Friday, January 2, 2015

Today's Teamster News 01.02.15

Teamster News
First Student School Bus Workers Choose Teamsters Local 570 Representation  teamster.org   ...First Student school bus drivers and monitors who transport children attending Baltimore City Public Schools have voted to join Teamsters Local 570 in Baltimore. The 113 school bus workers work out of First Student yards in Baltimore and Severn, Md., and joined the union seeking respect, fair pay and dignity at work...
Travel Management Company Pilots Vote To Join Teamsters  teamster.org   ...Pilots with Travel Management Company (TMC) voted overwhelmingly, 120-57, today in favor of Teamster representation. After the National Mediation Board (NMB) certifies the election, about 200 TMC pilots will become members of Teamsters Local 1108 in Richmond Heights, Ohio, and join the more than 75,000 airline industry workers currently represented by the Teamsters Airline Division...
Teamsters help Catholic Charities haul huge donation of furniture from Ogunquit inn to sell for food  Bangor Daily News   ...“Teamsters Local 340 is again sending their Joint Council 10 truck up for three truckload trips to Aroostook County to help out Catholic Charities’ food bank and their ‘Feed the County’ efforts this holiday season,” said Traci Place, a business agent for the union...
Teamsters rail conference calls for limited access to locomotive recordings  Progressive Railroading   ...The Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC) is not opposed to the installation of locomotive voice and video recorders (LVVRs), but all recordings should be used pursuant to the Canadian Transportation Accident Investigation and Safety Board Act, union officials announced last week...
Union decries decrease in railroad maintenance crews  Bismarck Tribune   ...Reductions in maintenance workers on Canadian Pacific tracks could cause more delays, according to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters...
Snyder County owes $90G to two guards  Daily Item   ...Snyder County still owes several thousand dollars to two Snyder County Jail guards who won their jobs back in April after being terminated two years earlier for sexual harassment...
Teamsters, Medina Council approve contract  Medina Gazette   ... Medina City Council approved a new collective bargaining agreement Tuesday with Teamsters Local 436, which represents city service department employees...
Trade
Obama hopes to enlist GOP in push for trade pact, despite Democratic resistance  UK Progressive   ...President Obama is preparing a major push on a vast free-trade zone that seeks to enlist Republicans as partners and test his premise that Washington can still find common ground on major initiatives...
Obama executive actions put Asia free trade deal at risk  Washington Times  ...President Obama is preparing a major push on a vast free-trade zone that seeks to enlist Republicans as partners and test his premise that Washington can still find common ground on major initiatives...
The President Set a Goal of Doubling Exports by 2014—Why Haven’t We?  Economic Policy Institute   ...The United States failed to achieve a doubling of exports between 2009 and 2014, as promised in President Obama’s National Export Initiative (NEI). It wasn’t even close. Total U.S. goods and services exports increased by less than 50 percent ($766 billion, or 48.4 percent) between 2009 and 2014 (estimated), as shown in the figure below. Meanwhile, imports increased by an even larger $883.8 billion, and as a result, the U.S. trade deficit increased by $117.0 billion...
Say Goodbye to 'Made in China'  Bloomberg   ...In November, Hebei Iron & Steel Co Ltd, a provincial-owned company and China’s largest steelmaker by production, announced that it was moving 5 million tons of its annual production -- roughly 11 percent of the 45 million tons of steel it makes every year -- to South Africa. According to press reports, it won’t be going abroad alone...
War on Workers 
Map: Where Workers' Pay Has Risen the Most in Past Decade  Wall Street Journal   ...while the one-third of all counties have seen a decline in annual average pay, those counties hold about 46% of U.S. population. That shows you how densely populated some of those counties are...
Wage stagnation puts the squeeze on ordinary workers (Opinion)  Los Angeles Times   ...The median net worth of upper-income families reached $639,400 last year. That's nearly seven times as much as for those in the middle and almost 70 times what people at the lower end of the economic spectrum are making...
The Story Behind Wage Fixing in Hollywood  Real News   ...Wage theft stories aren't only happening at fast food companies like McDonald's, but the computer animation industry is also being accused of fixing employee wages. Major players like Disney, Sony, and many more have been entangled in a conspiracy called Techtopus...
Labor's big comeback  Politico   ...In a chain of end-of-the-year rulemakings, filings and decisions, the NLRB is exercising more muscle on labor’s behalf than Obama achieved during his previous six years in office...
Epidemic of Violence against Health-Care Workers Plagues Hospitals  Scientific American   ...Health-care workers are hit, kicked, scratched, bitten, spat on, threatened and harassed by patients with surprising regularity. In a 2014 survey, almost 80 percent of nurses reported being attacked on the job within the past year...
Worker killed in accident at Ford Claycomo Assembly Plant  KMBC   ...A contract worker died on the job at Ford's Claycomo plant early Tuesday. Investigators said a beam fell on the man as he worked to help build a new assembly line...
Highway 68 construction worker killed by drunk driver   Better Roads   ...Jesus Fernandez, 51, was just doing his job on Highway 68 in California when a suspected drunk driver took his life...
Racers Mourn for Track Worker Killed in Raceway Accident  New Times   ...The racing world suffered a loss this past Sunday when an experienced track worker at the Palm Beach International Raceway died during a race when an unmanned, out-of-control motorcycle crashed into him...
Rest stop worker hit and killed on I-40   Fox8   ...A rest stop worker was hit by a car and killed along Interstate 40 near Benson Monday morning...
Miscellaneous
Low Oil Prices Drive US Rig Count Down  Oil Prices   ...Onshore US drilling rigs fell by 37 to 1,499 in the week ending Dec. 26. Ten rigs were dropped in the previous week and 29 went out of service the week before that...
Q3 2014 GDP Revised Up to a Whopping 5.0%  Economic Populist   ...This is the highest quarterly GDP since Q3 2003, a full eleven years ago.  The reason for the revision blow out was consumer spending and investment...