Task: songer_geniss

What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Your task is to identify the issue in the case, that is, the social and/or political context of the litigation in which more purely legal issues are argued. Put somewhat differently, this field identifies the nature of the conflict between the litigants. The focus here is on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. Consider the following categories: "criminal" (including appeals of conviction, petitions for post conviction relief, habeas corpus petitions, and other prisoner petitions which challenge the validity of the conviction or the sentence), "civil rights" (excluding First Amendment or due process; also excluding claims of denial of rights in criminal proceeding or claims by prisoners that challenge their conviction or their sentence (e.g., habeas corpus petitions are coded under the criminal category); does include civil suits instituted by both prisoners and callable non-prisoners alleging denial of rights by criminal justice officials), "First Amendment", "due process" (claims in civil cases by persons other than prisoners, does not include due process challenges to government economic regulation), "privacy", "labor relations", "economic activity and regulation", and "miscellaneous".

PER CURIAM.
This is an appeal from an order granting summary judgment for the defendant in a suit brought to compel arbitration under section 301 of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 185. The sole question is whether the contracts entered into between the plaintiff union and the defendant employer required the employer to arbitrate the change from an incentive pay system to a straight hourly pay system for the plaintiff’s members.
The parties agree that the case is controlled by United Steelworkers of America v. Warrior & Gulf Navigation Co., 363 U.S. 574, 80 S.Ct. 1347, 4 L.Ed.2d 1409. The plaintiff relies particularly on the following expression found on page 582, on page 1353 of 80 S.Ct.:
“An order to arbitrate the particular grievance should not be denied unless it may be said with positive assurance that the arbitration clause is not susceptible of an interpretation that covers the asserted dispute. Doubts should be resolved in favor of coverage.”
The court also said on page 584, on page 1354 of 80 S.Ct.: “A specific collective bargaining agreement may exclude contracting out from the grievance procedure.”
The Master Agreement between the parties contained both an arbitration provision and a no-strike clause. However, paragraph 3-c of the applicable Wage Plan Agreement, entered into subsequently, says in part:
“The Company may cancel any production standard or incentive application when new or changed conditions such as those referred to make it impracticable, in the Company’s judgment, to accurately measure the operation for incentive application. Thereafter, the hourly base rate for the job class to which the job is assigned shall apply.” [Emphasis added.]
Paragraph 4 of the Wage Plan Agreement, which provides that the grievance and arbitration procedures set out in the Master Agreement, shall be utilized only:
“(a) At any time after the initial agreement on the hourly base rate scale referred to in Paragraph 2-e, the accuracy of descriptions and the accuracy of the application of the evaluation factors described in the Job Evaluation Manual to new or changed jobs other than bench-mark jobs; and
“(b) The accuracy of the application of .sound and accepted work measurement techniques to the development of production standards by the Company.”
The language of paragraph 3-c clearly states that the employer’s judgment is controlling as to whether an incentive system should be in effect, and paragraph 4 does not include the dispute in question among the matters which are arbitrable. Therefore, this court holds that under the Agreement, the employer was not obligated to submit to arbitration.
Judgment affirmed.

Question: What is the general issue in the case?
A. criminal
B. civil rights
C. First Amendment
D. due process
E. privacy
F. labor relations
G. economic activity and regulation
H. miscellaneous
Answer:

Answer: F