Teamster News
Vote On County Pay Raises In The Offing St. Petersburg Tribune ...The Teamsters has asked for a $15 per hour minimum. Sholtes said the request has nothing to do with a national movement among fast-food workers for a $15 minimum wage. The union used data from the living wage calculator, which sets the minimum hourly wage at $15 to support two adults and $9.63 for one adult...
EVSC board votes to accept Teamsters contract 14 News ...Evansville-Vanderburgh School Corporation board members voted Monday night to accept the contracts of several employee groups, including the Teamsters Union. Members of Teamsters Local 215 includes custodians, bus drivers, bus aids, and secretaries...
Teamsters Port Division Assisting Truck Drivers Fired By TTSI teamster.org ...On Wednesday evening, Sept. 3, 2014, at least thirty-three (33) port truck drivers who participated in recent unfair labor practice strikes and filed “wage and hour” claims with the California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) were fired by their employer, Total Transportation Services Inc. (TTSI), when they refused to acquiesce to the company’s illegal demand to withdraw their claims for wage theft as misclassified “independent contractors.”...
Trade
The Transatlantic Trade And Investment Partnership: Getting The Criticism Right The Journal ...As an investment agreement, the TTIP is probably bad for everyone whose name does not end in Ltd, Plc, or something similar...
China’s Runaway Steel Industry Trade Reform ...production capacity for China’s steel industry has grown by an astonishing 200 million tons since late 2012, to 1.1 billion tons today. (By contrast, the entire U.S. steel industry produced only 87 million tons in 2013.) Yet first half domestic consumption of steel stands at 376.1 million tons, up an anemic 0.4 percent over the same period last year. Steel exports are growing but at the expense of “increasing trade conflicts and constant trade remedy investigations.”...
State Battles
The shortfall that wouldn't die Uppity Wisconsin ...Today's news that the budget shortfall is nearly 2 billion dollars and apparently rising leads one to believe that maybe too little cash is sticking in Madison. Other recent news makes it clear that the administration has been helping put more cash in the pockets of some taxpayers (and out-of-staters) than others...
As lawyers prep for John Doe hearing, legal tab tops $672,000 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ...The cost to taxpayers for defending the state against lawsuits over an investigation into Gov. Scott Walker and his allies has quickly escalated to more than $672,000...
Voter ID On Trial in Texas (opinion) New York Times ...Laws like these used to be blocked by Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which required that the federal government preapprove any voting rules enacted by states and localities with a history of discriminatory voting practices. But in a destructive ruling last year, the Supreme Court struck down Section 5 as unconstitutional. Only hours after that ruling, Texas resurrected its voter-ID law, which had been stopped by Section 5...
Ruling In Nebraska Could Have Big Overall Impact On Keystone XL Nebraska Radio Network ...A ruling by the state Supreme Court on the law that authorized the Keystone XL route through Nebraska could have ramifications well beyond this state. Attorney General Jon Bruning is confident the Supreme Court will uphold the law that set the route...
War On Workers
The Fast Food Strikes Have Been A Stunning Success For Organized Labor Slate ...at this early date, it’s more useful to think of them as the spearhead of a broader living wage movement that has also seen retail workers at stores such as Walmart protest for better pay. Framed that way, the effort has been startlingly effective. For the cost of a few Super Bowl ads, the SEIU and some dedicated fast food workers have managed to completely rewire how the public and politicians thinks about wages...
STILL 1.4 Million Fewer Full-Time Jobs Than in 2008 naked capitalism ...It’s still 1.4 million below 2008? In 2008, the economy was in full collapse mode. The Fed has expanded its balance sheet by $3.7 trillion since August 2008 and there are fewer full-time jobs now than then? Remind me again what that $3.7 trillion has bought!...
Koch 101 Slate ...The Koch brothers are paying millions to inject libertarian ideas into high school curriculums...
Koch Industries adopts new public posture to neutralize opponents, recast image Washington Post ...Koch Industries, which produces goods ranging from Angel Soft toilet paper to iPhone parts, is adopting a more visible strategy to neutralize critics on the left and promote a warm, patriotic image of its multinational empire...
Evidence Says That Students Do Better In Schools With Strong Teachers’ Unions Addicting Info ... Collective bargaining provides a legal, structured process in which local unions and management can develop reforms, such as peer review or performance-based pay...
Senate moves forward with amendment to the Constitution on elections The Hill ...The Senate on Monday advanced a constitutional amendment meant to reverse two recent Supreme Court decisions on campaign spending...
Some Uber Drivers Say Company’s Promise Of Big Pay Day Doesn’t Match Reality Washington Post ...The lure of taking home 80 percent of the fares he collected as a driver for Uber was a sweet incentive for Demek Dagnachew to sign up with the ride-sharing service in April. But soon after he started ferrying passengers around the District in his 2012 Toyota Camry, he said he noticed his earnings didn’t quite reflect the 80/20 split he’d been promised...
Sources: Taj To File For Bankruptcy, Close In November CBS News ...A source confirms to CBS 3 Eyewitness News that the Taj Mahal has already begun the process for bankruptcy and layoff notices could go out to workers next week. As of August, the casino hotel had more than 2,800 employees...
State Consultant Says Bridgeton Landfill Fire Spreading North St. Louis Post Dispatch ...The consultant hired by the Missouri Department of Natural Resources says the “subsurface fire” at the Bridgeton Landfill is expanding and moving closer to the radioactive West Lake Landfill...
Miscellaneous
Exclusive: Safety concerns dog Boeing 787 Aljazeera ...Using a concealed camera, the worker films inside the Boeing South Carolina plant, recording his discussions with colleagues. He randomly asks 15 of his co-workers who assemble the 787 "Dreamliner" if they would fly on the plane. Ten say they would not...
