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Strike

Brazil: GM Workers Reject Contract, Continue Strike In Defiance Of Union

October 17, 2021 Eduardo Parati, WSWS. , , ,
The readiness of workers to continue their struggle for jobs and decent wages is an expression of the growing resistance of the working class in Brazil and worldwide to the assault on their living conditions and the ruling class’s demand for a new “normal” of mass COVID-19 infections. Recently, strikes in defense of living conditions were also conducted by Jurong shipyard workers in Espírito Santo, metalworkers in Paraná, app delivery workers throughout Brazil, and yesterday by teachers and municipal employees in São Paulo. Since the beginning of the year, the living conditions of the working class have seriously deteriorated in Brazil. Studies have shown that as early as December 2020, more than half of the Brazilian population was living under food insecurity, a situation that has worsened in the face of food and fuel price hikes and a cumulative inflation rate of 10.25 percent over the past 12 months.

Group Home Workers Launch Strike Against Low Wages And Benefits

October 16, 2021 Erik Schreiber, WSWS. , , ,
Group home workers in Connecticut went on strike on Tuesday morning after talks with their employer, Sunrise Northeast, broke down. The workers are demanding higher wages, affordable health benefits and pensions. Sunrise runs 28 group home and day care programs for the intellectually disabled throughout Connecticut. Workers formed picket lines in front of the company’s homes in New London, Hartford, Danielson and Columbia. The workers’ responsibilities include helping residents to shower and dress and reminding them to take their medication. Like other health care workers, the group home workers have been risking their health and lives during the pandemic. As of October 13, Connecticut had recorded 2,907 new coronavirus cases and one new death during the previous week. To date, the state has seen 8,667 deaths.

Hospitals Brace For Strikes As Workers Protest Staff Shortages

October 16, 2021 Kristen Hwang, Cal Matters. , , ,
As weary health care workers across California enter the 19th month of the pandemic, thousands are walking off the job and onto the picket line, demanding more staffing. The strikes and rallies threaten to cripple hospital operations that have been inundated by the COVID-19 Delta surge as well as patients seeking long-delayed care. More than two dozen hospitals across the state — including some Kaiser Permanente and Sutter Health facilities and USC Keck Medicine — have experienced strikes by engineers, janitorial staff, respiratory therapists, nurses, midwives, physical therapists and technicians over the past four months. This week, nearly a third of all California hospitals reported “critical staffing shortages” to the federal government, with more predicting shortages in the coming week.

Why Hollywood Workers Are Threatening A Massive Strike

October 16, 2021 Dave Jamieson, Huffington Post. , , ,
Roughly 60,000 film and television workers in Los Angeles and other cities plan to walk off the job early Monday if the major studios don’t offer a satisfactory union contract before then. It would be the largest strike to hit the U.S. private sector in 14 years. Matthew Loeb, the president of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts (IATSE), said his members hope it doesn’t come to that. But after five months of negotiations, he said it was necessary to Set A Deadline and force the studios’ hand. “Otherwise you’re kicking the can down the road,” said Loeb, who spoke with HuffPost on Wednesday just before heading into another bargaining session. “It’s time that the employers make a decision.”

Over 10,000 Deere Workers Launch First Strike In 35 Years

October 14, 2021 WSWS. , , ,
Approximately 10,100 workers at agricultural equipment giant Deere and Company began to strike at midnight Central Time early Thursday morning. The workers are located at plants in Iowa, Illinois and Kansas, as well as two parts centers in Georgia and Colorado. The walkout is the first at the company in 35 years and is the largest strike by manufacturing workers in the US since the 40-day strike at General Motors in 2019. “Our time is now!” a Deere worker in Illinois told the WSWS. A second worker added, “We are glad to be going on strike, it shows we’re not settling. That’s what everybody wanted the first time,” i.e., when the last contract expired on October 1. “People knew it was time based on the horrible TA [tentative agreement] Deere offered, so they’re fed up and ready to do what’s necessary,” a third Deere worker stated.

The Great Strike Of 2021

October 13, 2021 Jack Rasmus. , , ,
The best definition of a strike is when ‘workers withhold their labor’ for better wages and working conditions. The conventional wisdom is that unions go on strike. But that is incorrect. Workers go on strike and they don’t necessarily need to be members of unions. That fact is evident today as millions of US workers are refusing to return to their jobs. They are ‘withholding their labor’ searching for better pay and a future. We are witnessing the ‘Great Strike of 2021’ and it’s composed mostly of millions low paid non-unionized workers! Workers returned to jobs at a rate of 889,000 a month during the 2nd quarter 2021 (April-June) as the economy reopened. That average fell to only 280,000 per month in the just completed 3rd quarter 2021 (July-Sept), according to the Economic Policy Institute.

160,000 Metalworkers In South Africa Are On Strike

October 10, 2021 Ju Angio, Left Voice. , , ,
On October 5, the South African National Union of Metalworkers (NUMSA) called for an indefinite strike (a strike without a set end date) to demand an 8-percent increase in wages — and 160,000 workers in the steel and engineering sector answered the call. The union, South Africa’s largest, represents 400,000 workers in total. The massive strike continues the tense social crisis that has rocked the country since riots broke out in July in two provinces over the jailing of former president Jacob Zuma. “We’re suffering,” Sapelo, a metallurgy technician, told Radio France International. “I’ve been at this job for 13 years with no gratitude. The salary I get isn’t enough. I’m in debt, and I have to support my father, my mother, my brothers, and sisters. They all depend on me.”

Kaiser Permanente Employees May Strike Over Two-Tier Pay System

October 9, 2021 Mark Kreidler, Capital & Main. , , ,
For 13 years, registered nurse Kim Mullen has been part of a successful experiment: a collaborative partnership between the health care professionals at Kaiser Permanente and the executives who run the massive nonprofit. Decisions about the day to day delivery of care were shared among physicians, managers and employees. Workers’ input was actively and continuously solicited. Staffing ratios, wages and benefits, patient care — all were subject to group-based discussion and problem solving. “It’s a model that puts patients first,” says Mullen, who works at Kaiser’s South Bay Medical Center in the Harbor City area of Los Angeles. “We have always led in partnership. I now help teach that model of partnership. And we’ve known what the vision was — like a compass, with our patients’ care right in the middle.

Indefinite Strike Hits South Africa’s Engineering Sector

October 6, 2021 Peoples Dispatch. , , ,
The first day of the indefinite strike in South Africa’s engineering sector on Tuesday, October 5, saw workers in red T-shirts hit the streets in thousands demanding a wage hike. Marches and rallies were witnessed in Kaserne, Northern Cape, Eastern Cape and Western Cape.  In Johannesburg, thousands marched to the office of the Metals Engineering and Industries Bargaining Council (MEIBC), where the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) delivered a memorandum to all the employer associations in the sector. Representing 155,000 of the estimated total 300,000 workers in the sector, NUMSA is leading the strike, which is also supported by other unions.

Workers At Kellogg’s Cereal Production Plants Are On Strike

October 6, 2021 BCTGM. , , , ,
Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union (BCTGM) President Anthony Shelton issued the following statement in support of 1,400 BCTGM members in Battle Creek, Mich. (Local 3G), Omaha, Neb. (Local 50G), Lancaster, Pa. (Local 374G) and Memphis, Tenn. (Local 252G) who are on strike against the Kellogg Company: “The BCTGM International Union stands in unwavering Solidarity with our courageous Brothers and Sisters who are on strike against the Kellogg Company.  “For more than a year throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Kellogg workers around the country have been working long, hard hours, day in and day out, to produce Kellogg ready-to-eat cereals for American families. 

IATSE Authorizes Strike With ‘Yes’ Votes Totaling 98 Percent

October 4, 2021 By Chris O'Falt and Chris Lindahl, IndieWire. , , ,
IATSE members have overwhelmingly voted in favor of a strike authorization, the union announced Monday morning. Ninety-eight percent of all votes cast were in favor of a strike, and 90 percent of all members turned out to vote. But production won’t grind to a halt, at least not yet. The results give IATSE President Matthew Loeb the power to call a strike for IATSE members working under two expired contracts: the Hollywood Basic Agreement, which covers the approximately 40,000 to 45,000 members of 13 West Coast locals, and the Area Standards Agreement, which covers some 10,000 to 15,000 members employed on productions in places like Georgia, New Mexico, and Louisiana. Negotiations between IATSE and the AMPTP reached an impasse last month, prompting Loeb to call the vote.

Wave Of Labor Unrest Could See Tens Of Thousands On Strike Within Weeks

October 2, 2021 Michael Sainato, The Guardian. , ,
Tens of thousands of workers around the US could go on strike in the coming weeks in what would be the largest wave of labor unrest since a series of teacher strikes in 2018 and 2019, which won major victories and gave the American labor movement a significant boost. The unrest spans a huge range of industries from healthcare to Hollywood and academia, and is largely focused on higher wages, fighting cuts and better working and safety conditions, especially in light of Covid-19.

Cinematographers Guild Urges Members To Authorize Strike

September 27, 2021 David Robb, Deadline. , , ,
Leaders of IATSE’s largest local – the International Cinematographers Guild Local 600 – are urging their members to authorize a strike against film and television productions across the country. The local’s national executive board voted unanimously on Sunday to support a nationwide strike authorization vote and to recommend that members vote “Yes” on it. “The elected leaders of Local 600 spoke with one voice today on behalf of the thousands of their members who are unified in their resolve to get a fair deal from the employers who have walked away from the bargaining table,” said Local 600 president John Lindley. “This fight is about basic rights and safe and healthy working conditions,” said Rebecca Rhine, the local’s national executive director.

Coal Miners’ Ongoing Strike Against BlackRock’s Warrior Met

September 22, 2021 Stansfield Smith, Popular Resistance. , , ,
Larry Spencer, UMWA District 20 Vice President, represents the 1,100 coal miners in three UMWA locals which on strike against Warrior Met in Alabama since April 1, 2021. He will give an update on the strike in a September 28 webinar. The strikers are fighting to reverse concessions that were foisted on them in 2016 when BlackRock and other billionaire creditors set up Warrior Met Coal and took over mine operations with the aid of a bankruptcy court. To keep their jobs, Warrior Met made the miners work up to seven days a week and take a $6-an-hour pay cut, accept reduced health insurance, and give up most of their overtime pay and paid holidays. BlackRock is one of the three majority shareholders in the new company.

Nabisco Strike Ends: BCTGM Members Overwhelmingly Accept New Contract

September 19, 2021 BCTGM. , , ,
Members of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union (BCTGM) working for Nabisco/Mondelez in Portland, Ore., Aurora, Colo., Richmond, Va., Chicago, Ill. and Norcross, Ga. have voted overwhelmingly to accept a new collective bargaining agreement. Approval of the contract ends the BCTGM’s strike against Nabisco which began on August 10, 2021. In commenting on the membership vote to ratify the new contract, BCTGM International President Anthony Shelton stated, "This has been a long and difficult fight for our striking members, their families and our Union. Throughout the strike, our members displayed tremendous courage, grit and determination.
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