Workers Rights and Jobs

Women Confront Ugly Harassment At Beauty Products Plant

March 5, 2020 Bianca Cunningham, Truthout.org Organize! Factories, Sexism, Women, Workers Rights and Jobs

At a lotion factory outside Chicago, workers endured years of sexual harassment, coercion, gender and racial discrimination, and unsafe working conditions. Last year the women at Voyant Beauty came together to fight back. The workers at Voyant are overwhelmingly female, and almost all long-term temps. They blend, bottle, pack, and ship beauty products for brands like Victoria’s Secret, Johnson & Johnson, and Aveeno.

Employment-Based Health Care Is An Anchor Around The Neck Of The U.S. Working Class

February 19, 2020 Mark Dudzic, Labornotes.org Educate! Health Care, Medicare, Reform, Workers Rights and Jobs

Last June at the House Ways and Means Committee Hearing on Medicare for All, Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas lamented, “That great health care plan that your union negotiated for you? It’s gone. Banned under Medicare for All.” A right-wing congressman with a 7 percent lifetime voting score from the AFL-CIO crying crocodile tears for union health care plans can easily be dismissed as just another absurdity of America’s political dysfunction.

Walmart Workers Demand Fair Pay And Hours At Protest Outside Alice Walton’s Penthouse As Retail Giant Cuts Jobs

February 19, 2020 By Julia Conley, Commondreams.org Resist! Class Struggle, Protests, Walmart, Workers Rights and Jobs

Walmart workers issued a "wake up call" to Alice Walton, an heir to the retailer's $500 billion fortune, in New York on Tuesday by marching to Walton's New York penthouse and demanding her company pay its 1.5 million workers a living wage and give them reliable, stable work schedules. The protest was partially a response to the company's so-called "Great Workplace" restructuring initiative which Walmart began testing last year and plans to roll out in at least 1,100 of its 5,300 U.S. stores by the end of 2020.

New Employment Analysis Shows That A Good Job Is Hard To Find These Days

February 15, 2020 By G. Dunkel, Workers.org Educate! Employment, Workers Rights and Jobs

The constitutionally mandated State of the Union address opened Feb. 4 with the first of many boasts: “Jobs are booming, incomes are soaring, poverty is plummeting.” Trump went on with the lie, “The average unemployment rate under my administration is lower than any administration in the history of our country.” A Milwaukee, Wis., job fair in November 2019 verifies the fact that unemployment is high in Black communities in cities.

It’s Time To Shorten The American Work Week

February 13, 2020 Robert R. Raymond , Truthout.org Create! Class Struggle, Labor Movement, Workers, Workers Rights and Jobs

Americans are one of the most overworked populations in the world. With the average worker clocking 47 hours a week, Americans work more hours per year than almost any other industrialized country — 423 more than German workers, 248 more than workers in the United Kingdom, and 266 more hours a year than French workers, according to the latest Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development statistics.

Eight Thousand Hospital Workers Strike In Seattle

February 5, 2020 By Steve Leigh, Labornotes.org Resist! Class Struggle, Strikes, Workers Rights and Jobs

After nine months of fruitless negotiations, 8,000 hospital workers in the Swedish Medical Center chain in Seattle walked out January 28 on a three-day strike. After nine months of fruitless negotiations, 8,000 hospital workers in the Swedish Medical Center chain in Seattle walked out January 28 on a three-day strike. The strikers include everyone from nurses and medical assistants to orderlies and janitors. They are represented by SEIU 1199NW.

Number Of Workers Represented By A Union Held Steady In 2019

February 3, 2020 Staff, Epi.org Organize! Labor Unions, Workers Rights and Jobs

New data on unionization from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that in 2019, 16.4 million workers in the United States were represented by a union. There was very little change in this figure from 2018 (+3,000). However, because workers entered the workforce faster than the number of workers represented by a union increased over this period (1.2% vs. 0.02%), the share of workers represented by a union ticked down between 2018 and 2019, from 11.7% to 11.6%.

The Long Struggle Of The Amazon Employees

January 31, 2020 Staff, Rosalux.de Resist! Amazon, Class Struggle, Workers Rights and Jobs

For more than three years, including well over 100 strike days, the employees at Amazon continue to fight for a collective agreement. Although the labour dispute has still not been won, it exemplifies the struggle of employees in the low-wage sector against a global corporation. The conflict at Amazon has become a ‘laboratory of resistance’.

UPS Worker Challenged Powerful Union Leaders And Won

January 26, 2020 By Juliana Feliciano Reyes, The Philadelphia Inquirer. Organize! Labor Union, UPS, Workers Rights and Jobs

When the meeting was called to order, some UPS workers who had been with the company for decades could barely believe their eyes. Membership meetings like these are mostly empty. But on this snowy Saturday morning in Bridesburg, a sea of black-and-yellow satin Teamsters Local 623 jackets buzzed around a packed hall. For the first time in more than two decades, there’s a new crew running the shop. And at the top of the elected slate is an African American man — the first to lead the 101-year-old local — and one who’s spent his entire adult life doing the backbreaking work of a package handler at UPS’s massive East Coast facility by the Philadelphia airport. The rise of Richard Hooker Jr., 40, and his slate, dubbed #623livesmatter, marks the culmination of a grassroots effort to revitalize a 4,500-member shop at a major corporation during a time when legacy unions have languished.

Missouri Unions Add 47,000 Members, Putting Total At A 15-Year High

January 25, 2020 David Nicklaus, Stltoday.com Educate! Class Struggle, Labor Unions, Missouri, Workers Rights and Jobs

The defeat of a right-to-work law in 2018 seems to have given Missouri's unions a boost. Their membership grew by 46,000 last year, bucking a downward national trend. The increase boosted the state's union membership to 297,000 people, the highest number since 2004. Union members now make up 11.1% of the state's workforce, the highest percentage since 2008.

Low-Wage Work Is More Pervasive Than You Think, And There Aren’t Enough “Good Jobs” To Go Around

January 24, 2020 Martha Ross and Nicole Bateman, Brookings.edu Educate! Jobs and Wages, Workers Rights and Jobs

Even as the U.S. economy hums along at a favorable pace, there is a vast segment of workers today earning wages low enough to leave their livelihood and families extremely vulnerable. That’s one of the main takeaways from our new analysis, in which we found that 53 million Americans between the ages of 18 to 64—accounting for 44% of all workers—qualify as “low-wage.” Their median hourly wages are $10.22, and median annual earnings are about $18,000.

Take My Benefits—Please!

January 15, 2020 By Mark Dudzic, Newpol.org Create! Health Care, New Economy, Workers Rights and Jobs

At the June 2019 House Ways and Means Committee Hearing on Medicare for All, Texas Republican Kevin Murphy lamented, “That great health care plan that your union negotiated for you? It’s gone. Banned under Medicare for All.” A right-wing congressman with a 7 percent lifetime voting score from the AFL-CIO crying crocodile tears for great union health care plans can be easily dismissed as just another absurdity of the increasingly dysfunctional American political system.

On Those Questionable US Wage Stats…Again

January 3, 2020 By Jack Rasmus, Counterpunch.org Educate! Wages, Workers Rights and Jobs

In recent months, various independent business and research sources have been raising questions about the accuracy of US official job and wage statistics. Several more sources have joined the discussion, questioning the oft-cited official—and widespread mainstream press reported–3.1% annual rise in US wages the past year. As many have indicated, the 3.1% grossly over-estimates recent wage increases in the US for several important reasons.

Postcard From Paris

December 26, 2019 By James Graham, Counterpunch.org Resist! France, Pensions, Reform, Workers Rights and Jobs

“For over two years we’ve been hearing about this pension reform! Two years of ‘consultations,’ which, cross our hearts, were to be full to the brim with transparency, intelligibility and instruction. Two years enshrouded in a haze – not to say a dense fog – of a strategy which, playing for time with contradictions, altered estimates and impossible-to- reconcile positions, end up with a strike that looks set to last. Two years supposed to reassure us but which, au contraire, have only caused anguish and sent diverse age groups and trades not among the first concerned with the reform down to the street.”

French Union Workers Vote To Halt Production At Key Oil Facility

December 24, 2019 Sudip Kar-Gupta, Bate Felix, Reuters Resist! France, General Strike, Strikes, Workers Rights and Jobs

French workers voted on Monday to halt production at a key oil facility that supplies Paris and the surrounding region, joining other petroleum industry shutdowns in a nationwide strike against government pension reforms. Industrial action against President Emmanuel Macron’s reforms has also crippled train services over the past two weeks, escalating into clashes between protesters and police in the capital earlier on Monday. Protesters scuffled with police at the Gare de Lyon train station in Paris early on Monday as the strike went into its 19th day. The strike, which has disrupted Christmas preparations, has also affected other main Paris stations such as the Gare du Nord, which handles Eurostar services to London and Brussels, and the Gare de l’Est.

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