Saturday, June 22, 2013

Today's Teamster News 06.22.13

Ex-Enron boss Jeffrey Skilling's sentence cut to 14 years  BBC News   ...Jeffrey Skilling presided over Enron when it became embroiled in one of the biggest corporate frauds in US history...Thousands of workers lost their jobs and retirement savings when energy firm Enron collapsed in 2001...
Goodwill pays workers with disabilities as little as 22 cents an hour  Salon   ... In 2010, an Applebee’s in a tony New York suburb hired hearing- and visually impaired employees through a placement program with the Helen Keller National Center and paid them between $3.97 per hour and $5.96, well below the state minimum wage of $7.25. And it’s perfectly legal due to a Depression-era loophole in federal labor law...
Couple Orders Tie From Banana Republic, Gets Folders Full Of Sensitive Employee Info Instead Consumerist   ...When you order clothing online, there’s always the chance you’ll get the wrong size or color. But you rarely get three folders full of sensitive employee documents containing things like Social Security numbers, addresses, and tax forms. But that’s what one couple say happened to them when they placed an order with Banana Republic for a tie and pocket square...
Brazil protests: president to hold emergency meeting  The Guardian   ...Night of protests draws vast crowds in cities across Brazil, with a total turnout estimated at 2 million...
Deflating Minimum Wage Costs Workers Billions of Dollars (opinion)   Huffington Post   ...A single minimum wage worker who has worked continually for the federal minimum wage since 1968 has been deprived of over a quarter million dollars in wages over the course of those 45 years...
U.S., Vietnam still far apart on clothing in trade talks   Reuters   ...U.S. efforts to forge a "21st Century" trade agreement with Vietnam and 10 other countries in the Asia Pacific region are running into problems mired in the past, including a textile trade policy that U.S. industry does not want to give up…
Pressure Pays Off: Obama Administration Finally Lets Congress See Secretive TPP Text (But Still Not the Rest of Us)  Public Citizen   ...for the first known time in the three years that the secretive deal has been under negotiation by the Obama administration, said administration has allowed a member of Congress to view three chapters of the bracketed negotiating text...
Madoff trustee cannot sue big banks, U.S. court rules  Reuters   ...The trustee seeking money for Bernard Madoff's victims suffered a big defeat as a federal appeals court rejected his bid to recover nearly $30 billion from JPMorgan Chase and Co. and other banks he accused of aiding in the swindler's fraud...
7-Eleven deploying immigration inspectors  New York Post   ...7-Eleven is deploying its own team of immigration inspectors to franchises nationwide in the wake of a big illegal-alien scandal where the feds say workers in Long Island and Virginia were given stolen identities and then forced to work up to 100 hours weekly for a fraction of their wages...
Three States Dump Major Private Prison Company In One Month  Think Progress   ...State lawmakers who embraced private prisons as a cost-cutting measure are starting to have trouble ignoring their abysmal conditions. Corrections Corporation of America, the largest and most powerful private prison company in the nation, lost four prison contracts in the past month after extensive reports of abuse, neglect, and even fraud...
Michigan lawmakers vote to change foreclosure rules  Detroit Free Press   ...The Republican-controlled House and Senate on Thursday gave final approval to bills that keep intact the redemption period when homeowners can challenge a foreclosure’s legality. An earlier version of the measure would have reduced the period from six months to 60 days...
New scale bypass system can read driver logs, CSA profile with no stopping  Truck News   ...A new scale bypass system that allows drivers and carriers with good CSA scores to pass through weigh stations without stopping, is generating some buzz in the US...
Diversified drivers reject latest offer  Fort McMurray Today   ...Bus drivers with Diversified Transportation, who are members of Teamsters Local 362, have rejected another contract offer from their employers, even though the majority of the negotiating committee recommended accepting it...
FirstGroup Executives See Big Payouts as Company, Workers Suffer  IBT   ...FirstGroup PLC is under fire for awarding hefty bonus payments to top U.S. executives while workers have been denied fair wage increases and improved working conditions...
Get Text Message Updates That Are Important to YOU  IBT   ...Teamsters, sign up to get personalized text messages from the IBT. Text to 86466 the word MAG and your member ID number – located above the label on the back of your latest Teamster magazine...