Teamster News
BLET organizes Illinois Railway short line workers teamster.org ...The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) scored a short line organizing victory last week as a majority of workers at Illinois Railway voted to make the BLET their designated collective bargaining representative...
Teamster at US Foods Seeks Information About Merger teamster.org ...Frank Rinetti, a Teamster member and employee of US Foods, recently sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) seeking information about the proposed Sysco-US Foods merger and he also outlines his concerns about the merger's impact on jobs...
Union teamsters met Wednesday, will vote Thursday KERO Bakersfield ...GET union employees met Wednesday to discuss the proposal from GET...
Trade
Five Tests Walmart Must Pass to Show its 'Made In America' Street Cred manufacture this ...If Walmart is truly serious about its pledge to help American manufacturers, the corporation will slash its imports into the U.S...
Country-Of-Origin-Labeling Dispute Threatens U.S. Exports, Jobs The Hill ...A long list of U.S.-manufactured goods and agricultural products are being threatened by a trade dispute about whether U.S. Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) requirements discriminate against our bordering countries’ meat products. Absent quick action to settle the dispute, the governments of Canada and Mexico—currently the two largest markets for U.S. exports—could impose $2 billion in retaliatory tariffs that would endanger thousands of American jobs...
State Battles
Corporate front groups pushing laughable “National Employee Freedom Week” and other anti-union effort eclectablog ... “National Employee Freedom Week”... encourages union members to become freeloaders by leaving their unions while the unions continue to bargain for on their behalf for better wages, better working conditions, and better benefits...
Floridians tried to stop gerrymandering, and Republicans gerrymandered anyways. We’re about to see who wins. Washington Post ...If it passes muster with the courts in anything like its present form, it will have been a pretty major victory for the GOP in overcoming the so-called Fair Districts amendments -- and an equally large setback for redistricting reformers seeking to rein in partisan gerrymandering...
Christie: GOP governors to spend millions in Maine Associated Press ...New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie returned to Maine on Tuesday to help raise money for Gov. Paul LePage and predicted that the Republican Governors Association would spend millions of dollars in the state this fall to help LePage win a second term...
Record number of labor candidates prep to run for public office at New Jersey State AFL-CIO Labor Candidates School Politicker NJ ...A record-sized class of rank-and-file union members representing 23 local unions from across all sectors of the labor movement took part in the New Jersey State AFL-CIO Labor Candidates School August 9-10, 2014, at the Rutgers University Inn and Conference Center in New Brunswick...
The Big Money Behind Walker’s Campaign Express Milwaukee ...Walker returned to the deep pockets of his recall mega-contributors, including Las Vegas gambling billionaire Sheldon Adelson and his wife, Miriam. Adelson donated $250,000 to Walker in 2012...
Labor and small businesses team up on California franchising law MSNBC ...the theory appears to be that protecting franchisors against the threat of closure will make it easier for them to do things like raise workers’ wages...
War On Workers
Electric Worker Hit By Train, Killed In Edmond KWTV ...The train was traveling southbound when it hit and killed Edmond Electric Worker, Bob Waterson Tuesday evening. Edmond city officials say Waterson was with the company for more than 34 years...
Rail CEOs to Investors: "Bomb Trains" Safe At Almost Any Speed DeSmog Blog ...Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) recently said it would proceed with plans to increase speeds for oil-by-rail unit trains in Devil’s Lake, N.D. to 60 MPH from 30 MPH, despite opposition from local officials...
What’s Lost in the Market Basket Stories Economic Policy Institute ...they have succeeded by taking a distinctly high-road approach: the company takes care of its workers, paying decent wages, offering benefits to full- and part-time staff, and providing employees with a profit-sharing plan. At the same time, Market Basket still offers prices lower than its competitors, Walmart included...
Union Workers In Maine Join Protest Of FairPoint Outsourcing Plans Portland Press Herald ...Hundreds of unionized FairPoint Communications Inc. workers in Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire staged “informational protests” Tuesday to educate customers about the negative impact of company plans to boost outsourcing, union representatives said...
For Largest U.S. Companies, Jobs Growth Has Lagged Profits, Revenues Reuters ...From 2001 to 2013, inflation-adjusted revenue at 100 of the largest publicly traded companies grew 71 percent and inflation-adjusted operating profit rose 150 percent. Global headcount reported in company financial filings rose 31 percent...
Los Angeles To Vote On Killing Major Wall Street Deal As City Drowns In Financial Fees International Business Times ...Los Angeles lawmakers were expected to vote Wednesday on a proposal to renegotiate or terminate an interest rate swap deal from the mid-2000s that critics say now costs the city millions of dollars a year in fees. If successful, the initiative could make the city the nation's largest to challenge ballooning Wall Street levies that accompany similar interest rate swap deals throughout the nation...
Front and center: Amendment 3 pushes teacher tenure into the spotlight Southeast Missourian ...if teachers have been teaching in the same district for five years, they're granted due process rights by statute. "Before that, they're at-will," Meyer said. Five years, she said, is probably the longest probationary period used around the country...
Miscellaneous
Does Your Boss Know You’re Reading This? Surveillance Technology Boosts Efficiency But Creates Workplace Issues Atlanta Journal-Constitution ...There are few laws and court cases to help companies or workers understand the limits, leaving some gray areas for protection of employees’ privacy...
