TEAMSTERS
Air General Workers at Detroit Metropolitan Airport Choose Teamsters Teamster.org ...Workers with Air General who provide cargo, mail handling and warehousing services at Detroit Metropolitan Airport have voted to join Teamsters Local 283 in Wyandotte, Mich. The 30 workers joined the Teamsters seeking better pay, benefits and working conditions...
Fort Polk Teamsters Vote for Strike Authorization Teamster.org ... Fort Polk federal contractors that work for URS/AECOM voted overwhelmingly for strike authorization last week following their rejection of a substandard last, best and final offer from the company. The workers, who are members of Teamsters Local 19 in Humble, Texas, voted down the contract proposal by a 90 percent margin...
Ballots Sent Out For San Bernardino County Contract Teamster.org ...Thousands of public employees in San Bernardino County, California, will now have an opportunity to use their voice in the workplace! Yesterday, ballots for the tentative agreement covering the 11,000 employees went in the mail to each union household. The bargaining committee and stewards from Teamsters Local 1932 (newly charted this year after the successful organizing campaign) unanimously endorsed the agreement...
Hoffa Opposes Highway Bill Measure Go By Truck ...Teamsters President James Hoffa penned an article for the Los Angeles Daily News expressing concern about a provision in the House of Representatives’ highway bill that he says would contribute to more dangerous highways. The provision would allow carriers to deny state-required rest and meal breaks to their drivers. Several judicial rulings have upheld California’s right to impose mandatory breaks for all workers, including truck drivers...
FRA: Northeast Rail Corridor Needs Significant Investment Teamster.org ...The Federal Railway Administration (FRA) issued a report this week on upgrades needed for the Northeast Corridor (NEC) rail system. Members of the Teamsters Rail Conference from the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen and the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division work side by side on the NEC to keep the trains running efficiently and safely...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Obama urges Congress to approve Pacific trade pact early in 2016 Reuters ...President Barack Obama on Friday urged the U.S. Congress to quickly approve a 12-nation Pacific trade pact early in 2016, telling reporters the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was essential to the American economy as well as national security. Obama last week gave Congress 90 days' notice that he would sign the TPP deal, which seeks to remove trade barriers and set common standards in 40 percent of the world economy...
TPP uncertainties to dog Obama trip to Asia Politico ...President Barack Obama wraps up Group of 20 meetings today in Turkey, where the recent attack in Paris has taken center stage. That stop precedes a trip through Asia this week, where he hopes to build on the momentum of the recently concluded Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement and to reassure allies...
Leaders of TPP states to meet in Manila Japan News ...The leaders of Japan, the United States and 10 other countries that reached a broad Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade accord last month will hold a meeting in Manila on Wednesday. At the meeting, the TPP leaders are expected to declare that they will aim for the early entry into force of the TPP pact...
APEC Business Council Calls on States to Ratify TPP as Route to FTAAP Sputnik News ...The APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) is calling on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) member states to ratify the deal as soon as possible, as it may lead to trade agreements encompassing larger areas such as the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP), the head of Australia’s ABAC delegation said Monday...
TTIP trade talks: Germany urges US to let MPs see texts BBC ...The German government has urged American authorities to give German MPs access to key documents in the EU-US trade negotiations known as TTIP. The request came amid widespread opposition to the confidential talks, which are aimed at creating the world's biggest free trade zone...
ILO says most Bangladesh garment factories must improve fire safety Reuters ...The International Labour Organisation (ILO) said on Friday 80 percent of export-oriented ready made garment (RMG) factories in Bangladesh needed improvement in fire and electrical safety standards. A spotlight was thrown on Bangladesh's garment sector, the world's second biggest which supplies many global brands, after the collapse of a factory complex in 2013...
French officials warned that austerity increased security peril Al Jazeera ...After the carnage in and around Paris Friday night, when eight assailants used explosives and automatic weapons to kill at least 128 people, recent warnings by security officials over the spiking threat of attack amid budgetary austerity have assumed a particularly grim prescience...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Lawmakers hear right-to-work comparative study Metro News ...In Sunday’s Joint Standing Committee on the Judiciary meeting, WVU economics researcher John Deskins reported his findings in relation to the differences between right-to-work and non-right-to-work states. West Virginia AFL-CIO President Kenny Perdue spoke against right-to-work, pointing out that it hurts states’ economies more than it helps...
Wages, safety lower in right-to-work states, lawmakers told WV Gazette-Mail ...Legislators heard the pros and cons Sunday of proposed legislation to make West Virginia a right-to-work state, with proponents saying it will help grow the state’s economy, and opponents calling it an effort to destroy unions and hurt working-class families. Both sides agreed that average wages are lower in right-to-work states, but differed on whether that is a good or bad thing...
New York State Workers Laud Higher Minimum Pay New York Times ...The governor’s action highlights his larger efforts to increase the statewide minimum wage for all workers, in both the public and private sectors, to $15 an hour from the current rate of $8.75, which would require the approval of the State Legislature. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour...
Minimum wage: Pressure mounts on Oregon lawmakers to take up increase in 2016 OregonLive ...As the movement to raise Oregon's minimum wage gathers steam, everyone is looking to see if the Legislature — facing ballot measures for $13.50 and $15, a worsening housing crisis in Portland and pressure from Gov. Kate Brown — will pass an increase during the 2016 session. Most agree that an increase is likely next year...
The Right’s Anti-Minimum Wage Arguments Have Pretty Much Stayed the Same for 80 Years In These Times ...Over the past year, the campaign to raise the minimum wage has been steadily accumulating prominence, political allies and, most importantly, successes. Not surprisingly, it has also occasioned a pushback from conservative politicians and columnists who view its increase as a misguided, self-defeating folly...
U.S. LABOR
Kohler workers on strike Fight Back News ...On Nov. 15, at 9:00 a.m., about 2100 workers of Kohler Co., represented by United Auto Workers Local 883 in Kohler, Wisconsin voted by a 93.4% margin to strike, with about 1800 members voting. The strike started Nov. 15. The facility is shuttered and not operational. In 2010, Kohler pushed the workers to accept a concessionary contract...
Majority favor UAW-Ford contract in early voting Detroit Free Press ...Ford's emphasis on investment in its 26 facilities across the U.S. is paying off in early positive results as 52,900 UAW members continue to vote on a new four-year tentative agreement on Sunday even as workers at a big assembly plant in Claycomo, Mo. voted against the agreement...
Kaiser, mental health workers avert strike San Jose Mercury News ...Kaiser Permanente and its mental health workers have reached a tentative contract settlement, averting a strike that had been planned to start Monday, the union announced late Sunday. Health clinicians and Kaiser agreed on a tentative three-year contract overcoming two major sticking points...
Solano County and SEIU labor union reach impasse The Reporter ...After months of negotiations, an expired contract and a two-day strike, Solano County and Service Employees International Union, Local 1021 have reached an impasse. “Future discussion would be futile,” said the county in a press release issued Friday afternoon. It noted that the impasse was declared after negotiations reached late into the night Thursday...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Voices from a City in Mourning: Paris Reels After 129 Killed in Deadliest Attacks in Decades Democracy Now ...France has entered a third day of mourning after a string of suicide bombings and shootings targeted restaurants, a concert hall and the national soccer stadium on Friday night. The simultaneous attacks killed 129 people and injured hundreds more. It was the deadliest attack on French soil in decades...
After Paris Attacks, Critics Warn Against 'Wars of Vengeance' Common Dreams ...As details trickled out about Friday's deadly attacks in and around Paris, observers urged world leaders to avoid knee-jerk responses both at home and abroad. Beating the drum for "all-out war" would not be strategically sound, critics cautioned in the wake of the attacks...
We kicked the Koch Brothers’ ass: How Denver parents beat back big money, charter schools, right-wing lies Salon ...News stories told of a national program bearing down on the school district, with “money pouring in from Americans for Prosperity, the national organization founded by the Koch brothers,” in an effort to impose an agenda from outside the community that included a new history curriculum, new restrictions on teachers’ job security, and more privately-operated charter schools. The results came in last week, and voters recalled the board majority and voted in a new slate of progressive-minded candidates...
The Second Democratic Debate Was a Great Night for Republicans (opinion) The Nation ...The Democrats kept citing the examples of Republicans to explain—and justify—their policies on everything from progressive taxation to breaking up big banks. The Democrats were not referencing 2016 Republicans, who in each new GOP presidential debate further expose the extent to which the party of Lincoln has broken faith with every idea for which it ever stood. Saturday was a great night for the Republican Party that was...
Protests Erupt In Minneapolis After Cops Shoot Unarmed Black Man Think Progress ...Black Lives Matter activists in Minneapolis took to the streets on Sunday to protest the police shooting of an unarmed black man who, according to some witnesses, was already in handcuffs when the cops opened fire. The man was shot during a midday altercation on the street, as police officers reportedly tried to stop him from interfering with a paramedic crew assisting a victim of an assault...
