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Worker Rights and Jobs

Workers Funding Other Workers’ Misery

October 15, 2023 Rachel Phua, The American Prospect. , , ,
Critics of private equity often stress the business model’s impact on workers. Blackstone’s Packers Sanitation Services, Inc., was found to have illegally hired over 100 minors and placed them in dangerous jobs. Arby’s and Dunkin’ Donuts owner Roark Capital lobbied against a federal minimum wage. Fairmont and Sofitel owner Brookfield Asset Management has repeatedly threatened to retaliate against hotel workers attempting to unionize. And when the private equity purchase of Toys ‘R’ Us drove the toy retailer into bankruptcy, leading to a loss of over 30,000 jobs, its owners Bain Capital, KKR, and Vornado Realty Trust made off with about $200 million in management fees.

Book Review: Soldiers As Workers In A Toxic Workplace

October 14, 2023 Betsy Zucker, Labor Notes. , , , ,
For decades, the armed services and contractors on bases abroad used massive burn pits for waste disposal, rather than safer methods. They burned everything from tires to computer equipment to medical waste and more, often using jet fuel, a known carcinogen, as an accelerant. These dangerous fumes would probably never have been allowed in stateside civilian workplaces. In the U.S., a company may risk penalties for illegal emissions or dangerous working conditions. If a civilian worker is lucky, their job may even have a union contract and a way to fight an unsafe workplace. Even without a union contract, if a job is lousy or overtly unsafe, a person can often walk away.

Introducing The Louder Than Ten Workers’ Cooperative

October 14, 2023 Travis Gertz, Louder Than Ten. , ,
Today is a big day. Today, Louder Than Ten Industries Inc. hands over operations to Louder Than Ten Workers’ Cooperative. That means Abby, Rachel, and I are equal partners. It also means new employees have the opportunity to purchase a stake and join us as an equal partner. We know this might sound like a questionable decision to many of you—especially to owners and consultants in our industry. We’re here to tell you that aside from being a more equitable and moral way of doing business, it’s also more practical, sustainable, productive, and financially secure. We’re gonna tell you why.

Auto Workers Escalate: Surprise Strike At Massive Ford Truck Plant

October 12, 2023 Keith Brower Brown, Labor Notes. , , , , , , ,
Every Friday for the past four weeks, Big 3 CEOs have waited fearfully for Auto Workers (UAW) President Shawn Fain to announce which plants will strike next. But without warning on Wednesday afternoon, the union threw a haymaker: within 10 minutes the UAW would be shutting down the vast Kentucky Truck Plant. This plant, on 500 acres outside Louisville, is one of Ford’s most profitable—cranking out full-size SUVs and the Superduty line of commercial trucks. “We make almost half of Ford’s U.S. revenue right here,” says James White, who has worked in the plant for a decade. These 8,700 strikers join the 25,000 already walking the lines at assembly plants and parts distribution centers across the country in the union’s escalating Stand-Up Strike.

On The Picket Line

October 11, 2023 Marie Kelly, Workers World. , , , , , ,
Registered nurses at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, New Jersey, have taken action against corporate greed and exploitation as well as union-busting tactics. Their strike is into its third month. The 1,700 nurses, represented by United Steelworkers Local 4-200, are demanding safe staffing. Research has proven that adequate nurse to patient ratios save lives. The pandemic was the match that lit the fire around safe staffing. Nurses were pushed to the brink and were no longer willing to put their patients’ lives and their own well-being and professional licenses at risk. Since the strike, RWJU bosses have shown that they undervalue their nurses by suspending health benefits and limiting picket lines at hospital entrances.

North Carolina Sanitation Workers Strike For $5K Bonuses

October 8, 2023 Ben Carroll, Labor Notes. , , ,
“We’re here to make a stand. At least 40 trucks should be on the road right now, and as far as we know, no trucks have gone out this morning,” said Durham, North Carolina, sanitation worker Christopher Benjamin, flanked by 100 sanitation and other city workers at a September 6 press conference. This was the first morning of a six-day strike by the North Carolina Public Service Workers Union (United Electrical Workers, UE, Local 150). During the six-day “stand down,” as they called it, sanitation workers would show up to the yard each morning and refuse to take out the garbage and recycling trucks, instead holding meetings and rallies in the parking lot throughout the day.

United Campus Workers Rack Up Victories In ‘Right-To-Work’ Tennessee

October 7, 2023 Justin A. Davis, Waging Nonviolence. , , , , , ,
In recent years, U.S. labor organizing has turned an exciting corner. National headlines have burst with workers putting pressure on far corners of the economy for fair wages and safe, secure jobs — from employees at major logistics corporations like Amazon and UPS to auto workers and Hollywood writers and actors. The world of higher education is no different, and colleges and universities across the country have seen their own wave of new labor campaigns. Last fall, for example, 48,000 workers at the University of California went on a 40-day strike — the largest higher ed strike in U.S. history.

New Jersey Nurses Two Months Into Strike For Safe Staffing

October 7, 2023 Sudip Bhattacharya, Labor Notes. , , , ,
There ought to be nine nurses on the day shift at 9 Tower, a trauma surgery unit inside the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Instead, some days there are just three. “Sometimes I’d look at a patient’s face and know that I won’t be able to maybe help feed them when they need to be fed,” said nurse Sophia Moccio, “or clean them when they need to be cleaned. It is distressing, and depressing for us.” Staffing levels this bad are a major reason why she and 1,700 of her co-workers at RWJUH have been on strike since August 4. Nurses in her 34-bed unit often have to manage the care of six patients apiece—and sometimes seven or eight.

UAW Scores Major Victory

October 7, 2023 Luis Feliz Leon, In These Times. , , , , , ,
On Facebook Live Friday afternoon, United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain symbolically awarded roses to automakers General Motors, Stellantis, and Ford based on progress at the negotiating table, a reference to the reality show ​“The Bachelor.” The only thing missing was teary-eyed CEOs breathing a sigh of relief as the UAW agreed not to widen its strike to more factories for now. The UAW was poised to tap 5,000 members at GM’s assembly plant in Arlington, Texas, as part of its latest stand-up strike escalation. These workers would have joined 25,000 already on strike at five assembly plants and 38 parts distribution centers nationwide.

University Of Maine Graduate Students Win Union Recognition

October 5, 2023 Christopher Burns , Portside. , , , , ,
The Maine Labor Relations Board last week certified the Maine Graduate Workers Union-UAW after an independent arbitrator determined it had a majority support among graduate workers, according to the Maine AFL-CIO. The university system said in August it would recognize the union and began bargaining if an independent analysis found it had a majority support. The graduate workers union will represent about 1,000 graduate assistants, research assistants and teaching assistants who make up a large percentage of the teaching and research workforce across the system’s seven campuses, according to the Maine AFL-CIO, which announced the certification on Friday afternoon.

AI Goes To War

October 4, 2023 William D. Hartung, TomDispatch.com. , , , , ,
On August 28th, Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks chose the occasion of a three-day conference organized by the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA), the arms industry’s biggest trade group, to announce the “Replicator Initiative.” Among other things, it would involve producing “swarms of drones” that could hit thousands of targets in China on short notice. Call it the full-scale launching of techno-war. Her speech to the assembled arms makers was yet another sign that the military-industrial complex (MIC) President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us about more than 60 years ago is still alive, all too well, and taking a new turn. Call it the MIC for the digital age.

Biggest Health Worker Strike In United States History Begins

October 4, 2023 People's Dispatch. , , , , , , , , , ,
On October 4, 75,000 healthcare workers at Kaiser Permanente facilities in several US states are set to go on strike for three days following the breakdown of contract negotiations last week. A coalition of several unions representing health workers in California, Colorado, Oregon, Washington, Virginia, and Washington, DC is battling the nonprofit health giant for safe staffing levels, cost of living pay increases, and against a two-tier pay system that Kaiser is trying to introduce. The largest union in the coalition is Service Employees International Union (SEIU)-United Healthcare Workers West (UHW) with 57,443 members, but the coalition also includes Office and Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU) Local 30, SEIU Local 49, OPEIU Local 2 and others.

Where There Are Scabs, There Is Violence

October 4, 2023 Bill Cole, Labor Notes. , , , , , , ,
The province of Quebec was the first jurisdiction in North America to pass legislation banning replacement workers, in 1977, after significant increases in picket line violence across the province. One dispute was a 20-month-long strike involving UAW Local 510 and United Aircraft (later called Pratt & Whitney), which became one of the most violent strikes in Canadian history. In a blunt observation about replacement workers, Quebec’s Minister of Labour, Pierre-Marc Johnson, stated on the floor of the legislature that “where there are scabs there is violence.” Johnson said his government further supported a greater balance in the bargaining dynamic between labor and management.

The Industry Backlash Against Low-Wage Worker Victories

October 4, 2023 Inayat Sabhikhi, Inequality.org. , , ,
Over the past year, media coverage of the red-hot labor market gave employers considerable print space to rehash stale narratives of how “no one wants to work anymore.” Less prominent were the sober facts: wage gains have barely kept pace with inflation, the cost of living crisis is dire, and race and gender wage gaps persist — especially among tipped workers. Despite these challenges, some of the lowest-paid workers in the country — delivery drivers in New York City and restaurant workers in Washington, DC — have won significant victories. The New York drivers won the country’s first minimum wage for their occupation and DC servers won a ballot initiative to get rid of the local subminimum wage for tipped workers.

Five Lessons From The North Hollywood Stripper Strike

October 3, 2023 Maria Esch, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
The successful formation of a union in an industry like stripping — defined by high turnover, irregular pay scales, a culture of competition fostered by employers and stigmatized labor – is incredibly rare. Before Star Garden and Magic Tavern, the feat had only been achieved once before, at the Lusty Lady Theatre in San Francisco in 1996, which has since closed its doors. The journey to unionization was not an easy one. Facing every union-busting tactic in the book, Equity Strippers Noho, formerly known as the North Hollywood Stripper Strike, was actively picketing outside of Star Garden for a whopping eight months before they officially read the results of their union election: a unanimous “yes.”
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