worker exemption.

• The outcome could influence how last-mile delivery work is treated across industries that rely on interstate supply chains.

Forced arbitration keeps expanding across workplaces

The modern workplace dispute system increasingly runs through private arbitration rather than public courts. Employers commonly present arbitration paperwork at onboarding, bundled with routine forms and policies. The practical effect is that many workers sign away the ability to bring claims in court without meaningful negotiation or even a clear understanding of what they are giving up.

That shift did not happen by accident. It grew out of a decades-long legal project to apply the Federal Arbitration Act, a 1925 statute originally designed to enforce arbitration agreements between businesses, to employment relationships. Labor advocates have long argued that Congress did not intend the law to govern worker-employer disputes. Yet a key Supreme Court ruling in 2001 opened the door for employers to treat arbitration clauses as enforceable conditions of employment across most industries.

Today, forced arbitration is not simply an alternative forum. It is often a structural advantage for employers because it reduces public scrutiny, limits collective action and makes it harder for workers to find representation. When disputes are pushed into private systems, patterns of misconduct can remain hidden, and the deterrent effect of public litigation weakens.

What the Supreme Court will decide in Flowers Foods v. Brock

Strom began by discussing the case set for argument later this month, Flowers Foods v. Brock, which centers on a deceptively technical question with broad consequences: who qualifies for the transportation worker exemption in the Federal Arbitration Act.

Strom said the statute contains language excluding certain workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce from forced arbitration. In practice, that exemption has become one of the few remaining pathways for workers to challenge mandatory arbitration clauses.

The worker at the center of the case is a last-mile delivery driver in a national bread distribution system. The company’s supply chain moves baked goods from production sites to warehouses and then to local destinations such as supermarkets. The driver’s route is local, but the products have traveled across state lines as part of a continuous commercial flow.

Strom explained that employers and industry groups are urging the court to adopt a narrow definition of interstate commerce that would exclude workers who do not personally cross state lines. Worker advocates argue that the approach ignores how modern logistics functions and would allow companies to carve out large segments of the delivery workforce from the exemption.

The dispute is not limited to one bakery company. Strom said the argument's logic would apply to any enterprise that relies on a layered distribution model in which long-haul transport feeds regional hubs and local drivers complete the final leg.

Why last-mile drivers are central to interstate commerce

Last-mile delivery has become a defining feature of the modern economy. Whether the product is food, medicine or consumer goods, the promise to deliver depends on a chain of labor that connects production, warehousing and local distribution.

In that system, Strom explained, the last mile is not incidental. It is the point at which interstate commerce becomes real for customers and business models are fulfilled. Treating last-mile work as separate from interstate commerce because a driver stays within one state draws an artificial line through an integrated process.

Worker advocates emphasize that commerce is not only about crossing borders. Strom said it is about moving goods through a coordinated network. A local driver delivering products that have traveled across state lines is performing work that is essential to the interstate transaction.

This framing matters, Strom explained, because the transportation worker exemption is one of the few legal tools available to resist forced arbitration. If the exemption is narrowed, more workers could be locked into private dispute systems even when their labor is inseparable from interstate supply chains.

The real stakes: jury trials, class actions and public accountability

Employers’ push for forced arbitration is widely understood as a strategy to reduce legal exposure. Two features of public courts are particularly threatening to corporate defendants: jury trials and class actions.

Strom explained that jury trials introduce community judgment and uncertainty. Class actions, especially in wage and hour disputes, allow workers to aggregate smaller harms into a case that is economically viable to litigate.

A common wage theft pattern involves small daily losses that add up over time. Strom gave examples like how a few minutes shaved from paid time each shift can add up to meaningful money over a year. But for a single worker, the total may still be too small to justify hiring counsel. When arbitration is mandatory and individualized, it becomes even harder to build a case that attracts representation.

The result is not merely that workers lose more often. Strom said the result is that many cases never get filed. Forced arbitration can operate as a silent filter, keeping disputes out of any forum where they might be meaningfully tested.

Confidentiality compounds the problem. Court filings are public, allowing workers, journalists and attorneys to see patterns, compare claims and build knowledge across cases. Whereas arbitration is typically private, limiting visibility and preventing workers from learning whether others have faced the same conduct.

How recent Supreme Court rulings shaped the battlefield

Strom explained how this case arrived in a legal landscape shaped by earlier Supreme Court decisions that expanded arbitration’s reach and restricted collective procedures.

The 2001 decision that applied the Federal Arbitration Act broadly to employment contracts left only a narrow carveout for transportation workers. More recently, the court has heard a series of cases about who fits within that carveout.

In the last several years, the court has signaled that the exemption can apply based on the work performed rather than the employer’s industry label. That approach, Strom said, recognizes that transportation work can be found across many kinds of businesses.

Strom added that Flowers Foods v. Brock tests whether the court will continue that functional analysis or accept a border-crossing requirement that would exclude many workers who move goods as part of interstate distribution.

What to watch next for unions and workers

The Supreme Court’s decision will be closely watched by unions, worker advocates and employers because it may determine how far forced arbitration can reach into logistics and delivery work.

Strom explained that if the court narrows the exemption, employers could gain leverage to impose arbitration on a wider set of workers who handle goods moving through interstate channels. That would likely reduce public litigation and make it harder to challenge wage theft, misclassification and other workplace violations.

If the court maintains a broader understanding of interstate commerce, last-mile drivers and similarly situated workers may retain a pathway to court. Even then, Strom warned, the larger forced arbitration system would remain in place for most workers, leaving the exemption as a limited defense rather than a comprehensive solution.

For labor, the case is a reminder that workplace rights are shaped not only by statutes and contracts but by procedural rules that determine where disputes can be heard and whether workers can act collectively.

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