Teamsters
Teamsters warn Frontier Airlines over stalled contract talks The Denver Post ...The International Brotherhood of Teamsters Airline Division has asked the National Mediation Board to arbitrate its ongoing contract dispute with Denver-based Frontier Airlines. And, if that doesn't work, Frontier's union-represented aircraft technicians, ground service technicians and tool-room attendants could exercise their right to strike — a move that essentially could cripple Frontier's operations...
Labor union brings back food drive to feed the hungry in Maine Bangor Daily News ...For several years before 2014, the Teamsters Local 340 labor union used the annual Maine Potato Blossom Festival as a vehicle to feed the hungry throughout Aroostook County. But the organization lost major donors in the last couple of years and wasn’t able to sponsor the drive last year. The organization is back this year with the food drive and a float in the Maine Potato Blossom parade...
Biddeford City Council meeting ends abruptly WMTV ...Disputes over contracts between Biddeford officials and three employee unions shut down the City Council meeting after just a few minutes Tuesday night. Tensions were already high when union members poured into council chambers. Members of Biddeford’s police, public works and firefighters’ unions said councilors were trying to avoid talking about the contracts. City officials said they plan to meet with the Teamsters Local 340 in mediation...
1934 Teamsters’ strike turned Minneapolis from ‘scab’ town to union supporter MinnPost ...“No trucks shall be moved! By nobody!” was the rallying cry of Minneapolis Teamsters Local 574 as they struck in the summer of 1934. Their demands were clear: a fair wage, union recognition, and the trucking firms’ recognition of inside workers as part of the union. Despite the violent reaction of the authorities, the 574 won on all these points...
Global Labor & Trade
TPP ministers to gather in Hawaii July 28-29 Japan Times ...Pacific Rim countries pursuing a free trade initiative are set to hold ministerial talks on July 28 and 29 in Hawaii to wind up their marathon negotiations, a source said Monday. The United States, Japan and 10 other countries came up with the plan as hopes for an early signing of the Trans-Pacific Partnership...
Pacific Trade Deal Negotiators See a Wrap in Late July New York Times ...With a final accord in sight, the 12 nations negotiating a trans-Pacific trade agreement linking 40 percent of the global economy have set a last round of talks for late July on the remaining issues on the most ambitious trade deal in a generation...
TPP Still Has A Long Way To Go Forbes ...Congress’s having given President Obama fast-track authority for the Trans-Pacific Partnership doesn’t assure that the agreement will enjoy smooth sailing the rest of the way. There are still any number of rocks in the water that could sink it. There are enough unresolved issues in the text to keep the negotiators at the table for a long time...
Obama working to make Vietnam an ally in dealing with China’s rise Washington Post ...Administration officials said Hanoi has been signaling interest in forging deeper economic and military ties with the United States, and Obama has extended a hand to Vietnam, which is among the 12 nations involved in an expansive Pacific Rim trade pact...
U.S. reports progress on human rights after Obama meeting with Vietnamese leader NOLA ...The United States and Vietnam Tuesday (July 7) committed in a joint statement to "support for the promotion and protection of human rights." On Monday, Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., organized a letter from seven Republican senators [which] said that human rights should be a priority as the United States moves forward with negotiations for the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement with Vietnam and other Pacific nations...
Canada Pledges Support for ‘Powerhouse’ Pacific Trade Pact Bloomberg ...The Canadian government is reiterating its support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, with Finance Minister Joe Oliver saying increased trade and investment will benefit the economy. Canada is under pressure to open up its dairy and poultry sectors, where production is controlled through quotas and imports are restricted with high tariffs. Dismantling that system, known as supply management, may become an issue in rural districts...
9 Ways the TPP Is Bad for Developing Countries Foreign Policy ...If enacted, the TPP could block these countries from successfully industrializing and joining the developed world. What would this mean in practice? Blocking industrialization would mean locking these countries into low-end agricultural and extractive industries, preventing tens of millions from accessing higher-paying jobs in the manufacturing and service sectors...
Britain slashes spending in new austerity drive Business Insider ...Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne unveiled fresh austerity measures Wednesday to slash the country's debt, evoking the plight of crisis-hit Greece in presenting the first purely Conservative budget for nearly 20 years. Osborne slashed welfare spending to honour campaign promises...
Greece Submits New Loan Request, as Tsipras Takes Defiant Stance New York Times ... Greece, running out of money and under a tight deadline from European leaders, on Wednesday requested a three-year loan from the eurozone’s bailout fund. But other than alluding to plans to begin overhauling its tax and pension systems next week, Greece did not detail what economic changes it would make in exchange for the loan...
State & Living Wage Battles
Prevailing Wage Repeal, Reform Stripped from WI Budget; Extraordinary Session Called to Address We Party Patriots ...Wisconsin Republicans have reached an agreement which will allow them to pass a budget for 2015-2017 after a week of contentious infighting over prevailing wage reforms and funding for a new Milwaukee Bucks arena. As part of the deal, Republicans agreed to eliminate these issues from the budget itself and instead take up an extraordinary session to tackle the outstanding questions...
Wisconsin's budget bill a Pandora's Box of attacks against workers Daily Kos ...Wisconsin's GOP lawmakers have packed a lot of punch into a provision in the state's budget bill, with most of it undercutting labor unions and workers along with reducing oversight of law enforcement. The measure, known as Motion 999, gained notoriety when one initiative that would have quashed the state's open record laws came to light. It was so deeply unpopular that lawmakers led by Gov. Scott Walker shelved it...
Wisconsin Is Trying to Take Away the Right to a Weekend Gawker ...In Wisconsin, Republicans led by Scott Walker has done an amazing job of destroying public unions and handing all power over the workplace back to business interests. Now, with little fanfare, they want to take away the right for workers to have a single day off. Wisconsin state legislators are preparing to vote on a budget. One additional measure is worth gaping at, perhaps above all others: section 56, which would take away workers’ right to a weekend—even a one day weekend...
Scott Walker's Office Was Part of a Sneaky Effort to Keep His Records Private Mother Jones ...Gov. Scott Walker's office has confirmed in a statement that it was involved with the measure to change Wisconsin's open-records law to block access to many currently available government documents. The statement was released after Wisconsin Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R) acknowledged that Walker's office took part in discussions to slip the changes into a last-minute budget bill...
Wisconsin Senate passes budget, votes to scale back prevailing wage law Chicago Sun-Times ...The Republican-controlled Wisconsin Senate passed the $73 billion state budget just before midnight Tuesday, sending it to the Assembly after voting to repeal a prevailing wage law for local government projects, a move Democrats called an affront to the middle class...
Sherrod Brown pushes for charter school accountability and transparency Daily Kos ...A lack of accountability and transparency are a key problem of charter schools in many states across the country, allowing them to made into centers of corporate profit above their mission as centers of education. That lack, and that profit drive, is what leads to abuses like charter schools that pay above-market rents to real estate companies connected to school executives. Sen. Sherrod Brown has a bill that would change that and other abuses...
Missouri voter ID measure from GOP candidate OK to circulate Springfield News-Leader ...A Republican candidate for Missouri secretary of state now can gather signatures for an initiative petition to allow lawmakers to require voter identification. Democratic Secretary of State Jason Kander on Tuesday announced the proposed constitutional amendment can begin circulating...
Martin O’Malley Has the Right Solution for Puerto Rico’s Debt Crisis The Nation ...Puerto Rico is not Greece. But the United States commonwealth is confronted with a debt crisis. It faces the threat of a brutal round of austerity cuts, which could make a bad circumstance dramatically worse. If ever there was a moment that called for enlightened leadership that recognizes both the economic and social challenges facing the Puerto Rico, this is it...
U.S. Labor
Hospital, nurses union reach tentative contract deal News OK ...Negotiators for Eastern Maine Medical Center and a union representing nurses at the hospital have reached a tentative agreement on a new three-year contract. The deal announced early Wednesday could avert a threatened two-day strike by the nurses next week. It must be ratified by the union membership and the hospital's board...
US: a look back at the UAW-Detroit three talks of 2011 InAutoNews ...The United Automotive Workers union is set to renegotiate the labor agreements for the represented workers at the three largest US automakers – General Motors, Ford and Fiat Chrysler. The summer negotiations for the contracts for the upcoming four years are going to kick off next week...
Nurse ratio bill advances to D.C. Council's health committee Washington Business Journal ...A bill that would require minimum staffing for nurses in D.C. hospitals was approved by the D.C. Council's business committee Tuesday and will now advance to the health committee for consideration. National Nurses United, the nursing union representing many of the local nurses pushing for ratios, called the vote an "important step"...
Union Is the New Black: Labor Organizing in Orange Is the New Black, And What It Means For You Union Plus ...In its third season with Netflix, Orange Is the New Black has had a significant effect on America's consciousness regarding: race, women and incarceration, and transgender issues. This season highlighted many character backstories, but personally, the most interesting plot-line was that of the security guards and their efforts to organize a potential union...
Company Raises Its Minimum Wage To $15 So Employees Won’t ‘Worry About Making Ends Meet’ Think Progress ...Internet Truckstop Group, an Idaho-based company that owns a number of internet trucking logistic websites, is raising base pay for its employees to $15 an hour. The company has 250 full- and part-time employees, about 110 of whom will get a raise because of the increase. Most average $11 to $12 hours currently. CEO Scott Moscrip said the company, whose revenues have grown between 10 and 30 percent a year, was due for a pay increase...
Miscellaneous
After 6-Year Tenure Not Prosecuting Banks, Eric Holder Returns 'Home' to Defend Them Common Dreams ...Former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder's return this week to a high-level position at Covington & Burling, a corporate law firm that represents big banks, has some calling it a dramatic and troubling example of the Washington-to-Wall-Street revolving door. That's because Holder's six years of service under the administration of President Barack Obama were defined by his refusal to criminally prosecute any of the financial institutions...
Donald Trump’s Empire Was (Probably) Built On Immigrant Labor Think Progress ...As a real estate tycoon, Donald Trump built up and has given his name to clothing lines, hotels, resorts, golf courses, a winery, and apartment buildings. And for a man who has unapologetically characterized Mexican immigrants as rapists and drug dealers, and has said that infectious diseases are spilling across the border, Trump has decided to work in industries where it’s impossible to avoid the Latino immigrants he is maligning...
The End of Encryption? NSA & FBI Seek New Backdoors Against Advice from Leading Security Experts Democracy Now ...Encryption refers to the scrambling of communications so they cannot be read without the correct key or password. The FBI and GCHQ have said they need access to encrypted communications to track criminals and terrorists. Fourteen of the world’s pre-eminent cryptographers, computer scientists and security specialists have issued a paper arguing there is no way to allow the government such access without endangering all confidential data...
Waiting to Die in Prison—for Selling a Couple of Bags of Pot Mother Jones ...How many prisoners are serving life sentences for pot? At least 69, based on data collected by the American Civil Liberties Union and other organizations. But that figure probably is low, particularly if you count older inmates serving lengthy sentences who will likely die in prison. Federal judges have sentenced 54 people to life without parole for marijuana crimes since 1996...
Popular Protests Are Spreading Across Central America, and Washington Is Getting Nervous The Nation ...In both Guatemala and Honduras, credible accusations of corruption are spurring mass mobilization truly popular in their class composition. In response, Washington is reacting in its usual manner to such threats: more militarization...
