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Worker Rights and Jobs

Oregon Nurses End 46-Day Strike With Pay And Staffing Agreements

March 4, 2025 Kari Thompson, Labor Notes. , , , , , ,
After 46 days on the picket line, nurses walked back into eight Providence hospitals across Oregon in good spirits after ratifying a new contract with their employer February 26. Their effort was bolstered by striking doctors, nurse practitioners, and other hospitalists at Providence St. Vincent’s, and doctors, nurses, and midwives at the Providence Women’s Clinics. The agreements for the 5,000 nurses, who are represented by Oregon Nurses Association (ONA), include improvements in staffing language, pay raises, and pay for missed meals or breaks during a shift. They had rejected a proposal in early February, voting to stay on strike.

How Rank-And-File Democracy Transformed The Teamsters And UAW

March 3, 2025 Michael J. Goldberg, Power At Work. , , , , , , ,
It’s well known in labor circles that the 2020’s opened with a tremendous resurgence of rank-and-file activism in the workplace. Beginning with 2021’s “Striketober” and sparked initially by the hardships of the pandemic and emboldened by the labor shortages that followed, that upsurge targeted union and nonunion workplaces alike. Among the collective bargaining breakthroughs in already unionized workplaces, two of the most important involved the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) and the United Auto Workers (UAW). In 2023, the IBT won a historic contract with its largest employer, UPS, without having to follow through on its threat to strike.

How Common Ground Cafe Workers Won A Union And A Cafe

February 28, 2025 Bernadette King Fitzsimons, EWOC. , , , ,
In December 2022, workers at Common Ground Cafe in Baltimore started to talk about forming a union. They wanted to address issues of pay equity and workplace discrimination, among others. They hoped their boss would be open to working with them to improve the cafe, which had been a mainstay in Baltimore’s Hampden neighborhood for over 20 years. Instead, when the boss found out about their union drive in July 2023, he closed the business with less than 12 hours’ notice. Nik Koski, a Common Ground worker involved in the union campaign, was completely shocked: “We prepare ourselves for the different ways a boss might retaliate, but to actually experience it was something else.”

Targeted Postal Workers Are A Bellwether For All US Unions

February 27, 2025 Eric Chornoby, Labor Notes. , , , ,
The Trump administration has set its sights on the U.S. Postal Service and its 600,000 workers, 91 percent of whom are union members. The USPS is the nation’s largest unionized employer. Postal workers like me are raising the alarm. If any agency should be immune to political meddling, it’s the USPS. The Postal Service’s role is outlined in the U.S. Constitution. The 1970 Postal Reform Act establishes postal workers’ right to collective bargaining and to filing with the NLRB. If the Trump administration thinks it can interfere in this unionized workplace, no worker is safe.

OnPoint United Workers Fight To Unionize Overdose Prevention Site

February 26, 2025 OnPoint United Workers, Left Voice. , , ,
It’s been over a year since we won recognition and began negotiations at OnPoint NYC, an uphill battle to ratify a union contract. The compassion and love required to do the vital work we provide often comes at a personal cost to us as employees, yet our organization’s leadership refuses to extend that same love to us. As the first organization of its kind, there are no existing structures to support us, often leaving us burnt out and without proper protections for our well-being and mental health. Yet despite winning recognition over a year ago, our employer continues to union bust at every turn. We say: enough is enough.

National Day Of Action: Federal Union Rank-And-Filers Protest Musk

February 25, 2025 Steve Early, Beyond Chron. , , , , , ,
In Washington, D.C., there’s now a ritual formula for labor gatherings outside a government office to protest the latest depredations of the “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) created by President Trump. Paid staffers from national union headquarters and the AFL-CIO arrive with neatly printed signs and approved messages. Worried federal workers mill about on their lunch hour, share the latest rumors, and hold the signs. PR consultants buttonhole the press and hand out media advisories. Often the news of day involves another lawsuit being filed against DOGE. Top union officials and their putative friends on Capitol Hill show up to deliver fiery rally rhetoric or leave statements of support in their wake.

Care Workers Get A Seat At The Table

February 24, 2025 Osita Nwanevu, In These Times. , , ,
The way she tells it, Sandra Sherwood first stepped into direct care work at 16, when she started caring for her grandfather who had suffered a stroke on his farm. ​“Mom and I headed over there, and when we got there, granddad couldn’t even make a sentence —it was all garbled, didn’t make any sense of what he was trying to say,” she remembers. ​“He would be in a wheelchair from then on because it affected one whole half of his body.” “Everything got sold,” she continues. ​“The property, the chickens, the cows, the pigs — everything got sold. Granddad and grandma ended up moving in with my mom and dad and the family.

Locals Hit Elon Musk Tesla Car Dealers Again

February 23, 2025 John Zangas, DC  Media Group. , , , , , , ,
Local grassroots organizers stepped up actions on Saturday for the second weekend outside Elon Musk’s Tesla electric vehicle dealerships in hopes of spurring a boycott against the company. At least four dealerships were targeted in the region as fury rose against the mega-billionaire and world’s richest man. The protests were part of a national effort by many grassroots groups. Local dealerships of the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia (DC-MD-VA) at Georgetown, Washington DC; Rockville, Maryland; Tysons Corner and Arlington, Virginia were among those sites of the weekend protests.

The Movement Supporting Public Employees Is Rising

February 23, 2025 Sarah Jaffe, In These Times. , , , , ,
Thousands of workers hit the streets February 19, all around the country — at federal offices like the Department of Health and Human Services, at Tesla dealerships and public spaces — to declare their opposition to the slashing and burning of public services currently happening under the guise of ​“efficiency.” Workers focused on billionaire Elon Musk’s power within President Donald Trump’s new administration, through the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). National Park Service workers, standing in the snow, brandished signs reading, ​“Immigrants didn’t steal my job. The president did.”

Federal Workers Mobilize Against Musk’s And Trump’s ‘Corporate Coup’

February 21, 2025 Jenny Brown, Labor Notes. , , , ,
Federal employee union members have been speaking out, rallying, and suing, as agency after agency has been hit by Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE)—a private unaccountable entity which has been demanding access to all government records while spreading wild lies about waste and fraud. Around 20,000 workers have been summarily fired so far. Federal workers raised the alarm at over 30 “Save our Services” rallies around the country Wednesday, including in New York, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Philadelphia, Denver, Boston, Boise, Chattanooga and Chicago.

Blocked Nippon Deal Is Lesson On Tariffs: Workers Need A Say

February 19, 2025 Jenny Brown, Labor Notes. , , ,
The business press howled in January when outgoing President Joe Biden blocked Japanese steel giant Nippon from buying U.S. Steel. The Steelworkers (USW) had strongly opposed the deal. But Nippon’s promises to invest, and U.S. Steel’s threats to close plants, led some members and local union officials to support it. As a result, the press portrayed the disagreement as “union bosses” versus the rank and file. In fact, most workers were skeptical and the union had good reasons to oppose the takeover. The Trump administration has imposed 25 percent tariffs on imported steel and aluminum, to start March 4.

Strike At Kaiser: They Take Care Of Us, Who Will Take Care Of Them?

February 17, 2025 Cal Winslow, Counter Punch. , , , , ,
2400 striking behavioral health care workers in Southern California have taken to the streets – literally. On February 8, workers sat down in the middle of Sunset Blvd in Los Angeles, blocking traffic in front of Kaiser Permanente’s Los Angeles Medical Center. The strikers, members of the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW), blocked traffic until a dozen of them, as well as California Labor Federation President Lorena Gonzalez and other supporters, were arrested. The sit-in marked day 110 of the strike. The strikers want parity with Kaiser’s workers in Northern California, workers who won significant gains in a 2022 10-week strike.

University Of California Healthcare, Research Employees Vote To Strike

February 16, 2025 Suhauna Hussain, Los Angeles Times. , , , , ,
Thousands of University of California healthcare, research and technical employees voted to authorize a strike, citing what they described as systemic and ongoing staffing shortages that erode patient care and hurt research operations. The strike authorization comes amid strained negotiations between the university and University Professional and Technical Employees-CWA Local 9119, the union representing nearly 20,000 employees in various research labs and medical facilities across the 10-campus UC system. The unionized workers include nurse case managers, mental health counselors, optometrists, pharmacists, physical therapists, clinical researchers, IT analysts and animal health technicians.

Leveraging Public Funding To Strengthen Worker Protections

February 14, 2025 Nick Wertsch, Inequality.org. , , ,
Weeks into President Trump’s second term, everyday working people are already suffering the brunt of conservative attacks, from ICE raids and mass arrests to unlawful cuts to the federal workforce and the elimination of programs that expand and ensure equity of opportunity, bar discrimination, and reduce racial disparities. Most recently, the Trump administration has unleashed a broadside of attacks on federal workers and the agencies such as the National Labor Relations Board that protect them. Unions are one of the most effective institutions for reducing racial and economic inequality, protecting immigrant communities, and building worker power.

It’s Time For A United Front To Take On Billionaire Rule

February 13, 2025 Luis Feliz Leon, In These Times. , , , , ,
President Donald Trump relishes deploying the ​“weave,” his vulgar stream-of-consciousness spiels in which his vengeful fantasies and antipathy towards a cast of enemies become punchlines in an insult-comic routine. His far-right former adviser Steve Bannon has termed the Trump administration’s psychological warfare approach ​“flooding the zone.” ​“Every day we hit them with three things,” Bannon told PBS’s Frontline in 2019. ​“They’ll bite on one, and we’ll get all of our stuff done. Bang, bang, bang. These guys will never — will never be able to recover. But we’ve got to start with muzzle velocity.”
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