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Worker Rights and Jobs

Spain: Anarchists Assemble Picket Lines For Ikea Dispute

September 2, 2023 Freedom News. , , , ,
We request solidarity from all the Sections of the AIT / IWA and international affiliates regarding a labour conflict between our comrade and FOLDECO DEVELOPMENT S.L, a company he had been working at for almost three years. After our colleague suffered from workplace harassment by the company’s management, including xenophobic insults and even physical aggression, we have made the pertinent complaints and taken legal action. We are also taking action against one of its main customers, and therefore accomplice; the multinational IKEA, for whom FOLDECO manufactured furniture parts.

Co-op Development In The Digital Economy

September 2, 2023 International Centre For Co-Operative Management, Grassroots Economic Organizing. , , ,
Co-op models have a marginal position in business education, the technology industry, and the popular imagination. In response, co-operators and their allies have created incubators, accelerator programs, and mutual-aid networks to support early-stage tech co-ops. Join us for an online panel facilitated by co-op researcher-practitioner Emi Do that brings together presenters from several such projects: CoTech, Exit to Community Collective, Platform Cooperativism Consortium, SPACE4, Start.coop, UnFound Accelerator, and Union Cooperative Initiative. These projects advance democratic business formation and co-op theory-building, and they offer valuable lessons on the promises and challenges of accelerating worker ownership today.

UAW: Our Members Are Willing To Do Whatever It Takes

September 1, 2023 Natalia Marques, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
Workers and leaders at the United Auto Workers (UAW) are currently battling the three largest automakers in the US (General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis) in a massive campaign to negotiate the master contract for 144,000 “Big Three” auto workers. Their contract is set to expire on September 14, if no agreement is reached before then, workers will go on strike. The UAW has set the tone for these negotiations with a set of militant demands that address the unsupportable conditions US workers, particularly industrial workers, have endured following neoliberal deindustrialization.

This Is How The Next Great American General Strike Happens

September 1, 2023 Joe Maniscalco, Work-Bites. , , ,
The next great general strike to captivate the United States will not be organized — it’ll be organic. And it could be the most transformative general strike this country has ever seen. Right now, the head of the Transport Workers Union of America is threatening to shut down the second-largest commuter railroad in the nation; striking SAG-AFTRA and WGA members want to break up Hollywood; and militants within the UAW are still keen on bringing the Big Three automakers to their knees. Add to that mix, increasingly-fed up Starbucks baristas and Amazon warehouse workers unable to organize or get a union contract.

Extreme Heat On The Job: Workers Need Protections Now

August 31, 2023 Food Chain Workers Alliance. , , ,
The dangers of heat stress for both indoor and outdoor workers is only increasing as our planet continues to warm. In the food system, farmworkers, warehouse workers, restaurant workers and street vendors are some of the most impacted, but this is a hazard for workers across all sectors, like construction workers and delivery drivers. Incarcerated people are also extremely vulnerable to the dangers of heat stress. Yet, federal OSHA has no standard to protect workers from the dangers of heat exposure. A small number of states have created their own standards: California, Minnesota, Washington, and last year, Oregon and Colorado.

Kentucky Auto Workers At Ford Are Preparing For A Strike

August 29, 2023 Luis Feliz Leon, Labor Notes. , , , ,
Five hundred Auto Workers (UAW) from Local 862 held rallies in Louisville, Kentucky, August 24 and 25, part of a wave of practice pickets and rallies around the country. Class struggle was on everyone’s lips. A variety of issues brought them to the picket, but the auto workers there were unanimous about turbocharged wealth inequality leaving workers behind. At the Thursday picket, Local 862 member Aaron Webster said he’s grown tired of feeling squeezed, describing the contract fight as a fight between the rich and the poor. Webster started working at the Kentucky Truck Plant in 2014 building Ford Super Duty Trucks, Ford Expeditions, and Lincoln Navigators.

Driving Economic Justice: The Public Option

August 29, 2023 Udayan Tandon, Grassroots Economic Organizing. , , , ,
Taxi workers in the late 1960s and through the 1970s struggled against the transformation of their industry from regulated and unionized jobs to deregulated independent contracting work. This meant the loss of collective bargaining rights for taxi workers and a sharp rise in precarious working conditions as employers were able to shift business risk onto workers, cut expenses on benefits, and increase profits in-turn. In a spirited response, taxi workers self-organized and sustained union-like alt labor groups, for example the New York Taxi Workers Alliance in New York and United Taxicab Workers  in San Francisco, that fought for better working conditions for taxi workers through municipal and city regulations.

The Changing Climate Of Class Struggle

August 28, 2023 John Clarke, Canadian Dimension. , , ,
Two very different developments in the last year, each affecting the lives of workers in the United States, bring home the degree to which the impacts of climate change are redefining the nature of the class struggle. The implications that flow from this development are well worth considering. Last August, an article in the New York Times took up the question of how intensifying heat waves were leading to deteriorating working conditions and increased health and safety risks for UPS drivers and other workers. It pointed out that since 2015 hundreds of UPS and US Postal Service, FedEx, and other delivery company drivers had suffered the ill effects of heat exposure, and several drivers had died.

Camas Teachers Go On Strike; Battle Ground And Evergreen Could Follow

August 28, 2023 Anthony Macuk, KGW. , , , ,
Camas, Washington - Hundreds of teachers in the Camas School District officially went on strike around 9 a.m. Monday morning, cancelling what would have otherwise been the first day of the school year. The union representing Camas School District teachers announced Sunday evening that it would follow through on plans to strike and confirmed there would be no classes on Monday. The announcement came after a last-ditch round of bargaining on Sunday, which the Camas Education Association said ended when "the district refused to make commitments to reasonable class sizes or equitable funding for music, PE, and libraries."

After Beloved Coffee Shop Abruptly Closed, Workers Reopen As Co-Op

August 27, 2023 Rebekah Kirkman, The Real News Network. , , ,
Jake Urtes and Jonah Gallagher were getting ready to play a show in Brooklyn when they found out they had lost their jobs. The pair had taken the week off work for a short tour with their band, Shift Meal. To everyone’s surprise, their boss and owner of Common Ground Bakery Cafe, a long-established and beloved coffee shop in Baltimore’s Hampden neighborhood, had abruptly shut down the shop. On the Common Ground internal Slack channel, workers read owner Michael Krupp’s brief message to all staff informing them that they wouldn’t need to come to work the next day, Monday, July 3.

Can Boycotts Help Workers Win?

August 27, 2023 Eric Blanc, Labor Politics. , , ,
The recent uptick in labor organizing has prompted not only a rise in strikes, but also the return of an old labor weapon: the boycott.  While boycott campaigns generally have a mixed record at best, this tactic was used successfully in the recent unionization and first contract victories at Burgerville in Oregon as well as Spot Coffee in upstate New York — a campaign that set the stage for the subsequent Starbucks upsurge. Raising the slogan, “No Contract, No Field Trips,” unionizing workers at Medieval Times in New Jersey and California are now linking up with K-12 teachers to boycott the company until it stops its alleged union-busting.

Atlanta Conference: ‘What Will A New Society Run By Workers Look Like?’

August 26, 2023 Natalia Marques, People's Dispatch. , , ,
Social movement organizers and leaders from across the US will gather in Atlanta, Georgia, on September 2, for the International People’s Assembly-North America conference titled “Dilemmas of Humanity: A Socialist Horizon”. They will meet at the city’s historic “Neighborhood Church” to deliberate on questions including “What will a new society run by workers look like? How will we reverse the climate crisis and restore our relationship to the earth? What could global cooperation look like without US imperialism?” This conference will take place in the context of dire financial hardships for the people of the US. The US Census reports that out of over 230 million people surveyed, nearly 70% struggle to pay basic weekly living expenses.

The UPS Teamsters Contract Has Been Ratified – What Now?

August 26, 2023 Teddy Ostrow and RuWalsh, The Real News Network. , , , ,
On Tuesday, August 22, the Teamsters union announced that its members voted to ratify the national UPS contract by 86.3% –  and with record turnout. Workers won significant raises, the abolition of the two-tier driver system, air conditioning in package cars, thousands of new full-time jobs, and more. In our previous episode, we discussed the gains of the tentative agreement and the years of Teamsters organizing it took to make them possible, including the past year’s contract campaign which built a credible strike threat. In this episode, we dug deeper into the various layers of members’ reactions to the contract, as well as what’s required of the membership to enforce it and build on it moving forward.

150,000 United Auto Workers Vote To Authorize Strike By 97% Majority

August 26, 2023 Fight Back News!. , , , , ,
Detroit, Michigan - United Auto Workers (UAW) members voted overwhelmingly, August 25, to grant authorization to call for strikes during ongoing contract negotiations between UAW and General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis motors companies if needed to win their demands in bargaining. Union members voted to authorize the strike by an average of 97% of voters who work for the three companies. UAW President Shawn Fain said, “The Big Three is our strike target. And whether or not there’s a strike - it’s up to Ford, General Motors and Stellantis, because they know what our priorities are. We’ve been clear.” The UAW workers are fighting for a 46% wage increase, restoring their pensions, a 32-hour work week, and increased retiree benefits.

Labor Organizing Secret: Ten-Minute Meetings

August 26, 2023 Lisa Xu, Labor Notes. , , ,
As auto workers prepare for the expiration of the Big 3 auto contracts covering 150,000 members September 14, some are turning to a valuable tool they saw UPS Teamsters use: the 10-minute meeting. It’s simply an in-person meeting with your co-workers that is just 10 minutes long—and which, crucially, is held at work. Instead of scheduling a long meeting offsite on off-time, you’re bringing the meeting to them, and making it as convenient as possible. Ten-minute meetings can update members on negotiations and important actions during a contract campaign. Leading up to the UPS expiration, for example, Teamster activists held brief parking lot meetings right before or after their shifts.
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