TEAMSTERS
Teamsters Applaud Supreme Court's Refusal to Hear Amerijet Lawsuit Teamster.org ...Teamsters Airline Division Director Capt. David Bourne in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s denial of a petition this week by Amerijet International Inc.: “It comes as no surprise that the Supreme Court would refuse to hear this case, and in doing so, uphold the Eleventh Circuit Court’s reasoning that this lawsuit is without merit. The lawsuit by Amerijet is unnecessary and a blatant abuse of the legal process in an effort to circumvent the legally established standards of labor law”...
Judge: Con-way Violated Rights of Workers in Los Angeles Teamster.org ...Con-way Freight, Inc. violated the rights of workers who were trying to form their union with the Teamsters and must re-hire two workers it unlawfully fired during the organizing campaign, among other remedies, an administrative law judge with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has ruled. The workers at Con-way’s Los Angeles terminal were trying to join Local 63. The company must cease its illegal activities, reinstate the two fired workers and pay them back wages and benefits, and take other steps...
Pettiness Reaches New Heights At Résidences Soleil Teamsters Canada ...Unhappy with being forced to pay half of its workers’ life insurance premiums, Résidences Soleil owner Eddy Savoie is taking it out on his workers by making them pay… for their coffee! This bizarre story began in October 2012 when the management of Résidences Soleil decided to do away with its long-standing practice of paying 50% of its employees’ life insurance premiums. Teamsters Local Union 106 filed grievances to protest against this arbitrary decision...
Concord city employees to strike Wednesday Contra Costa Times ...Barring a last minute deal, the city's largest employee union will strike Wednesday to protest alleged unfair labor practices in the public works department. Teamsters Local 856 represents 137 employees, including administrative, clerical and maintenance staffers. The union also represents police dispatchers, but they will report to work Wednesday...
San Francisco tech shuttles get long-term approval USA Today ...San Francisco’s tech shuttles that service Facebook, Google and other companies have gained a permanent place in the city’s transportation system. The Teamsters have been involved in helping to organize shuttle drivers and other workers at Silicon Valley tech giants including Apple, eBay, Facebook and Yahoo. “We are pleased with this ruling, which protects daily public transit riders and the shuttle drivers who deserve to be treated properly and with dignity,” said Rome Aloise...
21 Organizations Fighting for Labor Rights in the Food System Huffington Post ...In Tracy, California, Teamsters members are fighting poverty wages and severe violations of basic rights at Taylor Farms. And more than 11,000 Teamsters workers have united to defeat a mega-merger of U.S. Foods and Sysco, which would have jeopardized thousands of broadline food service and transportation jobs...
Local 727 Beverage Members Stand Together for Strong Contracts in Niles, Alsip Local 727 ...Teamsters Local 727 members at Coca-Cola Refreshments and Reyes/Great Lakes Coca-Cola Distribution wore their unity loud and proud on Tuesday, November 17, as negotiations continued for new contracts with both companies. Hundreds of members sported red Teamster T-shirts as they started their shifts in beverage production and warehouse facilities in Chicago, Niles and Alsip, Ill. Local 727 also brought food and refreshments to members in Niles and Alsip, rallying together in support of new agreements...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Petrobras holdout strikers to vote on new deal Thursday Reuters ...A union representing workers in the Brazil's top oil region will vote on Thursday on a contract offer from state-run oil company Petrobras on Thursday or continue a strike, the most disruptive in 20 years, the union said Wednesday. The union, Sindipetro Norte Fluminense, called the vote after Petroleo Brasileiro SA, as Petrobras is known, agreed to discuss its demand that members receive back pay for all the days they were on strike...
Prospects dim for 2016 Pacific Rim trade vote in US Congress Reuters ...A 12-nation Pacific Rim free-trade deal, facing stiff opposition from many Democrats and unexpected resistance from Republicans, is unlikely to be voted on by the U.S. Congress before President Barack Obama leaves office, according to some Republican lawmakers and aides. A veteran Senate Republican aide, who asked not to be identified, said Republican leaders intend to shelve the deal until after the November 2016 presidential election...
House Democrats call TPP 'too big' to pass Congress The Hill ...A half dozen House Democrats asserted on Wednesday that opposition is growing for a sweeping Asia-Pacific trade agreement as the White House ramps up efforts to build support for the deal. The six Democrats — Reps. Rosa DeLauro (Conn.), Louise Slaughter (N.Y.), Marcy Kaptur (Ohio), Nydia Velázquez (N.Y.), Mark Pocan (Wis.) and Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii) — said the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal is “too big” to pass Congress and must be scrapped...
Pacific Rim trade pact praised, panned as proposed deal faces uphill battle in to Congress AP ...The Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal between the U.S. and 11 other Pacific nations is drawing potential new members from Asia and criticism from those excluded, as it heads for a tough ride in the U.S. Congress. Leaders of the trade grouping that spans the Pacific Rim met alongside a regional economic summit on Wednesday in the Philippines and President Barack Obama urged them to ratify the deal "as quickly as possible"...
Obama expects TPP approval from Canada after first meeting with Trudeau Globe and Mail ...Barack Obama said he expects Canada will sign on to the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The President of the United States made the comment following his first formal meeting with new Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The Liberal government has officially been non-committal on the deal...
APEC Protesters Defy Water Cannons as TPP Signing Announced TeleSUR ...While APEC condemned “terrorism” and called for an international security response in the summit's last day, protesters continued to slam free trade. Philippine police pushed back crowds with water canons in Manila on Thursday as demonstrators protested the Asian-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit, soon after member states agreed that the the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement would be signed on Feb. 4, 2016...
UK PM to Get $15 Mln Private Jet Ahead of Public Austerity Cuts Sputnik News ...David Cameron will be given his own version of the US President's Air Force One. This is despite the government's commitments to cutting billions of pounds of public spending. A Royal Air Force Voyager A330 is to be re-fitted at the taxpayers' expense, in order to provide private transportation for Mr Cameron, senior ministers, and possibly members of the royal family...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
77 California cities on ‘economically challenged’ list SacBee ...Nearly a third of Californians live in 77 “economically challenged” cities – including Los Angeles – with high levels of poverty, and low levels of income and employment, a new study declares. Moreover, says the report from the National Resource Network, California’s distressed cities are more than a quarter of the 297 U.S. cities over 40,000 population that fall into that category...
New York Cities to Raise Minimum Wage for City Workers Wall Street Journal ...Buffalo and Rochester are moving to raise the minimum wage of municipal employees to $15 an hour as part of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s push to raise the wage floor for all workers. The Democratic governor joined the mayors of both cities for their announcements on Wednesday...
Gov. Cuomo: State should enact $2B tax cut if minimum wage is raised to $15/hour Daily News ...Gov. Cuomo suggested Wednesday that the state enact a $2 billion tax cut if the Legislature approves his plan to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. At an event in Buffalo, Cuomo accused businesses of “stealing from taxpayers” by paying workers low wages knowing those same employees can also qualify for state welfare assistance. The governor called the situation a “scam” and “the mother of all loopholes”...
Democrats attack Rep. Bishop on union wage votes The Detroit News ...The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is running drive-time radio ads this week linking U.S. Rep. Mike Bishop’s votes on prevailing wage bill provisions with campaign donations from the powerful DeVos family of Grand Rapids. The ads, on the air in Metro Detroit and Lansing, charge that the Rochester Republican “wants to gut prevailing wage laws that make sure construction workers get paid a fair local wage”...
U.S. LABOR
Airport workers at 7 U.S. hubs to strike Wednesday night Washington Post ...Airport workers at seven of the busiest U.S. airports are going on strike Wednesday night to protest what they say are poor working conditions and retaliation for unionizing. More than 2,000 workers, including cleaners, wheelchair attendants, and baggage handlers plan to strike at Fort Lauderdale, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago O’Hare, Newark Liberty and New York’s Kennedy and LaGuardia airports, the Service Employees International Union said...
SEIU, Local 1021 returns to work as negotiators meet with county, mediator The Reporter ...Following a two-day strike action Wednesday, members of Service Employees International Union, Local 1021 voted to take a breather today as union negotiators meet with Solano County negotiators and a mediator. John Stead-Mendez, SEIU executive director, explained that the membership wanted the bargaining team to focus on negotiations and not worry about the striking workers...
Ford's UAW agreement in jeopardy after defeats at big plants Crain's ... Leaders of the United Auto Workers union scrambled Wednesday to salvage a proposed labor agreement with Ford, warning rank-and-file members that a rejection of the deal could jeopardize investments that would sustain U.S. factory jobs. With three-fourths of the national Ford union voted counted, 52 percent have rejected the proposed contract, Jimmy Settles, head of the UAW's Ford Department, said at UAW Local 600 in Dearborn, Michigan...
UAW Taking 'Micro' Approach to Unionizing Volkswagen Plant ABC ...The United Auto Workers union is back with a more concentrated approach after suffering a bitter loss in its efforts to gain collective-bargaining rights for all blue-collar workers at Volkswagen's plant in Tennessee. The National Labor Relations Board on Wednesday granted a petition by a small group of skilled-trades workers to hold a vote on being represented by the UAW for collective bargaining purposes...
Rauner Strikes Contract Deals With Unions, Takes Aim At AFSCME Progress Illinois ...The state of Illinois and a number of labor unions have reached four-year contract agreements, the Rauner administration said Wednesday. In announcing the new agreements, the Rauner administration used the opportunity to take aim at AFSCME Council 31. The union and the administration have yet to reach a new contract agreement...
Remembering the Life and Music of Labor Agitator Joe Hill, Who Was Executed 100 Years Ago Today In These Times ...Joe Hill saw his music as a weapon in the class war, composing songs to be sung on soapboxes, picket lines or in jail. And 100 years ago today, the forces of capital and the state of Utah executed him. Born Joel Hagglund in Sweden, Hill immigrated to the United States in 1902. Hill became politicized, eventually joining the Industrial Workers of the World...
Money and clout on the line for teachers union in 2016 CAL Matters ...The California Teachers Association, one of Sacramento’s most powerful interests, is heading into an extraordinary year with decisions on the ballot, in the Capitol and in the courts holding the potential to impact its clout for many years to come. Billions of dollars for schools will likely be at stake on the 2016 ballot as well as pivotal campaigns for state Legislature and a question about union pensions...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
The Koch intelligence agency Politico ...The political network helmed by Charles and David Koch has quietly built a secretive operation that conducts surveillance and intelligence gathering on its liberal opponents, viewing it as a key strategic tool in its efforts to reshape American public life.
The operation, which is little-known even within the Koch network, gathers what Koch insiders refer to as “competitive intelligence” that is used to try to thwart liberal groups and activists...
Elizabeth Warren Blasts Tax Plan as 'Giant Wet Kiss' to Corporate America Common Dreams ...Denouncing a "rigged" system that favors corporations over middle-class Americans, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said in a "must-watch" speech on Wednesday that any reform of the U.S. corporate tax code must force big businesses to "substantially increase" the amount of federal tax they pay. Warren's address at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. "staked out the left-wing position on corporate tax reform," Politico said...
Growing Number of Voters Have Families Impacted by Immigration Policy NBC ...For a significant number of potential 2016 voters, immigration policies are not an abstraction but have a direct impact for their loved ones. As many as 1.5 million U. S. citizen relatives of immigrants awaiting deportation relief under the president's stalled executive action program will be eligible to vote for president next year...
Hysterical Corporate Media Fueling War Fervor, Xenophobia in 24/7 Cycle Common Dreams ...Just as they did in the wake of 9/11, corporate media outlets—led by cable news networks—are spreading hysteria, fueling anti-immigrant sentiment, and beating the drum for war by providing "context-free coverage of terror," as one analyst put it this week. The 24/7 coverage of Friday's attacks in Paris and their aftermath, marked by speculation and sensationalism, is only helping the media conglomerates...
In Minneapolis, Local Black Lives Matter Activists Draw on a Growing National Network Truth Out ...Like many groups, BLM Minneapolis emerged as the wider movement for black lives exploded into headlines last year. The last few months, the group has been working to further involve community members in their strategizing and decision-making processes, as well as create opportunities to mobilize more broadly around the forces impacting black, Latino and indigenous city residents...
With Demands for Racial Justice, Student 'BlackOut' Actions Sweep US Common Dreams ...Students at colleges and universities from coast to coast walked out of class, held rallies and teach-ins, and protested on Wednesday as part of a coordinated national day of action demanding racial justice both on- and off-campus. The actions were both inspired by and in solidarity with recent protests at the University of Missouri and other institutions...
Showing posts with label Teamsters Canada. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Teamsters Canada. Show all posts
Thursday, November 19, 2015
Monday, October 5, 2015
Today's Teamster News 10.05.15
TEAMSTERS
Hoffa Says Tenuous TPP Agreement Does Not Listen to Workers' Concerns Teamster.org ...Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa in response to trade officials reaching an agreement on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a deal which would lead to thousands of U.S. jobs being shipped overseas and unsafe food and products flooding our store shelves. “Bum trade deals like NAFTA have killed upwards of 1 million U.S. jobs, many of which moved abroad. And that’s the concern with the looming TPP"...
Don't break faith with workers on multiemployer pension plans: Marcy Kaptur and James P. Hoffa (opinion) Cleveland Plain Dealer ...This year, as we celebrate its 41st anniversary, ERISA's pension protections are crumbling. A few weeks ago, the U.S. Treasury Department held a hearing in Washington, D.C., on finalizing a rule that opens the door to significant pension cuts including for current retirees. More than 100 retirees traveled to Washington, D.C., at their own expense to protest, and dozens spoke out against the rule at the hearing...
Union Continues Fight for CVS Pharmacists’ Breaks Local 727 ...Teamsters Local 727 representatives continue to fight to ensure CVS pharmacist members are no longer denied their breaks and meal periods. Earlier this year, the union filed a grievance on behalf of all members for the company’s denial of uninterrupted breaks and meal periods. CVS management refused to work with the union to resolve the grievance, so Local 727’s legal department is taking the case to arbitration...
Strike, protests could happen for tech bus drivers, union warns SF Gate ...A union representing tech bus drivers warned members to prepare to strike if their employer, Compass Transportation, refuses to budge on giving them better health care benefits and more holidays. The drivers shuttle employees for large companies, including Apple, Genentech, Yahoo, eBay, PayPal and Evernote, and are represented by the Teamsters Union...
Teamsters Demand Reinstatement of Haitian Worker Unfairly Dismissed From Heineken Plant Teamsters Canada ...On September 1st, Wilson Celiné, an employee of Brasserie Nationale d’Haïti, showed up for work as usual, only to be handed a dismissal letter. Hired as a maintenance technician in 2006 by this subsidiary of multinational Heineken International, this engineer by profession and labour activist incurred the wrath of his employer by participating in a union activity and filing a complaint...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Trans-Pacific Partnership Trade Deal Is Reached New York Times ...The United States and 11 other Pacific Rim nations on Monday agreed to the largest regional trade accord in history, a potentially precedent-setting model for global commerce and worker standards that would tie together 40 percent of the world’s economy, from Canada and Chile to Japan and Australia. The Trans-Pacific Partnership still faces months of debate in Congress...
Officials Reach Deal On Trans-Pacific Partnership Reuters ...Pacific trade ministers have reached a deal on the most sweeping trade liberalization pact in a generation that will cut trade barriers and set common standards for 12 countries, an official familiar with the talks said on Monday. Leaders from a dozen Pacific Rim nations are poised to announce the pact later on Monday. The deal could reshape industries and influence everything from the price of cheese to the cost of cancer treatments...
Sanders blasts ‘disastrous’ Obama trade deal The Hill ...Sen. Bernie Sanders labeled a new trade deal finalized by the Obama administration on Monday as “disastrous,” and said he would work to defeat it. Sanders, the Vermont senator leading Hillary Clinton in polls of New Hampshire, said the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal will lead to the loss of U.S. jobs, adding he was “disappointed but not surprised” by the decision to complete it. “Wall Street and other big corporations have won again,” Sanders said...
TPP Would Include Auto Market Opening for Japan New York Times ...A U.S.-Japan agreement on autos trade as part of a sweeping Pacific Rim trade deal would have its own dispute settlement mechanism, including penalties, if Japan does not open its market enough to U.S. vehicles, a source close to the negotiations said on Friday. Negotiators are working to finalize a trade deal which would stretch from Japan to Peru and autos trade has been one of a few remaining and politically charged sticking points...
If There Really Is a Final TPP Deal: Can It Pass Congress? When Does Congress Get to See a Final Text? Citizen.org ...If there really is a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal, its fate in Congress is highly uncertain given the narrow margin by which trade authority passed this summer, the concessions made to get a deal, and growing congressional and public concerns about the TPP’s threats to jobs, wages, safe food and affordable medicines and more...
Australia, US reach trade compromise Business Review ...The US and Australia are in agreement on an elaborate compromise within the Trans-Pacific Partnership to protect the intellectual property of complex drugs known as biologics, according to industry officials and an organisation following the talks. Under the bilateral deal, whose exact language is believed to be incomplete, countries in the trade bloc would have an alternative of either providing eight years of exclusivity to biologic drugs, or providing five years of so-called data exclusivity...
Three million people across Europe call for TTIP to be scrapped Economic Voice ...A Europe-wide petition calling for a halt to the trade deals being negotiated between the EU and the USA and Canada has reached three million signatures in the space of one year, days before it will be delivered to the European Commission in Brussels. Over 500,000 of the signatures that had been collected were from people resident in the UK. This morning 3,007,065 had signed the petition...
Anti-austerity protesters march in Manchester The Guardian ...Tens of thousands of people have joined an anti-austerity protest in Manchester on the opening day of the Conservative party conference, voicing opposition to policies including spending and benefit cuts, NHS reforms and restrictions on trade unions. Up to 60,000 people are said to have joined the demonstration, which was largely peaceful...
South Africa Coal Wage Strike Starts With No Dialog Planned Bloomberg ...The largest labor union at South Africa’s biggest coal producers said no meetings are planned with the companies after a wage strike started on Sunday night. “Our members have downed tools and supported our call for a strike,” Livhuwani Mammburu, a spokesman for the National Union of Mineworkers, which represents about 30,000 staff in the sector, said by phone on Monday. No meetings are scheduled with producers, including Anglo American Plc, Glencore Plc and Exxaro Resources Ltd., he said...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Wisconsin’s Voter ID Law Back In Court For Discriminating Against Students And Veterans Think Progress ...Wisconsin once again has to defend its voter ID law in federal court, this time responding to a challenge to the law’s exclusion of veterans’ IDs, technical college IDs, and out-of-state drivers’ licenses. Staff attorney Sean Young with the American Civil Liberties Union will argue before the federal district court in Milwaukee on Monday, asking them to allow these alternative IDs to be added to the state’s strict list of acceptable documents...
Tough voter ID rules pull Kansas into multiple lawsuits Salina Journal ...Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s successful push to require new Kansas voters to document their U.S. citizenship has spawned three lawsuits, including one he pursued against a federal agency in trying to enforce the policy. Kansas is one of only four states that make new voters show a birth certificate, passport or other citizenship papers. The Kansas requirement took effect in 2013...
Hoffa Says Tenuous TPP Agreement Does Not Listen to Workers' Concerns Teamster.org ...Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa in response to trade officials reaching an agreement on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a deal which would lead to thousands of U.S. jobs being shipped overseas and unsafe food and products flooding our store shelves. “Bum trade deals like NAFTA have killed upwards of 1 million U.S. jobs, many of which moved abroad. And that’s the concern with the looming TPP"...
Don't break faith with workers on multiemployer pension plans: Marcy Kaptur and James P. Hoffa (opinion) Cleveland Plain Dealer ...This year, as we celebrate its 41st anniversary, ERISA's pension protections are crumbling. A few weeks ago, the U.S. Treasury Department held a hearing in Washington, D.C., on finalizing a rule that opens the door to significant pension cuts including for current retirees. More than 100 retirees traveled to Washington, D.C., at their own expense to protest, and dozens spoke out against the rule at the hearing...
Union Continues Fight for CVS Pharmacists’ Breaks Local 727 ...Teamsters Local 727 representatives continue to fight to ensure CVS pharmacist members are no longer denied their breaks and meal periods. Earlier this year, the union filed a grievance on behalf of all members for the company’s denial of uninterrupted breaks and meal periods. CVS management refused to work with the union to resolve the grievance, so Local 727’s legal department is taking the case to arbitration...
Strike, protests could happen for tech bus drivers, union warns SF Gate ...A union representing tech bus drivers warned members to prepare to strike if their employer, Compass Transportation, refuses to budge on giving them better health care benefits and more holidays. The drivers shuttle employees for large companies, including Apple, Genentech, Yahoo, eBay, PayPal and Evernote, and are represented by the Teamsters Union...
Teamsters Demand Reinstatement of Haitian Worker Unfairly Dismissed From Heineken Plant Teamsters Canada ...On September 1st, Wilson Celiné, an employee of Brasserie Nationale d’Haïti, showed up for work as usual, only to be handed a dismissal letter. Hired as a maintenance technician in 2006 by this subsidiary of multinational Heineken International, this engineer by profession and labour activist incurred the wrath of his employer by participating in a union activity and filing a complaint...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Trans-Pacific Partnership Trade Deal Is Reached New York Times ...The United States and 11 other Pacific Rim nations on Monday agreed to the largest regional trade accord in history, a potentially precedent-setting model for global commerce and worker standards that would tie together 40 percent of the world’s economy, from Canada and Chile to Japan and Australia. The Trans-Pacific Partnership still faces months of debate in Congress...
Officials Reach Deal On Trans-Pacific Partnership Reuters ...Pacific trade ministers have reached a deal on the most sweeping trade liberalization pact in a generation that will cut trade barriers and set common standards for 12 countries, an official familiar with the talks said on Monday. Leaders from a dozen Pacific Rim nations are poised to announce the pact later on Monday. The deal could reshape industries and influence everything from the price of cheese to the cost of cancer treatments...
Sanders blasts ‘disastrous’ Obama trade deal The Hill ...Sen. Bernie Sanders labeled a new trade deal finalized by the Obama administration on Monday as “disastrous,” and said he would work to defeat it. Sanders, the Vermont senator leading Hillary Clinton in polls of New Hampshire, said the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal will lead to the loss of U.S. jobs, adding he was “disappointed but not surprised” by the decision to complete it. “Wall Street and other big corporations have won again,” Sanders said...
TPP Would Include Auto Market Opening for Japan New York Times ...A U.S.-Japan agreement on autos trade as part of a sweeping Pacific Rim trade deal would have its own dispute settlement mechanism, including penalties, if Japan does not open its market enough to U.S. vehicles, a source close to the negotiations said on Friday. Negotiators are working to finalize a trade deal which would stretch from Japan to Peru and autos trade has been one of a few remaining and politically charged sticking points...
If There Really Is a Final TPP Deal: Can It Pass Congress? When Does Congress Get to See a Final Text? Citizen.org ...If there really is a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal, its fate in Congress is highly uncertain given the narrow margin by which trade authority passed this summer, the concessions made to get a deal, and growing congressional and public concerns about the TPP’s threats to jobs, wages, safe food and affordable medicines and more...
Australia, US reach trade compromise Business Review ...The US and Australia are in agreement on an elaborate compromise within the Trans-Pacific Partnership to protect the intellectual property of complex drugs known as biologics, according to industry officials and an organisation following the talks. Under the bilateral deal, whose exact language is believed to be incomplete, countries in the trade bloc would have an alternative of either providing eight years of exclusivity to biologic drugs, or providing five years of so-called data exclusivity...
Three million people across Europe call for TTIP to be scrapped Economic Voice ...A Europe-wide petition calling for a halt to the trade deals being negotiated between the EU and the USA and Canada has reached three million signatures in the space of one year, days before it will be delivered to the European Commission in Brussels. Over 500,000 of the signatures that had been collected were from people resident in the UK. This morning 3,007,065 had signed the petition...
Anti-austerity protesters march in Manchester The Guardian ...Tens of thousands of people have joined an anti-austerity protest in Manchester on the opening day of the Conservative party conference, voicing opposition to policies including spending and benefit cuts, NHS reforms and restrictions on trade unions. Up to 60,000 people are said to have joined the demonstration, which was largely peaceful...
South Africa Coal Wage Strike Starts With No Dialog Planned Bloomberg ...The largest labor union at South Africa’s biggest coal producers said no meetings are planned with the companies after a wage strike started on Sunday night. “Our members have downed tools and supported our call for a strike,” Livhuwani Mammburu, a spokesman for the National Union of Mineworkers, which represents about 30,000 staff in the sector, said by phone on Monday. No meetings are scheduled with producers, including Anglo American Plc, Glencore Plc and Exxaro Resources Ltd., he said...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Wisconsin’s Voter ID Law Back In Court For Discriminating Against Students And Veterans Think Progress ...Wisconsin once again has to defend its voter ID law in federal court, this time responding to a challenge to the law’s exclusion of veterans’ IDs, technical college IDs, and out-of-state drivers’ licenses. Staff attorney Sean Young with the American Civil Liberties Union will argue before the federal district court in Milwaukee on Monday, asking them to allow these alternative IDs to be added to the state’s strict list of acceptable documents...
Tough voter ID rules pull Kansas into multiple lawsuits Salina Journal ...Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s successful push to require new Kansas voters to document their U.S. citizenship has spawned three lawsuits, including one he pursued against a federal agency in trying to enforce the policy. Kansas is one of only four states that make new voters show a birth certificate, passport or other citizenship papers. The Kansas requirement took effect in 2013...
Right-to-work issue prompts push in Republican Party Joplin Globe ...In the wake of the right-to-work fight in Missouri this year, some conservative business leaders and organizations have launched a two-pronged push that, if successful, could bring changes to the state's work environment, its education and legal systems, and more. But some Republicans fear one part of that push could end up dividing the party...
Prevailing wage backers push for public vote on repeal Detroit News ...The best chance advocates have to save a Michigan law that promises better wages on public works projects is if Republican legislators ignore a petition initiative and instead let voters decide the fate of prevailing wage. The 50-year-old statute requires workers on state-financed government construction projects to be paid local wage and benefit rates, which are based on union contracts...
Koch Brothers Backing Misleading Anti-Solar Campaign in Florida Truthout ...The Koch brothers and utility giants are bankrolling a ballot initiative in Florida to block the development of home solar and to protect the utilities' continuing oligopoly on energy generation in the Sunshine State. Solar is booming in the U.S., with a thirty percent increase in generation in 2014, but surprisingly it's facing an uphill battle in Florida...
Brown proposes paid sick leave Journal-News ...Federal legislation introduced last month would mandate employers provide some form of sick days, to use to heal or to care for a sick family member. While some business professionals understand the need, they say it may not be practical. Congress is considering the Healthy Families Act, a bill that’s being pushed by 30 senators in the Senate, including Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio...
Lawsuit Against St. Louis Minimum Wage Hike In Court Tomorrow CBS ...It’s business versus the city in court tomorrow. St. Louis is 10 days away from a minimum wage increase to $8.25 per hour, and eventually up to $11 per hour in 2018. But Attorney Jane Dueker is representing a coalition of business groups against the minimum wage hike. Her side believes the city is not able to raise the minimum wage to higher than what the state requires...
U.S. LABOR
Bankruptcy Lawyers Strip Cash from Coal Miners’ Health Insurance Pro Publica ...As coal companies go bankrupt or shut down throughout Appalachia and parts of the Midwest, the immediate fallout includes lost jobs and devastated communities. But the Indiana case stands out as an example of how financial deals hatched far from coal country can also endanger the future safety net. At issue is health insurance promised to people who worked for the Squaw Creek Coal Company in Warrick County, Indiana...
UAW, Fiat officials miscalculated young worker angst USA Today ...UAW negotiators failed to understand the deep hostility of entry-level workers who, instead of taking a substantial raise, chose to join forces with higher-paid veterans to resoundingly defeat a proposed, four-year deal with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. Entry-level workers, referred to as Tier 2, have been stuck in a separate, lower pay range since 2007...
Frontier strikes deals with IBEW unions in California, Florida Fierce Telecom ...Frontier has reached union labor agreements with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) AFL-CIO in California and Florida, allowing it to move forward with its $10.5 billion acquisition of Verizon's wireline assets in California, Florida and Texas that's expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2016. The IBEW local unions in California and Florida said in separate statements that they support the deal...
Prevailing wage backers push for public vote on repeal Detroit News ...The best chance advocates have to save a Michigan law that promises better wages on public works projects is if Republican legislators ignore a petition initiative and instead let voters decide the fate of prevailing wage. The 50-year-old statute requires workers on state-financed government construction projects to be paid local wage and benefit rates, which are based on union contracts...
Koch Brothers Backing Misleading Anti-Solar Campaign in Florida Truthout ...The Koch brothers and utility giants are bankrolling a ballot initiative in Florida to block the development of home solar and to protect the utilities' continuing oligopoly on energy generation in the Sunshine State. Solar is booming in the U.S., with a thirty percent increase in generation in 2014, but surprisingly it's facing an uphill battle in Florida...
Brown proposes paid sick leave Journal-News ...Federal legislation introduced last month would mandate employers provide some form of sick days, to use to heal or to care for a sick family member. While some business professionals understand the need, they say it may not be practical. Congress is considering the Healthy Families Act, a bill that’s being pushed by 30 senators in the Senate, including Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio...
Lawsuit Against St. Louis Minimum Wage Hike In Court Tomorrow CBS ...It’s business versus the city in court tomorrow. St. Louis is 10 days away from a minimum wage increase to $8.25 per hour, and eventually up to $11 per hour in 2018. But Attorney Jane Dueker is representing a coalition of business groups against the minimum wage hike. Her side believes the city is not able to raise the minimum wage to higher than what the state requires...
U.S. LABOR
Bankruptcy Lawyers Strip Cash from Coal Miners’ Health Insurance Pro Publica ...As coal companies go bankrupt or shut down throughout Appalachia and parts of the Midwest, the immediate fallout includes lost jobs and devastated communities. But the Indiana case stands out as an example of how financial deals hatched far from coal country can also endanger the future safety net. At issue is health insurance promised to people who worked for the Squaw Creek Coal Company in Warrick County, Indiana...
UAW, Fiat officials miscalculated young worker angst USA Today ...UAW negotiators failed to understand the deep hostility of entry-level workers who, instead of taking a substantial raise, chose to join forces with higher-paid veterans to resoundingly defeat a proposed, four-year deal with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. Entry-level workers, referred to as Tier 2, have been stuck in a separate, lower pay range since 2007...
Frontier strikes deals with IBEW unions in California, Florida Fierce Telecom ...Frontier has reached union labor agreements with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) AFL-CIO in California and Florida, allowing it to move forward with its $10.5 billion acquisition of Verizon's wireline assets in California, Florida and Texas that's expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2016. The IBEW local unions in California and Florida said in separate statements that they support the deal...
These Guestworkers Just Won $20 Million Back From the Company That Trafficked Them The Nation ... They came from India to repair the Gulf Coast after hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and were repaid with months of abuse. On Katrina’s 10th anniversary, both the workers and their bosses are finally getting their due. Following a landmark lawsuit victory in February, the maritime company that imported the roughly 500 “guestworkers” to repair storm-damaged Gulf Coast oil facilities has officially apologized as part of a $20 million settlement...
Video Game Voice Actors Push for Strike Over Performance Bonuses and Stressful Recordings In These Times ...Voice actors are demanding they receive residual income based on sales, with a performance bonus for every 2 million online subscribers or copies sold. This set-up is designed to ensure smaller games are unaffected, as this is the threshold at which a game can be considered a "blockbuster," according to creen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), the union representing the actors...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
The irreversible damage of Volkswagen’s stunning deceit Salon ...Volkswagen’s ruse to circumvent U.S. auto emissions standards has left many wondering about the precise environmental impact of its cars, which emitted more pollutants than regulations allow. On September 18 the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency discovered that four Volkswagen vehicles from model years 2009 to 2015 had been rigged with illegal software. They used a sophisticated algorithm that would make the cars run cleanly during emissions tests...
How Global Warming Makes Overcrowded Prisons Even More Dangerous Mother Jones ...There is no population more captive to the effects of global warming than the incarcerated. And given the huge concentration of black and Latino prisoners in America, this is a classic case of environmental injustice, as these consequences fall widely on prisoners of color. A new study from Daniel W. E. Holt of the Columbia Law School's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law explains over 144 pages what the climate-change toll truly is on the two-million-plus bodies caged in our prison system...
Doctors Without Borders Says U.S. May Have Committed War Crime Slate ...Doctors Without Borders said it was closing its hospital in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz on Sunday, a day after it was hit by what seems to have been a U.S. airstrike. The medical charity, commonly known by its French name Médecins Sans Frontières, or MSF, increased the death toll in the bombing, saying the total fatalities amount to 22, including 12 staff members and 10 patients, and 37 people were wounded...
Britain Says No to Slavery Reparations, But Offers to Buy Jamaica New Prison Common Dreams ...British Prime Minister David Cameron stirred outrage this week when he rejected growing calls for slavery reparations and instead offered £25 million for a new prison that would allow his government to deport Jamaican nationals incarcerated in the UK to serve out their sentences on the Caribbean island...
Video Game Voice Actors Push for Strike Over Performance Bonuses and Stressful Recordings In These Times ...Voice actors are demanding they receive residual income based on sales, with a performance bonus for every 2 million online subscribers or copies sold. This set-up is designed to ensure smaller games are unaffected, as this is the threshold at which a game can be considered a "blockbuster," according to creen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), the union representing the actors...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
The irreversible damage of Volkswagen’s stunning deceit Salon ...Volkswagen’s ruse to circumvent U.S. auto emissions standards has left many wondering about the precise environmental impact of its cars, which emitted more pollutants than regulations allow. On September 18 the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency discovered that four Volkswagen vehicles from model years 2009 to 2015 had been rigged with illegal software. They used a sophisticated algorithm that would make the cars run cleanly during emissions tests...
How Global Warming Makes Overcrowded Prisons Even More Dangerous Mother Jones ...There is no population more captive to the effects of global warming than the incarcerated. And given the huge concentration of black and Latino prisoners in America, this is a classic case of environmental injustice, as these consequences fall widely on prisoners of color. A new study from Daniel W. E. Holt of the Columbia Law School's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law explains over 144 pages what the climate-change toll truly is on the two-million-plus bodies caged in our prison system...
Doctors Without Borders Says U.S. May Have Committed War Crime Slate ...Doctors Without Borders said it was closing its hospital in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz on Sunday, a day after it was hit by what seems to have been a U.S. airstrike. The medical charity, commonly known by its French name Médecins Sans Frontières, or MSF, increased the death toll in the bombing, saying the total fatalities amount to 22, including 12 staff members and 10 patients, and 37 people were wounded...
Britain Says No to Slavery Reparations, But Offers to Buy Jamaica New Prison Common Dreams ...British Prime Minister David Cameron stirred outrage this week when he rejected growing calls for slavery reparations and instead offered £25 million for a new prison that would allow his government to deport Jamaican nationals incarcerated in the UK to serve out their sentences on the Caribbean island...
Friday, July 31, 2015
Today's Teamster News 07.31.15
Teamsters
Apple, Yahoo shuttle drivers set to vote on union USA Today ...Unions continue to make inroads into Silicon Valley. Shuttle drivers for Apple, eBay, Yahoo, Zynga and several other Silicon Valley firms are set to vote Saturday on a package for improved wages and benefits. The 160 drivers, most of them employed by Compass Transportation of San Jose, shuttle employees to and from those tech firms, as well as Amtrak, Evernote and Genentech. The drivers sought representation from Teamsters Local 853...
Garda Canada Security Corporation and Teamsters Local 362 reach a new collective agreement Government of Canada ...Today, the Honourable Dr. K. Kellie Leitch, Minister of Labour and Minister of Status of Women, congratulated Garda Canada Security Corporation and Teamsters Local 362 on the renewal of their collective agreement. The agreement was reached with assistance from the Labour Program’s Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS). The FMCS provides dispute resolution and dispute prevention assistance to trade unions and employers under the jurisdiction of the Canada Labour Code...
Port Truckers Testify Before Tidelands and Harbor Committee Over Misclassification, Wage Theft Long Beach Post ...Stakeholders from the Port of Long Beach (POLB), trucking companies and drivers testified before the Tidelands and Harbor Committee last night to address the misclassification. The idea that the businesses can flourish while paying their drivers as employees was illustrated by Kevin Baddeley, president of Shippers Transport Express (STE) based out of Carson. He said that since converting to an employee model in January and negotiating a union contract with the Teamsters Union shortly after, STE has been stable and its customers happy...
Time running out for Sun Tran negotiations with union KVOA ...Sun Tran and the employees’ union, Teamsters Local 104, are still negotiating to avoid a bus strike in Tucson. Their contract expires Friday at midnight. Union members, who are mostly bus drivers, are expected to vote on a new deal Saturday. If the union rejects the contract, a strike may follow. Signs at bus stations warn riders about the negotiations...
Global Labor & Trade
Pacific trade negotiators chase elusive final deal in tough talks Reuters ...Pacific Rim trade ministers neared the final spurt of negotiations on an ambitious free trade pact on Thursday, but differences over farm exports and monopoly periods for next-generation drugs kept them short of an elusive final deal. Ministers from the 12 countries negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which would cut trade barriers and set common standards for 40 percent of the world economy, are meeting in Hawaii to try to hammer out a deal...
Canada Under Pressure as Pacific Trade Talks Slow Over Dairy Bloomberg ...Negotiations on a landmark free-trade pact among 12 Pacific nations stumbled as pressure mounted on Canada to soften its stance on limiting dairy imports. After months of demands from nations including the U.S., Australia and New Zealand to open its dairy markets as part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, Canada outlined a proposal during talks in Hawaii that other nations rejected as inadequate, according to two people briefed on the negotiations...
Trade deal threatens affordable healthcare for millions, experts say Aljazeera ...Public health groups on Thursday warned that “absurd” patent and data protection clauses pushed by U.S. lawmakers during the final negotiations of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in Maui, Hawaii could hike prices for life-saving drugs and stifle innovation. Doctors Without Border (MSF) and the Generic Pharmaceutical Association are most concerned with measures such as the extension of intellectual property rights on drug patents and increased damages for the infringement of patents...
Trade Negotiators Reach Environmental Accord New York Times ...Trade negotiators from the United States and 11 other Pacific nations reached agreement late Thursday on broad environmental protections for some of the most sensitive, diverse and threatened ecosystems on earth, closing one of the most contentious chapters of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. As negotiators struggled to complete the largest regional trade agreement, they pointed to the environmental accord as a clear achievement. It will be controversial. Some environmental groups, like the Sierra Club, insist that it lacks the binding enforcement measures...
Patent Protection for Drugs Puts Pressure on U.S. in Trade Talks New York Times ...With 12 nations pressing to conclude the largest regional trade accord ever, United States officials find themselves squeezed between activists pressing to secure access to low-cost pharmaceuticals and Republicans who say Congress will reject a deal without strong patent protections for the drug industry. Negotiators gathered this week in Maui hoping the long-sought accord might be finished by Friday. But dozens of issues remain unresolved on the Trans-Pacific Partnership...
Group Seeks to Expose Cozy Ties Between US Trade Rep and Wall Street Common Dreams ...Citing his cozy ties to Wall Street banks, a group dedicated to exposing corruption and corporate influence in Washington, D.C. has submitted an official Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for all correspondence between U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and the 10 largest U.S. financial institutions. Rootstrikers, the grassroots organization behind the FOIA request, has said that because corporate giveaways like the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) pose a threat to robust financial regulation in general, "Americans deserve to know"...
Pacific Rim free trade deal comes with high price Aljazeera ...On the tropical shores of the island of Maui in Hawaii, 12 Pacific Rim countries are negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement behind closed doors. The current meeting in Hawaii between the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Brunei Darussalam, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore, Peru, and Vietnam is the latest and possibly final round of negotiations that have been grinding along and evolving for seven years. the deal has drawn critics from various spheres. Among the loudest are analysts concerned by how the deal will affect the availability and price of medicine...
WikiLeaks says US spied on Japanese government, companies Associated Press ...WikiLeaks says US spied on Japanese government, companies. The documents include what appear to be five U.S. National Security Agency reports, four of which are marked top-secret, that provide intelligence on Japanese positions on international trade and climate change. Three of the apparent NSA reports deal with climate change, and the other two with agricultural trade issues, including U.S. cherry exports to Japan...
Youth unemployment in Italy exceeds 44 percent, 38yr high RT ...Youth unemployment has increased to 44.2 percent in June, according to the Italian national statistics office. It’s the highest level since 1977 and about twice the eurozone average. The overall unemployment also increased in June, according to the data published Friday. The upsetting numbers come as the Italian Prime Minister is pursuing economic reforms that the government hopes will make the eurozone's third largest economy dominant in Europe and the world within 20-30 years...
Greek bailout talks shift into higher gear CBS ...Greece's talks with its international creditors on a third bailout worth 85 billion euros ($93 billion) shifted into a higher gear on Friday, with lead negotiators from the European Union and International Monetary Fund meeting key ministers in Athens. The talks with Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos and Economy Minister Giorgos Stathakis follow preparatory meetings in the Greek capital this week between lower-level officials on reforming the tax system and labor market regulations...
London’s National Gallery Labor Strike Escalates Artforum ...The entire group of union workers currently employed at the National Gallery in London are set to renew their strike this August, according to Sarah Cascone at Artnet. This comes after several other recent periods of labor dispute at the venerable British institution, all over the management’s plans to privatize visitor services at the museum. The Public and Commercial Services Union, which represents the workers who will be participating, has told the museum of its intentions to strike...
State & Living Wage Battles
Pennsylvania Employers Steal Tens Of Millions Of Dollars From Their Workers In Any Given Week Think Progress ...Pennsylvania’s low-wage workers lose between $19 million and $32 million to wage theft in any given week, potentially costing the state’s economy as much as a billion dollars in lost potential consumer spending each year, according to a new analysis by law students from Temple University. The economic analysis is premised on a 2009 study of Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles workers’ experiences of wage theft in various industries...
Michigan Supreme Court Upholds Right-to-Work Law, Takes Workers Back to the Gilded Age Truthout ...Republican lawmakers passed the measure in December 2012, making it illegal to require workers to pay union dues or service fees as a condition of employment. Shortly thereafter, public sector employees filed a lawsuit saying they were exempt from the law because their workplaces came under the jurisdiction of the Michigan Civil Service Commission, not private sector employment law. On Wednesday, July 29, the high court, in a 4-3 ruling, rejected the workers' plea. With that, the court completed the transformation of this longtime labor stronghold into an anti-labor regime, reminiscent of the Gilded Age US...
Kansas City Minimum Wage Hike? $15 Hourly Pay Proposed By Missouri Activists International Business Times ...Kansas City, Missouri, may see an initiative to increase the city's minimum wage on its November ballot. A group of civil rights organizations has demanded that their petition go to a vote to raise base hourly pay in the city to $15. In turn, business organizations have condemned the move as "job killing" and want to see wages stay at the state-mandated $7.65 per hour...
N.C. attorneys rest their case in federal voting rights trial Journal Now ...Attorneys representing North Carolina and Gov. Pat McCrory rested their case this morning after calling six witnesses in a federal trial over the state’s controversial election law. Several groups, including the N.C. NAACP and the U.S. Department of Justice, are suing the state and McCrory over House Bill 589, which became law in 2013. House Bill 589 eliminated same-day voter registration, reduced the days of early voting from 17 to 10, got rid of out-of-precinct provisional voting and abolished preregistration of 16- and 17-year-olds...
California's Drought and the Politics of Inequality (opinion) Truthout ...California Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in April, mandating urban centers to reduce water usage by 25 percent. Walking around working-class neighborhoods, one can't help but notice brown lawns and dying plants, which shows how seriously people are taking the task of water conservation. What's striking is who's willing to conserve - and who isn't. Forty-eight percent of wealthier homeowners with incomes above $100,000 a year say it would be "difficult" to conserve water...
Pittsburgh's paid sick leave bill headed to council for vote Monday Post-Gazette ...Pittsburgh City Councilman Corey O’Connor, with broad support from his colleagues, is looking to push through legislation Monday that would require businesses to provide paid sick leave to their employees before the council breaks for its August recess. If it clears that final vote, the bill, put forward July 6, will have gone from introduction to passage in less than a month...
U.S. Labor
Court backs labor board on election rule The Hill ...A federal court has upheld federal regulations designed to speed up union elections, dealing a blow to business groups who oppose the rule. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) should be allowed to expedite the process by which employees unionize, Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled for the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C...
NLRB to Rule on Northwestern Football Players’ Bid to Unionize Wall Street Journal ...The National Labor Relations Board is expected to decide in coming weeks whether to give labor unions a foothold in college sports, a decision that could have a widespread impact on college athletics. The five-member board of the federal labor agency is weighing whether Northwestern University’s scholarship football players are school employees, as an agency regional director ruled last year, and can therefore unionize...
Verizon strike on pension, health care possible APP.com ...Time is ticking down as negotiations between Verizon and its employees’ unions continue. The contract between Verizon and its union workforce, members of the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, expires at midnight Saturday. Both sides are “very apart on the issues,” said Candice Johnson, a CWA spokeswoman...
UAW, Ford kick off contract talks as auto business booms NWI.com ...The United Auto Workers union has kicked off contract talks with Ford, which is one of the Calumet Region's largest employers, with about 5,000 local workers. The UAW, which made deep concessions during the darkest days of the Great Recession, hopes to end a two-tier pay system in which younger workers are paid less than more veteran employees doing the same job...
Hundreds of United Steelworkers members rally downtown WPXI ...Hundred of United Steelworkers members and their allies rallied Thursday at the headquarters of Allegheny Technologies Inc. in downtown Pittsburgh. According to a release from the USW, the union is trying to reach agreement on a new contract for more than 2,200 members who work for ATI, a specialty metals and components supplier for the aerospace and defense, medical and industrial industries. Their old contract expired June 30...
Frontier Communications and Communications Workers of America Reach Agreement in Texas and Missouri MarketWatch ...Frontier Communications Corporation FTR, and the Communications Workers of America District 6 (CWA) are pleased to announce the signing of an agreement that will benefit CWA-represented employees in Texas and Missouri and Frontier’s future customers in Texas. The agreement is an important step forward in the process to complete Frontier’s planned acquisition of Verizon’s wireline business and assets in Texas, California and Florida...
Companies have found something to give their workers instead of raises Washington Post ...Once a staple of the American workplace, the annual raise is turning into a relic of the pre-crisis economy as companies turn to creative — and cheaper — ways to compensate their employees. More businesses are upping their spending on benefits such as one-time bonuses, health care and paid time off, according to recent survey data. Many are rolling out perks such as free gym membership, commuting subsidies, even pet health insurance...
‘She’s Not A Felon, She’s A Human Being': Obama Under Pressure To Ban The Box Before Leaving Office (opinion) Think Progress ...If you’ve ever applied for a job, you’ve probably seen the box. Hiring forms commonly require applicants to indicate if they’ve ever been convicted of a crime. That little check-box produces some grand societal failures: An estimated 60 to 75 percent of Americans released from prison cannot find work throughout their first year back home...
Bernie Sanders Lobbies for A.F.L.-C.I.O. Endorsement New York Times ...Citing his long legislative record and improving performance in opinion polls, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont told leaders of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. gathered here on Wednesday that he was best equipped to advance the rights and benefits of organized labor. Although he did not mention his rivals by name, Mr. Sanders, who was one of several candidates to address the organization’s executive council, said he told the group that no one had as clear a regard for the labor movement as he did...
Courting Unions, Hillary Clinton Says She Didn't Work on Trans-Pacific Partnership Bloomberg ...Hillary Clinton appeared to take another step away from the Trans-Pacific Partnership on Thursday, telling reporters that she didn’t work on the controversial trade deal while serving as President Barack Obama’s secretary of state. The Democratic presidential front-runner, who advocated for a multi-lateral Asia trade agreement as a member of Obama's administration but has pointedly refused to endorse the results as a candidate to succeed her old boss, walked a careful semantic line following a private meeting with the AFL-CIO executive council...
U.S. employment costs post smallest gain on record in second-quarter Reuters ...U.S. labor costs in the second quarter recorded their smallest increase in 33 years amid tepid gains in the private sector, but it likely was a temporary setback against the backdrop of diminishing labor market slack. The unexpectedly smaller rise reported by the Labor Department on Friday will probably not dampen speculation that the Federal Reserve is set to raise interest rates later this year...
Apple, Yahoo shuttle drivers set to vote on union USA Today ...Unions continue to make inroads into Silicon Valley. Shuttle drivers for Apple, eBay, Yahoo, Zynga and several other Silicon Valley firms are set to vote Saturday on a package for improved wages and benefits. The 160 drivers, most of them employed by Compass Transportation of San Jose, shuttle employees to and from those tech firms, as well as Amtrak, Evernote and Genentech. The drivers sought representation from Teamsters Local 853...
Garda Canada Security Corporation and Teamsters Local 362 reach a new collective agreement Government of Canada ...Today, the Honourable Dr. K. Kellie Leitch, Minister of Labour and Minister of Status of Women, congratulated Garda Canada Security Corporation and Teamsters Local 362 on the renewal of their collective agreement. The agreement was reached with assistance from the Labour Program’s Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS). The FMCS provides dispute resolution and dispute prevention assistance to trade unions and employers under the jurisdiction of the Canada Labour Code...
Port Truckers Testify Before Tidelands and Harbor Committee Over Misclassification, Wage Theft Long Beach Post ...Stakeholders from the Port of Long Beach (POLB), trucking companies and drivers testified before the Tidelands and Harbor Committee last night to address the misclassification. The idea that the businesses can flourish while paying their drivers as employees was illustrated by Kevin Baddeley, president of Shippers Transport Express (STE) based out of Carson. He said that since converting to an employee model in January and negotiating a union contract with the Teamsters Union shortly after, STE has been stable and its customers happy...
Time running out for Sun Tran negotiations with union KVOA ...Sun Tran and the employees’ union, Teamsters Local 104, are still negotiating to avoid a bus strike in Tucson. Their contract expires Friday at midnight. Union members, who are mostly bus drivers, are expected to vote on a new deal Saturday. If the union rejects the contract, a strike may follow. Signs at bus stations warn riders about the negotiations...
Global Labor & Trade
Pacific trade negotiators chase elusive final deal in tough talks Reuters ...Pacific Rim trade ministers neared the final spurt of negotiations on an ambitious free trade pact on Thursday, but differences over farm exports and monopoly periods for next-generation drugs kept them short of an elusive final deal. Ministers from the 12 countries negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which would cut trade barriers and set common standards for 40 percent of the world economy, are meeting in Hawaii to try to hammer out a deal...
Canada Under Pressure as Pacific Trade Talks Slow Over Dairy Bloomberg ...Negotiations on a landmark free-trade pact among 12 Pacific nations stumbled as pressure mounted on Canada to soften its stance on limiting dairy imports. After months of demands from nations including the U.S., Australia and New Zealand to open its dairy markets as part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, Canada outlined a proposal during talks in Hawaii that other nations rejected as inadequate, according to two people briefed on the negotiations...
Trade deal threatens affordable healthcare for millions, experts say Aljazeera ...Public health groups on Thursday warned that “absurd” patent and data protection clauses pushed by U.S. lawmakers during the final negotiations of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in Maui, Hawaii could hike prices for life-saving drugs and stifle innovation. Doctors Without Border (MSF) and the Generic Pharmaceutical Association are most concerned with measures such as the extension of intellectual property rights on drug patents and increased damages for the infringement of patents...
Trade Negotiators Reach Environmental Accord New York Times ...Trade negotiators from the United States and 11 other Pacific nations reached agreement late Thursday on broad environmental protections for some of the most sensitive, diverse and threatened ecosystems on earth, closing one of the most contentious chapters of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. As negotiators struggled to complete the largest regional trade agreement, they pointed to the environmental accord as a clear achievement. It will be controversial. Some environmental groups, like the Sierra Club, insist that it lacks the binding enforcement measures...
Patent Protection for Drugs Puts Pressure on U.S. in Trade Talks New York Times ...With 12 nations pressing to conclude the largest regional trade accord ever, United States officials find themselves squeezed between activists pressing to secure access to low-cost pharmaceuticals and Republicans who say Congress will reject a deal without strong patent protections for the drug industry. Negotiators gathered this week in Maui hoping the long-sought accord might be finished by Friday. But dozens of issues remain unresolved on the Trans-Pacific Partnership...
Group Seeks to Expose Cozy Ties Between US Trade Rep and Wall Street Common Dreams ...Citing his cozy ties to Wall Street banks, a group dedicated to exposing corruption and corporate influence in Washington, D.C. has submitted an official Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for all correspondence between U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and the 10 largest U.S. financial institutions. Rootstrikers, the grassroots organization behind the FOIA request, has said that because corporate giveaways like the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) pose a threat to robust financial regulation in general, "Americans deserve to know"...
Pacific Rim free trade deal comes with high price Aljazeera ...On the tropical shores of the island of Maui in Hawaii, 12 Pacific Rim countries are negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement behind closed doors. The current meeting in Hawaii between the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Brunei Darussalam, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore, Peru, and Vietnam is the latest and possibly final round of negotiations that have been grinding along and evolving for seven years. the deal has drawn critics from various spheres. Among the loudest are analysts concerned by how the deal will affect the availability and price of medicine...
WikiLeaks says US spied on Japanese government, companies Associated Press ...WikiLeaks says US spied on Japanese government, companies. The documents include what appear to be five U.S. National Security Agency reports, four of which are marked top-secret, that provide intelligence on Japanese positions on international trade and climate change. Three of the apparent NSA reports deal with climate change, and the other two with agricultural trade issues, including U.S. cherry exports to Japan...
Youth unemployment in Italy exceeds 44 percent, 38yr high RT ...Youth unemployment has increased to 44.2 percent in June, according to the Italian national statistics office. It’s the highest level since 1977 and about twice the eurozone average. The overall unemployment also increased in June, according to the data published Friday. The upsetting numbers come as the Italian Prime Minister is pursuing economic reforms that the government hopes will make the eurozone's third largest economy dominant in Europe and the world within 20-30 years...
Greek bailout talks shift into higher gear CBS ...Greece's talks with its international creditors on a third bailout worth 85 billion euros ($93 billion) shifted into a higher gear on Friday, with lead negotiators from the European Union and International Monetary Fund meeting key ministers in Athens. The talks with Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos and Economy Minister Giorgos Stathakis follow preparatory meetings in the Greek capital this week between lower-level officials on reforming the tax system and labor market regulations...
London’s National Gallery Labor Strike Escalates Artforum ...The entire group of union workers currently employed at the National Gallery in London are set to renew their strike this August, according to Sarah Cascone at Artnet. This comes after several other recent periods of labor dispute at the venerable British institution, all over the management’s plans to privatize visitor services at the museum. The Public and Commercial Services Union, which represents the workers who will be participating, has told the museum of its intentions to strike...
State & Living Wage Battles
Pennsylvania Employers Steal Tens Of Millions Of Dollars From Their Workers In Any Given Week Think Progress ...Pennsylvania’s low-wage workers lose between $19 million and $32 million to wage theft in any given week, potentially costing the state’s economy as much as a billion dollars in lost potential consumer spending each year, according to a new analysis by law students from Temple University. The economic analysis is premised on a 2009 study of Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles workers’ experiences of wage theft in various industries...
Michigan Supreme Court Upholds Right-to-Work Law, Takes Workers Back to the Gilded Age Truthout ...Republican lawmakers passed the measure in December 2012, making it illegal to require workers to pay union dues or service fees as a condition of employment. Shortly thereafter, public sector employees filed a lawsuit saying they were exempt from the law because their workplaces came under the jurisdiction of the Michigan Civil Service Commission, not private sector employment law. On Wednesday, July 29, the high court, in a 4-3 ruling, rejected the workers' plea. With that, the court completed the transformation of this longtime labor stronghold into an anti-labor regime, reminiscent of the Gilded Age US...
Kansas City Minimum Wage Hike? $15 Hourly Pay Proposed By Missouri Activists International Business Times ...Kansas City, Missouri, may see an initiative to increase the city's minimum wage on its November ballot. A group of civil rights organizations has demanded that their petition go to a vote to raise base hourly pay in the city to $15. In turn, business organizations have condemned the move as "job killing" and want to see wages stay at the state-mandated $7.65 per hour...
N.C. attorneys rest their case in federal voting rights trial Journal Now ...Attorneys representing North Carolina and Gov. Pat McCrory rested their case this morning after calling six witnesses in a federal trial over the state’s controversial election law. Several groups, including the N.C. NAACP and the U.S. Department of Justice, are suing the state and McCrory over House Bill 589, which became law in 2013. House Bill 589 eliminated same-day voter registration, reduced the days of early voting from 17 to 10, got rid of out-of-precinct provisional voting and abolished preregistration of 16- and 17-year-olds...
California's Drought and the Politics of Inequality (opinion) Truthout ...California Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in April, mandating urban centers to reduce water usage by 25 percent. Walking around working-class neighborhoods, one can't help but notice brown lawns and dying plants, which shows how seriously people are taking the task of water conservation. What's striking is who's willing to conserve - and who isn't. Forty-eight percent of wealthier homeowners with incomes above $100,000 a year say it would be "difficult" to conserve water...
Pittsburgh's paid sick leave bill headed to council for vote Monday Post-Gazette ...Pittsburgh City Councilman Corey O’Connor, with broad support from his colleagues, is looking to push through legislation Monday that would require businesses to provide paid sick leave to their employees before the council breaks for its August recess. If it clears that final vote, the bill, put forward July 6, will have gone from introduction to passage in less than a month...
U.S. Labor
Court backs labor board on election rule The Hill ...A federal court has upheld federal regulations designed to speed up union elections, dealing a blow to business groups who oppose the rule. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) should be allowed to expedite the process by which employees unionize, Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled for the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C...
NLRB to Rule on Northwestern Football Players’ Bid to Unionize Wall Street Journal ...The National Labor Relations Board is expected to decide in coming weeks whether to give labor unions a foothold in college sports, a decision that could have a widespread impact on college athletics. The five-member board of the federal labor agency is weighing whether Northwestern University’s scholarship football players are school employees, as an agency regional director ruled last year, and can therefore unionize...
Verizon strike on pension, health care possible APP.com ...Time is ticking down as negotiations between Verizon and its employees’ unions continue. The contract between Verizon and its union workforce, members of the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, expires at midnight Saturday. Both sides are “very apart on the issues,” said Candice Johnson, a CWA spokeswoman...
UAW, Ford kick off contract talks as auto business booms NWI.com ...The United Auto Workers union has kicked off contract talks with Ford, which is one of the Calumet Region's largest employers, with about 5,000 local workers. The UAW, which made deep concessions during the darkest days of the Great Recession, hopes to end a two-tier pay system in which younger workers are paid less than more veteran employees doing the same job...
Hundreds of United Steelworkers members rally downtown WPXI ...Hundred of United Steelworkers members and their allies rallied Thursday at the headquarters of Allegheny Technologies Inc. in downtown Pittsburgh. According to a release from the USW, the union is trying to reach agreement on a new contract for more than 2,200 members who work for ATI, a specialty metals and components supplier for the aerospace and defense, medical and industrial industries. Their old contract expired June 30...
Frontier Communications and Communications Workers of America Reach Agreement in Texas and Missouri MarketWatch ...Frontier Communications Corporation FTR, and the Communications Workers of America District 6 (CWA) are pleased to announce the signing of an agreement that will benefit CWA-represented employees in Texas and Missouri and Frontier’s future customers in Texas. The agreement is an important step forward in the process to complete Frontier’s planned acquisition of Verizon’s wireline business and assets in Texas, California and Florida...
Companies have found something to give their workers instead of raises Washington Post ...Once a staple of the American workplace, the annual raise is turning into a relic of the pre-crisis economy as companies turn to creative — and cheaper — ways to compensate their employees. More businesses are upping their spending on benefits such as one-time bonuses, health care and paid time off, according to recent survey data. Many are rolling out perks such as free gym membership, commuting subsidies, even pet health insurance...
‘She’s Not A Felon, She’s A Human Being': Obama Under Pressure To Ban The Box Before Leaving Office (opinion) Think Progress ...If you’ve ever applied for a job, you’ve probably seen the box. Hiring forms commonly require applicants to indicate if they’ve ever been convicted of a crime. That little check-box produces some grand societal failures: An estimated 60 to 75 percent of Americans released from prison cannot find work throughout their first year back home...
Bernie Sanders Lobbies for A.F.L.-C.I.O. Endorsement New York Times ...Citing his long legislative record and improving performance in opinion polls, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont told leaders of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. gathered here on Wednesday that he was best equipped to advance the rights and benefits of organized labor. Although he did not mention his rivals by name, Mr. Sanders, who was one of several candidates to address the organization’s executive council, said he told the group that no one had as clear a regard for the labor movement as he did...
Courting Unions, Hillary Clinton Says She Didn't Work on Trans-Pacific Partnership Bloomberg ...Hillary Clinton appeared to take another step away from the Trans-Pacific Partnership on Thursday, telling reporters that she didn’t work on the controversial trade deal while serving as President Barack Obama’s secretary of state. The Democratic presidential front-runner, who advocated for a multi-lateral Asia trade agreement as a member of Obama's administration but has pointedly refused to endorse the results as a candidate to succeed her old boss, walked a careful semantic line following a private meeting with the AFL-CIO executive council...
U.S. employment costs post smallest gain on record in second-quarter Reuters ...U.S. labor costs in the second quarter recorded their smallest increase in 33 years amid tepid gains in the private sector, but it likely was a temporary setback against the backdrop of diminishing labor market slack. The unexpectedly smaller rise reported by the Labor Department on Friday will probably not dampen speculation that the Federal Reserve is set to raise interest rates later this year...
To get a fair share, sharing-economy workers must unionize (opinion) Aljazeera ...Uber’s disruption of the cab industry has been welcomed by nearly everyone except those who rely on the cab industry for their livelihoods. It’s arguably made on-demand car rides easier, cleaner, safer, more accessible and, in some cases, even cheaper. The high prices of regulated taxi medallions have kept a small number of bosses in control, while drivers pay high gate fees in order to access their cars and wages. Uber is right that the traditional system is not well suited to drivers’ or customers’ needs. But the new boss is not so different from the old boss...
Social Justice & Other News
U.S. austerity was even worse than we thought, data suggest Washington Post ...The economy of the years between 2011 and 2014 was even more mediocre than previously recognized, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. State and local governments spent less than the bureau realized throughout the interval, as did the federal government last year. When government spends less, its public employees, contractors and suppliers are all stretched. They have less to live on, and less money to spend in the rest of the economy...
Court Rules Police Need a Warrant to Access Location Data From Your Cellphone Slate ...In an order released Thursday by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, Judge Lucy Koh found that Fourth Amendment protections extend to location data generated by cellphones. Ruling against the federal government, Koh affirmed that law enforcement agencies must seek a warrant before acquiring historical location data produced by a cellphone...
Will Prosecutors Charge Officers Who Lied to Protect Ray Tensing After He Fatally Shot Sam Dubose? Democracy Now ...Former University of Cincinnati police officer Ray Tensing has been released on a $1 million bail after pleading not guilty to the murder of Sam Dubose. Tensing, who is white, fatally shot the 43-year-old African-American man on July 19 after stopping him for not having a front license plate. Two additional officers, Phillip Kidd and David Lindenschmidt, have been placed on administrative leave...
Protesters Forcibly Removed by Police As Arctic Drilling Ship Escapes Blockade Common Dreams ...Ending a nearly two-day standoff, Greenpeace activists who had successfully blocked passage of a Shell Oil drilling vessel were dramatically removed from their positions on the St. Johns Bridge in Portland, Oregon on Thurdsay evening as a special team of law enforcement officers cut them away to allow passage of the ship...
House takes off for August vacation before looking at highway, transit bill NY Daily News ...Congress is hitting the road without fixing our highways. House members took off for their extended August vacation before taking a look at the Senate’s newly passed long-term transportation bill, adding one more touchy issue for lawmakers to grapple with in a busy fall session. The long-overdue bill passed the Senate on Thursday with heavy bipartisan support, getting 65 votes for the $350 billion package, which would make changes to highway, transit, railroad and auto safety programs for six years...
Trump's immigration plan would cost hundreds of billions of dollars CNN ...According to a 2009 Government Accountability Office report, the average cost of fencing per mile is around $2.8 million to $3.9 million for the easiest-to-install and least expensive urban fencing. "You don't necessarily get a lot of bang for your buck," said Tom Wong, an assistant professor of Political Science at University of California, San Diego. Rosenblum and Wong explained that a wall would primarily just slow the process of crossing the border, especially in more rural areas...
UN Report Card Gives US 'Failing Grade' on Human Rights Common Dreams ...A United Nations committee of independent monitors this week released a damning assessment of human rights in the United States, showing an overall dismal performance on issues from Guantanamo Bay detentions to mass surveillance to accountability for past atrocities—earning what the U.S. Human Rights Network called a "failing grade." The findings prompted immediate condemnation from human rights and social justice organizations based in the U.S., including the Dream Defenders, who joined a civil society delegation to Geneva last year to urge the repeal of "Stand Your Ground" laws...
Social Justice & Other News
U.S. austerity was even worse than we thought, data suggest Washington Post ...The economy of the years between 2011 and 2014 was even more mediocre than previously recognized, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. State and local governments spent less than the bureau realized throughout the interval, as did the federal government last year. When government spends less, its public employees, contractors and suppliers are all stretched. They have less to live on, and less money to spend in the rest of the economy...
Court Rules Police Need a Warrant to Access Location Data From Your Cellphone Slate ...In an order released Thursday by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, Judge Lucy Koh found that Fourth Amendment protections extend to location data generated by cellphones. Ruling against the federal government, Koh affirmed that law enforcement agencies must seek a warrant before acquiring historical location data produced by a cellphone...
Will Prosecutors Charge Officers Who Lied to Protect Ray Tensing After He Fatally Shot Sam Dubose? Democracy Now ...Former University of Cincinnati police officer Ray Tensing has been released on a $1 million bail after pleading not guilty to the murder of Sam Dubose. Tensing, who is white, fatally shot the 43-year-old African-American man on July 19 after stopping him for not having a front license plate. Two additional officers, Phillip Kidd and David Lindenschmidt, have been placed on administrative leave...
Protesters Forcibly Removed by Police As Arctic Drilling Ship Escapes Blockade Common Dreams ...Ending a nearly two-day standoff, Greenpeace activists who had successfully blocked passage of a Shell Oil drilling vessel were dramatically removed from their positions on the St. Johns Bridge in Portland, Oregon on Thurdsay evening as a special team of law enforcement officers cut them away to allow passage of the ship...
House takes off for August vacation before looking at highway, transit bill NY Daily News ...Congress is hitting the road without fixing our highways. House members took off for their extended August vacation before taking a look at the Senate’s newly passed long-term transportation bill, adding one more touchy issue for lawmakers to grapple with in a busy fall session. The long-overdue bill passed the Senate on Thursday with heavy bipartisan support, getting 65 votes for the $350 billion package, which would make changes to highway, transit, railroad and auto safety programs for six years...
Trump's immigration plan would cost hundreds of billions of dollars CNN ...According to a 2009 Government Accountability Office report, the average cost of fencing per mile is around $2.8 million to $3.9 million for the easiest-to-install and least expensive urban fencing. "You don't necessarily get a lot of bang for your buck," said Tom Wong, an assistant professor of Political Science at University of California, San Diego. Rosenblum and Wong explained that a wall would primarily just slow the process of crossing the border, especially in more rural areas...
UN Report Card Gives US 'Failing Grade' on Human Rights Common Dreams ...A United Nations committee of independent monitors this week released a damning assessment of human rights in the United States, showing an overall dismal performance on issues from Guantanamo Bay detentions to mass surveillance to accountability for past atrocities—earning what the U.S. Human Rights Network called a "failing grade." The findings prompted immediate condemnation from human rights and social justice organizations based in the U.S., including the Dream Defenders, who joined a civil society delegation to Geneva last year to urge the repeal of "Stand Your Ground" laws...
Friday, July 24, 2015
Today's Teamster News 07.24.15
Teamsters
Teamsters Canada: Stand Firm on Supply Management Teamster.org ...In advance of the final stages of Trans Pacific Partnership Negotiations (TPP), Teamsters Canada President Francois Laporte sent a letter today to International Trade Minister Ed Fast urging him to defend Canada’s Dairy Industry and to “make clear, as Canadian governments have done for many years in many trade talks, that our dairy supply management is ‘off the table’”...
Contractor/Employee Debate Heating up at Ports Truckinginfo ...Are drivers who handle the drayage of intermodal containers into and out of the nation's ports employees or independent contractors? The controversy was visible this week at ports on both coasts. The Teamsters union has been active in trying to get independent contractors at the ports declared employees...
Teamsters' bi-coastal drayage 'misclassification" protests heat up JOC.com ...The Teamsters are deploying a bi-coastal strategy to challenge what the union charges is misclassification of drayage truck drivers as independent contractors, an indication of how the issue has expanded far beyond the San Pedro Bay area. In Los Angeles-Long Beach, the Teamsters launched their sixth strike against Pac 9 Transportation, while in Savannah the union was supporting drivers who attended a public hearing by the Georgia Senate on employee misclassification...
Global Labor & Trade
U.S. diplomat pushes Canada for dairy, poultry access as TPP talks intensify Globe & Mail ...The top U.S. diplomat in Canada is wading into the debate over whether Ottawa is negotiating in good faith at major Pacific Rim trade talks, saying this country must come to the table as soon as possible with concrete proposals to offer foreign farmers more access to its heavily protected dairy and poultry sector...
IMF: Unionization, Higher Wages Reduce Income Inequality Solidarity Center ...he notion that unionization and higher wages decrease income inequality is a fundamental premise of the Solidarity Center and our allies. But now a surprising source has reached the same conclusion: the International Monetary Fund (IMF). “The decline in unionization is related to the rise of top income shares and less redistribution, while the erosion of minimum wages is correlated with considerable increases in overall inequality”...
Obama Administration Hype About a TPP Vote in 2015 Does Not Comport with Fast Track Timelines Public Citizen ...TPP proponents are eager for Congress to vote on a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal in late 2015. But to do so, given Fast Track’s statutorily-required timeframe of notice periods and pre-vote reports, TPP negotiations – and the TPP text itself – must be completed by the end of July. If notice to Congress of intent to sign the TPP were sent by August 1, a final TPP vote could be held the last week Congress is in session in December...
'Shrewd' Canada playing long game as TPP trade talks begin in Maui CBC News ...As Canada's lead negotiator Kirsten Hillman and the rest of her Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiating team sit down with their counterparts in Maui, Hawaii this weekend, they may sense pounding from more than just the nearby surf. The game has changed since trade negotiators from 12 Pacific Rim countries met in Guam last April. The Americans, who'd been busily deal-fixing without a mandate to back it up, are now armed with fast-track negotiating authority...
Anonymous hacks US Census Bureau over TTIP agreement, leaking employee details online International Business Timess ...The reason for the cyber-attack is the recent Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), both of which are top priorities for the Obama administration and promise a radical reform of the global politico-economic system, with integration and convergence of major Atlantic and Pacific nations...
Putting Business First: How TTIP Changes the Rules of the Game (opinion) TeleSUR ...TTIP would cut tariffs and lower regulatory barriers to make trade easier between the two countries. According to The Telegraph, it would be the biggest trade agreement of its kind, affecting one quarter of global trade. And yet despite this, no one is totally sure of what TTIP will actually do for the EU, because it is such an unusual trade agreement. Not only are the two parties involved exceptionally large, but the nature of the agreement is – according to the CEPS, “more like a wide-ranging regulatory agreement, with some elements of classical trade agreements as well”...
Administration Desperate to Announce Deal on Trans-Pacific Partnership: There May Be an Announcement, But a Real Deal? One Congress Would Approve? (opinion) Public Citizen ...Unless the Obama administration can not only announce a final Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal by the start of August, but also by then complete a TPP text and give notice to Congress of intent to sign it, a U.S. congressional vote on TPP almost certainly will be pushed into the politically perilous 2016 presidential election year...
Do not undermine efforts to combat human trafficking (opinion) The Hill ...both the Obama administration and the U.S. Congress could be poised to take a terrible step backwards in the struggle against the global scourge of human trafficking by weakening a key amendment to the Fast Track trade authority bill. Even more shocking are reports that the State Department is set to compromise its own Trafficking in Persons report to “upgrade” Malaysia without merit for narrow economic interests...
Many Greeks blame their economic plight on austerity-minded Germans USA Today ...As this economically distressed nation faces even more austerity measures, many citizens are taking their frustration out on hard-nosed Germany. The hashtag #BoycottGermany has been trending in the country since Germany took the lead in demanding tough bailout terms that have hiked taxes and slashed pensions. Tourist agencies report vacation cancellations that include many Germans...
Myanmar Officially Recognizes Trade Union Confederation Solidarity Center ...The government has officially recognized the Confederation of Trade Unions of Myanmar (CTUM), and registered the federation as representing “all Myanmar.” In a ceremony today, CTUM President Maung Maung and other union leaders received the registration papers, with Maung Maung thanking “everyone who made this vision of ours come true”...
Strikes, Labor Slowdowns Add up to Summer of Woe in Italy ABC News ...Italy's summer of woe is getting worse — as tourists face record-high temperatures, labor slowdowns, one strike at the Pompeii archaeological site and another at Alitalia that forced the cancellation of dozens of flights. Alitalia cancelled 15 percent of its flights Friday because of a walkout by pilots and flight attendants. Further south, hundreds of tourists lined up for hours in the sun Friday outside the gates of Pompeii, near Naples, after unions called a wildcat strike...
State & Living Wage Battles
The rapid success of Fight for $15: 'This is a trend that cannot be stopped' The Guardian ...When 200 New York restaurant workers walked out in the nation’s first-ever fast-food strike in late 2012, they were widely mocked for demanding minimum pay of $15 an hour, with some critics saying their demand was absurdly out of reach, akin to visiting Mars. But this week a New York state panel appointed by Governor Andrew Cuomo recommended establishing a $15 minimum wage for the state’s 180,000 fast-food workers...
Regional petition drive kicks off to repeal prevailing wage law Midland Daily News ...The debate over Michigan’s prevailing wage law has been somewhat contentious and that spilled over at the Associated Builders and Contractors Greater Michigan Chapter office on Thursday. Kicking off a regional petition drive to repeal Michigan’s prevailing wage law, Rep. Gary Glenn, R-Midland, Jimmy Greene, president/CEO ABC Greater Michigan Chapter and ABC-Michigan CEO Chris Fisher held a press conference promoting the regional petition drive to repeal the prevailing wage law...
Facing Lawsuits, North Carolina Relaxes Voter ID Rules Care2.com ...North Carolina passed one of the most comprehensive and toughest voter suppression laws in the country. The law targeted every demographic that had made the state one of the most progressive in the nation. At the time of passage, Republicans held all branches of government for the first time since reconstruction and were determined to reverse any progress made since then. The aggressive assault on voters led to several lawsuits against the state...
Virginia Odds and Ends Public Policy Polling ...There is even more overwhelming support from Virginians on another pair of pieces of progressive legislation. 64% in the state think all workers should get a minimum number of paid sick days, with only 19% opposed to that concept. And an equal 64% think borrowers should be able to deduct their student loan payments on their state income taxes, to just 20% against that...
Hillary Clinton to Back $15 Fast-Food Minimum Wage in New York New York Times ...Hillary Rodham Clinton on Friday will use a speech focused on growing the economy to endorse a $15-an-hour minimum wage proposal for fast-food workers recommended by a New York panel, a person briefed on her plans said. The remarks from Mrs. Clinton will come in the city where the fast-food workers’ labor effort first started several years ago. A panel created by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Wednesday recommended the change...
Meet ALEC’s Little Brother, ACCE The Nation ...So how has the American Legislative Exchange Council, a powerful lobby serving right-wing interests at the state level, responded to this resurgence of local democracy? With a systematic effort to destroy it. ALEC task force director Cara Sullivan recently explained to a room full of local officials that when it comes to citizen movements supporting job creation and higher wages, “perhaps the biggest threat comes from the local level”...
'Dark Cloud' of ALEC Converges at Annual Corporate-Political Lovefest Common Dreams ...Fighting to protect dark money. Attacking federal efforts to rein in carbon pollution. Undermining local democracy. These are just some of the "hot topics" on the agenda this week as conservative lawmakers, corporate lobbyists, and top GOP candidates from around the country gather in San Diego for the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)'s annual meeting...
U.S. Labor
Ford, UAW start optimistic contract talks Michigan Radio ...The United Auto Workers and Ford Motor Company are officially in talks for their next four-year contract. This time, the kickoff ceremony was held off Ford and UAW premises. The event at Ford follows last week's contract kickoff at General Motors and Fiat Chrysler. Analysts believe the talks with Fiat Chrysler could be the most problematic. The automaker has the highest number of workers being paid the "tier two" wage...
Verizon, CWA union lock horns over pension benefits Fierce Telecom ...Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union continue to be at odds over how to structure pension benefits for a new labor contract. The current contract expires on Aug. 1. In a new update post on the union negotiations, the CWA said that Verizon's pension proposals are not acceptable. "After listening to 5 minutes worth of their retrogressive and insulting pension presentation/proposal, the Union made it clear to the Company that we are looking for improvements to the Pension Plans"...
AFSCME: Governor trying to force work stoppage Rock River Times ...The state’s largest employees’ union says Gov. Bruce Rauner wants to try and force a strike or lockout while the union works to enact legislation to block a work stoppage and bring in a third party arbitrator. That’s according to an AFSCME Council 31 bargaining update posted to the Capitol Fax blog as a contract extension nears an end with no agreement in sight...
NLRB considering union's latest complaint against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin TribLive ...A discrimination charge filed against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin last month could be joining an earlier union complaint at a trial in front of a federal judge in Pittsburgh in September. An August trial on the earlier charge alleging hospital officials acted illegally by taking self-scheduling duties away from workers has been moved to Sept. 2. The complaints were filed by technicians and licensed practical nurses who formed a union at the hospital about a year ago...
In Indiana, Employers Can Fire Workers for Being Gay or Trans—and They Do, All the Time The Nation ...Decades worth of national and local surveys have found that gay and lesbian workers report widespread job bias. In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey of more than 1,000 LGBT adults, 21 percent believed they’d been treated unfairly by an employer because of their identity, and 23 percent said they’d received poor service at a restaurant, hotel, or place of business. Transgender people seem to have it the worst: In a landmark 2011 nationwide survey of 6,450 transgender and gender-nonconforming folks, 90 percent said they had been mistreated at work; 47 percent said they’d been fired, not hired or not promoted...
Applications for unemployment aid plunge to 42-year low USA Today ...The number of Americans filing initial applications for unemployment benefits fell to a 42-year low last week in the latest sign the labor market is poised for further gains. Even so, there are some signs of ongoing weakness in the job market. The unemployment rate fell in June mostly because many of the unemployed stopped looking for work, rather than found jobs. The proportion of Americans working or looking for work fell to a 38-year low...
Company To Pay Record-Breaking Damages For Telling Pregnant Woman She Couldn’t Do Her Job Anymore Think Progress ...This week, the auto parts retailer AutoZone dropped its challenge to a verdict ordering it to pay a record-breaking $185 million in damages to a former employee who claimed she was demoted and fired for being pregnant. Rosario Juarez was hired by AutoZone in 2000 and was eventually promoted to store manager in 2004. But when she became pregnant in September of 2005, she says her manager told her, “Congratulations…I guess,” adding, “I feel sorry for you”...
Social Justice & Other News
U.S. House bars funding for 'sanctuary' cities for immigrants Reuters ...The U.S. House of Representatives voted on Thursday to deny funding to cities that do not report undocumented immigrants to federal authorities, setting off outcry from the White House and immigration advocates. The bill, approved by a vote of 241 to 179 largely along party lines, was largely a Republican response to the recent killing of a San Francisco woman, allegedly at the hands of an immigrant man...
Robert Reich: It Would Be a Mistake For Progressives to Split Along 'Black Lives Matter' & 'Economic Justice' Lines Alternet ...Racial inequalities are baked into our political and economic system. Police brutality against black men and women, mass incarceration disproportionately of blacks and Latinos, housing discrimination that has resulted in racial apartheid across the nation, and voter suppression all reveal deep structures of discrimination that undermine economic inequality. Our only hope for genuine change is if poor, working class, middle class, black, Latino, and white come together in a powerful movement to take back our economy and democracy...
How Did ‘Driving While Black’ Turn Deadly for Sandra Bland? The Nation ...If the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by Darren Wilson was, as The New York Times put it, “simply the spark that ignited years of pent-up tension and animosity in the area,” then Bland’s response upon being stopped came from a similar place of pent-up tension. She didn’t bow and scrape and defer to the increasingly aggressive officer, as some are suggesting she should have. Sometimes a person or a people have just had enough...
Holder's Legacy: Mass Incarceration and Protection of Killer Cops, Part II (opinion) Truthout ...Eric Holder has been praised as a "civil rights"-oriented attorney general, but the only rights he has championed are those of the bankers, white vigilantes and killer cops. Holder refused to press charges against millionaire banking executives who, he assured Wall Street, 'were too big to jail.' Blacks have to make do with their Miranda warning rights - if they are lucky enough to survive an encounter with the police...
Teamsters Canada: Stand Firm on Supply Management Teamster.org ...In advance of the final stages of Trans Pacific Partnership Negotiations (TPP), Teamsters Canada President Francois Laporte sent a letter today to International Trade Minister Ed Fast urging him to defend Canada’s Dairy Industry and to “make clear, as Canadian governments have done for many years in many trade talks, that our dairy supply management is ‘off the table’”...
Contractor/Employee Debate Heating up at Ports Truckinginfo ...Are drivers who handle the drayage of intermodal containers into and out of the nation's ports employees or independent contractors? The controversy was visible this week at ports on both coasts. The Teamsters union has been active in trying to get independent contractors at the ports declared employees...
Teamsters' bi-coastal drayage 'misclassification" protests heat up JOC.com ...The Teamsters are deploying a bi-coastal strategy to challenge what the union charges is misclassification of drayage truck drivers as independent contractors, an indication of how the issue has expanded far beyond the San Pedro Bay area. In Los Angeles-Long Beach, the Teamsters launched their sixth strike against Pac 9 Transportation, while in Savannah the union was supporting drivers who attended a public hearing by the Georgia Senate on employee misclassification...
Global Labor & Trade
U.S. diplomat pushes Canada for dairy, poultry access as TPP talks intensify Globe & Mail ...The top U.S. diplomat in Canada is wading into the debate over whether Ottawa is negotiating in good faith at major Pacific Rim trade talks, saying this country must come to the table as soon as possible with concrete proposals to offer foreign farmers more access to its heavily protected dairy and poultry sector...
IMF: Unionization, Higher Wages Reduce Income Inequality Solidarity Center ...he notion that unionization and higher wages decrease income inequality is a fundamental premise of the Solidarity Center and our allies. But now a surprising source has reached the same conclusion: the International Monetary Fund (IMF). “The decline in unionization is related to the rise of top income shares and less redistribution, while the erosion of minimum wages is correlated with considerable increases in overall inequality”...
Obama Administration Hype About a TPP Vote in 2015 Does Not Comport with Fast Track Timelines Public Citizen ...TPP proponents are eager for Congress to vote on a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal in late 2015. But to do so, given Fast Track’s statutorily-required timeframe of notice periods and pre-vote reports, TPP negotiations – and the TPP text itself – must be completed by the end of July. If notice to Congress of intent to sign the TPP were sent by August 1, a final TPP vote could be held the last week Congress is in session in December...
'Shrewd' Canada playing long game as TPP trade talks begin in Maui CBC News ...As Canada's lead negotiator Kirsten Hillman and the rest of her Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiating team sit down with their counterparts in Maui, Hawaii this weekend, they may sense pounding from more than just the nearby surf. The game has changed since trade negotiators from 12 Pacific Rim countries met in Guam last April. The Americans, who'd been busily deal-fixing without a mandate to back it up, are now armed with fast-track negotiating authority...
Anonymous hacks US Census Bureau over TTIP agreement, leaking employee details online International Business Timess ...The reason for the cyber-attack is the recent Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), both of which are top priorities for the Obama administration and promise a radical reform of the global politico-economic system, with integration and convergence of major Atlantic and Pacific nations...
Putting Business First: How TTIP Changes the Rules of the Game (opinion) TeleSUR ...TTIP would cut tariffs and lower regulatory barriers to make trade easier between the two countries. According to The Telegraph, it would be the biggest trade agreement of its kind, affecting one quarter of global trade. And yet despite this, no one is totally sure of what TTIP will actually do for the EU, because it is such an unusual trade agreement. Not only are the two parties involved exceptionally large, but the nature of the agreement is – according to the CEPS, “more like a wide-ranging regulatory agreement, with some elements of classical trade agreements as well”...
Administration Desperate to Announce Deal on Trans-Pacific Partnership: There May Be an Announcement, But a Real Deal? One Congress Would Approve? (opinion) Public Citizen ...Unless the Obama administration can not only announce a final Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal by the start of August, but also by then complete a TPP text and give notice to Congress of intent to sign it, a U.S. congressional vote on TPP almost certainly will be pushed into the politically perilous 2016 presidential election year...
Do not undermine efforts to combat human trafficking (opinion) The Hill ...both the Obama administration and the U.S. Congress could be poised to take a terrible step backwards in the struggle against the global scourge of human trafficking by weakening a key amendment to the Fast Track trade authority bill. Even more shocking are reports that the State Department is set to compromise its own Trafficking in Persons report to “upgrade” Malaysia without merit for narrow economic interests...
Many Greeks blame their economic plight on austerity-minded Germans USA Today ...As this economically distressed nation faces even more austerity measures, many citizens are taking their frustration out on hard-nosed Germany. The hashtag #BoycottGermany has been trending in the country since Germany took the lead in demanding tough bailout terms that have hiked taxes and slashed pensions. Tourist agencies report vacation cancellations that include many Germans...
Myanmar Officially Recognizes Trade Union Confederation Solidarity Center ...The government has officially recognized the Confederation of Trade Unions of Myanmar (CTUM), and registered the federation as representing “all Myanmar.” In a ceremony today, CTUM President Maung Maung and other union leaders received the registration papers, with Maung Maung thanking “everyone who made this vision of ours come true”...
Strikes, Labor Slowdowns Add up to Summer of Woe in Italy ABC News ...Italy's summer of woe is getting worse — as tourists face record-high temperatures, labor slowdowns, one strike at the Pompeii archaeological site and another at Alitalia that forced the cancellation of dozens of flights. Alitalia cancelled 15 percent of its flights Friday because of a walkout by pilots and flight attendants. Further south, hundreds of tourists lined up for hours in the sun Friday outside the gates of Pompeii, near Naples, after unions called a wildcat strike...
State & Living Wage Battles
The rapid success of Fight for $15: 'This is a trend that cannot be stopped' The Guardian ...When 200 New York restaurant workers walked out in the nation’s first-ever fast-food strike in late 2012, they were widely mocked for demanding minimum pay of $15 an hour, with some critics saying their demand was absurdly out of reach, akin to visiting Mars. But this week a New York state panel appointed by Governor Andrew Cuomo recommended establishing a $15 minimum wage for the state’s 180,000 fast-food workers...
Regional petition drive kicks off to repeal prevailing wage law Midland Daily News ...The debate over Michigan’s prevailing wage law has been somewhat contentious and that spilled over at the Associated Builders and Contractors Greater Michigan Chapter office on Thursday. Kicking off a regional petition drive to repeal Michigan’s prevailing wage law, Rep. Gary Glenn, R-Midland, Jimmy Greene, president/CEO ABC Greater Michigan Chapter and ABC-Michigan CEO Chris Fisher held a press conference promoting the regional petition drive to repeal the prevailing wage law...
Facing Lawsuits, North Carolina Relaxes Voter ID Rules Care2.com ...North Carolina passed one of the most comprehensive and toughest voter suppression laws in the country. The law targeted every demographic that had made the state one of the most progressive in the nation. At the time of passage, Republicans held all branches of government for the first time since reconstruction and were determined to reverse any progress made since then. The aggressive assault on voters led to several lawsuits against the state...
Virginia Odds and Ends Public Policy Polling ...There is even more overwhelming support from Virginians on another pair of pieces of progressive legislation. 64% in the state think all workers should get a minimum number of paid sick days, with only 19% opposed to that concept. And an equal 64% think borrowers should be able to deduct their student loan payments on their state income taxes, to just 20% against that...
Hillary Clinton to Back $15 Fast-Food Minimum Wage in New York New York Times ...Hillary Rodham Clinton on Friday will use a speech focused on growing the economy to endorse a $15-an-hour minimum wage proposal for fast-food workers recommended by a New York panel, a person briefed on her plans said. The remarks from Mrs. Clinton will come in the city where the fast-food workers’ labor effort first started several years ago. A panel created by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Wednesday recommended the change...
Meet ALEC’s Little Brother, ACCE The Nation ...So how has the American Legislative Exchange Council, a powerful lobby serving right-wing interests at the state level, responded to this resurgence of local democracy? With a systematic effort to destroy it. ALEC task force director Cara Sullivan recently explained to a room full of local officials that when it comes to citizen movements supporting job creation and higher wages, “perhaps the biggest threat comes from the local level”...
'Dark Cloud' of ALEC Converges at Annual Corporate-Political Lovefest Common Dreams ...Fighting to protect dark money. Attacking federal efforts to rein in carbon pollution. Undermining local democracy. These are just some of the "hot topics" on the agenda this week as conservative lawmakers, corporate lobbyists, and top GOP candidates from around the country gather in San Diego for the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)'s annual meeting...
U.S. Labor
Ford, UAW start optimistic contract talks Michigan Radio ...The United Auto Workers and Ford Motor Company are officially in talks for their next four-year contract. This time, the kickoff ceremony was held off Ford and UAW premises. The event at Ford follows last week's contract kickoff at General Motors and Fiat Chrysler. Analysts believe the talks with Fiat Chrysler could be the most problematic. The automaker has the highest number of workers being paid the "tier two" wage...
Verizon, CWA union lock horns over pension benefits Fierce Telecom ...Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union continue to be at odds over how to structure pension benefits for a new labor contract. The current contract expires on Aug. 1. In a new update post on the union negotiations, the CWA said that Verizon's pension proposals are not acceptable. "After listening to 5 minutes worth of their retrogressive and insulting pension presentation/proposal, the Union made it clear to the Company that we are looking for improvements to the Pension Plans"...
AFSCME: Governor trying to force work stoppage Rock River Times ...The state’s largest employees’ union says Gov. Bruce Rauner wants to try and force a strike or lockout while the union works to enact legislation to block a work stoppage and bring in a third party arbitrator. That’s according to an AFSCME Council 31 bargaining update posted to the Capitol Fax blog as a contract extension nears an end with no agreement in sight...
NLRB considering union's latest complaint against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin TribLive ...A discrimination charge filed against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin last month could be joining an earlier union complaint at a trial in front of a federal judge in Pittsburgh in September. An August trial on the earlier charge alleging hospital officials acted illegally by taking self-scheduling duties away from workers has been moved to Sept. 2. The complaints were filed by technicians and licensed practical nurses who formed a union at the hospital about a year ago...
In Indiana, Employers Can Fire Workers for Being Gay or Trans—and They Do, All the Time The Nation ...Decades worth of national and local surveys have found that gay and lesbian workers report widespread job bias. In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey of more than 1,000 LGBT adults, 21 percent believed they’d been treated unfairly by an employer because of their identity, and 23 percent said they’d received poor service at a restaurant, hotel, or place of business. Transgender people seem to have it the worst: In a landmark 2011 nationwide survey of 6,450 transgender and gender-nonconforming folks, 90 percent said they had been mistreated at work; 47 percent said they’d been fired, not hired or not promoted...
Applications for unemployment aid plunge to 42-year low USA Today ...The number of Americans filing initial applications for unemployment benefits fell to a 42-year low last week in the latest sign the labor market is poised for further gains. Even so, there are some signs of ongoing weakness in the job market. The unemployment rate fell in June mostly because many of the unemployed stopped looking for work, rather than found jobs. The proportion of Americans working or looking for work fell to a 38-year low...
Company To Pay Record-Breaking Damages For Telling Pregnant Woman She Couldn’t Do Her Job Anymore Think Progress ...This week, the auto parts retailer AutoZone dropped its challenge to a verdict ordering it to pay a record-breaking $185 million in damages to a former employee who claimed she was demoted and fired for being pregnant. Rosario Juarez was hired by AutoZone in 2000 and was eventually promoted to store manager in 2004. But when she became pregnant in September of 2005, she says her manager told her, “Congratulations…I guess,” adding, “I feel sorry for you”...
Social Justice & Other News
U.S. House bars funding for 'sanctuary' cities for immigrants Reuters ...The U.S. House of Representatives voted on Thursday to deny funding to cities that do not report undocumented immigrants to federal authorities, setting off outcry from the White House and immigration advocates. The bill, approved by a vote of 241 to 179 largely along party lines, was largely a Republican response to the recent killing of a San Francisco woman, allegedly at the hands of an immigrant man...
Robert Reich: It Would Be a Mistake For Progressives to Split Along 'Black Lives Matter' & 'Economic Justice' Lines Alternet ...Racial inequalities are baked into our political and economic system. Police brutality against black men and women, mass incarceration disproportionately of blacks and Latinos, housing discrimination that has resulted in racial apartheid across the nation, and voter suppression all reveal deep structures of discrimination that undermine economic inequality. Our only hope for genuine change is if poor, working class, middle class, black, Latino, and white come together in a powerful movement to take back our economy and democracy...
How Did ‘Driving While Black’ Turn Deadly for Sandra Bland? The Nation ...If the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by Darren Wilson was, as The New York Times put it, “simply the spark that ignited years of pent-up tension and animosity in the area,” then Bland’s response upon being stopped came from a similar place of pent-up tension. She didn’t bow and scrape and defer to the increasingly aggressive officer, as some are suggesting she should have. Sometimes a person or a people have just had enough...
Holder's Legacy: Mass Incarceration and Protection of Killer Cops, Part II (opinion) Truthout ...Eric Holder has been praised as a "civil rights"-oriented attorney general, but the only rights he has championed are those of the bankers, white vigilantes and killer cops. Holder refused to press charges against millionaire banking executives who, he assured Wall Street, 'were too big to jail.' Blacks have to make do with their Miranda warning rights - if they are lucky enough to survive an encounter with the police...
Friday, July 10, 2015
VIDEO: Inside the world of Teamsters' business agents
As Local 362 said on its own blog:
Working their way up from employee to shop steward to finally, a business agent, is a rewarding journey – described by several of Local 362’s business agents as "the ultimate."
They are strong advocates for members’ rights, have an important relationship with the shop steward and are someone you know you can call if you have any issues.The Teamsters applauds the important work of business agents all across North America. They are the engine behind Teamster Power!
Thursday, May 7, 2015
The Reality of Being a Teamster
The video, put together by Local 395 in Saskatchewan, Canada, shows Teamster members doing what they do best: working and giving back. With few words and many pictures, the video highlights the leadership, solidarity and spirit of charity that defines life as a Teamster.
Members who helped raise thousands for the Calgary Flood Relief Fund, for example, show the kind of compassion demonstrated by Teamsters in Canada and throughout North America.
Ultimately, the video suggests, the Teamsters are about families and protecting workers and their loved ones.
Check out the video here:
Thanks, Local 395, for the inspiring tribute to Teamster life!
Monday, March 23, 2015
Today's Teamster News 03.23.15
Teamsters
Canadian National Railway has recently experienced a troubling spike in train derailments Reuters ...Doug Finnson, president of a Teamsters union representing CN Rail's train crews, said he was particularly concerned with the recent Ontario derailments. "We're on the record saying the trains are too long, the cars are too heavy, and the trains go too fast."...
'Jane the Virgin' Star Gina Rodriguez Gets Real About Hollywood Success Latino Post ...The actress also added that her father Gino, a well-known representative for the Teamsters, was "always very honest" and that he prepared their family "for the crude game that is society."...
Trade
Letter: Nolan working to block freetrade agreement fast-track Park Rapids Enterprise ...How can the United States sign an international trade agreement when Congress, our constitutionally delegated body to regulate commerce with foreign nations, isn’t allowed a seat at the negotiating table?...
State Battles
AG Madigan says no to Rauner right-to-work zones Chicago Tribune ...Democratic Attorney General Lisa Madigan said Friday that Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s plan to put in place small right-to-work areas across Illinois is illegal, marking the second time the state’s chief legal officer has pushed back against governor’s attempts to limit employee unions...
War on Workers
Retirement Crisis: The Great 401(k) Experiment Has Failed for Many Americans NBC News ...millions of workers nearing retirement are on track to leave the workforce with savings that do not even approach what they will need for health care, let alone daily living. Not surprisingly, retirement is now Americans' top financial worry, according to a recent Gallup poll...
How The Media Enable The Anti-Worker Movement National Memo ...News organizations help this anti-worker movement, even if they do not mean to, when they get facts wrong, lack balance, provide vagaries instead of telling details, and fail to apply time-tested reporting practices to separate fact from advocacy...
Union: Collective bargaining rights at issue in BP strike Chicago Tribune ...United Steelworkers members working at BP Whiting Refinery and public school teachers have a common bond, according to the local USW president — they both found themselves in a fight to maintain their collective bargaining rights...
Survival of the fittest might have actually been survival of the richest Washington Post ...Researchers recently uncovered a sharp decline in genetic diversity in male lineages across the world during the Stone Age. The study’s authors hypothesized that material gains made through early agricultural success — a proxy for wealth — gave smaller groups of related men the reproductive upper hand for generations...
Funeral Set for Tolland Worker Killed Patching Potholes NBC Connecticut ...David Lee Ridzon, 50, of Willington, died Thursday after he was struck by a public works truck while patching potholes on Anderson Road...
Miscellaneous
The Planet’s Best Stealth Fighter Isn’t Made in America The Daily Beast ...The U.S. military likes to think it makes the world’s most sophisticated combat aircraft. Think again...
Canadian National Railway has recently experienced a troubling spike in train derailments Reuters ...Doug Finnson, president of a Teamsters union representing CN Rail's train crews, said he was particularly concerned with the recent Ontario derailments. "We're on the record saying the trains are too long, the cars are too heavy, and the trains go too fast."...
'Jane the Virgin' Star Gina Rodriguez Gets Real About Hollywood Success Latino Post ...The actress also added that her father Gino, a well-known representative for the Teamsters, was "always very honest" and that he prepared their family "for the crude game that is society."...
Trade
Letter: Nolan working to block freetrade agreement fast-track Park Rapids Enterprise ...How can the United States sign an international trade agreement when Congress, our constitutionally delegated body to regulate commerce with foreign nations, isn’t allowed a seat at the negotiating table?...
State Battles
AG Madigan says no to Rauner right-to-work zones Chicago Tribune ...Democratic Attorney General Lisa Madigan said Friday that Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner’s plan to put in place small right-to-work areas across Illinois is illegal, marking the second time the state’s chief legal officer has pushed back against governor’s attempts to limit employee unions...
War on Workers
Retirement Crisis: The Great 401(k) Experiment Has Failed for Many Americans NBC News ...millions of workers nearing retirement are on track to leave the workforce with savings that do not even approach what they will need for health care, let alone daily living. Not surprisingly, retirement is now Americans' top financial worry, according to a recent Gallup poll...
How The Media Enable The Anti-Worker Movement National Memo ...News organizations help this anti-worker movement, even if they do not mean to, when they get facts wrong, lack balance, provide vagaries instead of telling details, and fail to apply time-tested reporting practices to separate fact from advocacy...
Union: Collective bargaining rights at issue in BP strike Chicago Tribune ...United Steelworkers members working at BP Whiting Refinery and public school teachers have a common bond, according to the local USW president — they both found themselves in a fight to maintain their collective bargaining rights...
Survival of the fittest might have actually been survival of the richest Washington Post ...Researchers recently uncovered a sharp decline in genetic diversity in male lineages across the world during the Stone Age. The study’s authors hypothesized that material gains made through early agricultural success — a proxy for wealth — gave smaller groups of related men the reproductive upper hand for generations...
Funeral Set for Tolland Worker Killed Patching Potholes NBC Connecticut ...David Lee Ridzon, 50, of Willington, died Thursday after he was struck by a public works truck while patching potholes on Anderson Road...
Miscellaneous
The Planet’s Best Stealth Fighter Isn’t Made in America The Daily Beast ...The U.S. military likes to think it makes the world’s most sophisticated combat aircraft. Think again...
Wednesday, March 4, 2015
Today's Teamster News 03.04.15
Teamsters
Teamsters ratify four-year contract at AMR nwLaborPress.org …Members of Teamsters Portland Local 223 and Vancouver Local 58 ratified a new four-year collective bargaining agreement at American Medical Response (AMR). The 450-member bargaining unit provides ambulance service to Multnomah and Clackamas counties in Oregon, and Clark and Cowlitz counties in Washington...
Bus Drivers Ratify New Contract With First Student WTOC ...After several long months of negotiations, Savannah First Student employees represented by Teamsters have overwhelmingly ratified their new contract, 117 to four, according to a spokesperson from Teamsters 728...
Teamsters Want Mexican Trucking Row Revisited In TPP Law360 …The International Brotherhood of Teamsters on Monday publicly called on U.S. trade officials to use the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks to reopen deliberations on Mexico's cross-border trucking services, blasting the administration's move to open the border to Mexican truckers earlier this year...
Teamsters To Protest Republic Services Teamsters Local 728 ...On Wed., March 4 at 12 p.m., sanitation workers who work for Republic Services, Inc. [NYSE: RSG] will hold an informational picket to educate the public on the company's human rights violations. Workers at Republic allege that Republic has broken federal laws that protect workers' rights, by unilaterally changing pay and working conditions without negotiating with their union...
S.F. politician calls for labor peace at bus stops USA Today …With labor unions in negotiations with the transportation companies that ferry Silicon Valley tech workers, a San Francisco legislator is calling on the city to consider "labor harmony" when granting permits to corporate shuttles...
Coming detraction: Tax credit ax? Boston Herald …Sean O’Brien, president of Teamsters Local 25, drivers for the movie biz, [said] “Through the tax credit, we have created an industry where people can make a good living and provide for their families,” he said...
Miller, State Attorneys General Join FTC In Challenging Sysco-US Foods Merger Storm Lake Pilot Tribune ...Attorney General Tom Miller and a bipartisan group of state attorneys general today joined the Federal Trade Commission's administrative complaint challenging a proposed merger between food distribution giants Sysco and US Foods...
Canadian National Railway and the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, representing rail traffic controllers, reach a collective agreement Yahoo! News ...The collective agreement covering about 185 rail traffic controllers expired on December 31, 2014...
Trade
Japanese official: Adding currency rules would kill Pacific trade pact Reuters …Any effort to add rules against currency cheating in a 12-nation Pacific trade pact would mean the end of negotiations, a senior Japanese negotiator said on Tuesday...
TPP Free Trade Agreement Would Increase Cost of Medicine In Mexico, Peru, Chile, And Other Countries Latin Times …TPP -- the Trans-PacificPartnership -- is making waves from Peru to Australia, concerning public health officials and consumer advocates. TPP, which would expand trade in 11 Pacific Rim countries, includes draft provisions for unprecedented expansion of pharmaceutical patent protection that could drive up the cost of medicine...
Let's Debate The Trans-Pacific Partnership -- History's Largest Trade Deal -- Before OKing It (opinion) Los Angeles Times ...If you haven't heard much about the TPP, that's part of the problem. It would be the largest trade deal in history — involving countries stretching from Chile to Japan, representing 792 million people and about 40% of the world economy. Yet it's been devised in secret, with a disproportionate amount of advice coming from corporations and Wall Street. This secrecy is the norm since NAFTA...
State Battles
Gov. Rauner asks community to back right to work in 'voter empowerment agenda' address Chicago Sun Times ...Rauner, who has in recent weeks focused on an agenda to allow “right to work” zones in targeted areas of the state, spent much of his address selling that point. It had one Illinois union saying Rauner held a “political obsession with crushing the unions that advocate for the middle class.”...
What a Right-to-Work Law Could Mean For Wisconsin Unions WUWM ...nion membership would likely fall in Wisconsin, if the state enacts such a measure It’s the trend, according to Cheryl Maranto. She’s a management professor at Marquette University. Maranto says union numbers tend to drop in right-to-work states, partly because many unions think it’s futile to expand into new workplaces there...
Minnesota Jobs Committee chair working to bring businesses from Wisconsin to Minnesota State Representative Pat Garofalo ...In light of legislation passed by the Wisconsin State Senate and being debated in the Wisconsin State Assembly that would make Wisconsin a "Right To Work" state, Job Growth and Energy Affordability Committee Chairman Rep. Pat Garofalo, R-Farmington, has extended an invitation to two Wisconsin businesses offering assistance relocating their headquarters to Minnesota...
Right To Work For Less: Gov. Scott Walker Wants To Lower Worker Pay In Wisconsin (opinion) Washington Post ...Look, there are no perfect institutions in America, and unions are no exception. But they exist for a critically important reason: to balance out the inherent power of employers over workers and, thus, to enforce a more equitable distribution of the fruits of growth. In this regard, it is not a coincidence that as unions have diminished in numbers and power, the earnings of the middle class have stagnated...
Bill restricting union dues collection fails but not dead yet in Pa. Senate PennLive ...An attempt to pass a controversial amendment to a bill that would restrict union dues collection from state and school employees' paychecks narrowly failed in the state Senate on Monday. But most likely, we haven't seen the last of this amendment to this so-called paycheck protection bill...
Common Construction Repeal May Require Further Study Indiana Public Media ...The Indiana House easily approved legislation repealing the state’s common construction wage, and the bill’s support in the Senate looks strong. That means pushing the issue to summer study committee could be opponents’ best hope...
Bill Would Reestablish N.H. Minimum Wage, Raise It To $10 An Hour By 2018 NHPR ...Under the bill backed by seven Democratic state Senators, the increased minimum wage would take effect at the beginning of 2016. The bill calls for further increases to $9 an hour in 2017 and $10 an hour in 2018...
War on Workers
NLRB Election Rules Near Test in Congress; Changes Said to ‘Streamline' Board Process Bloomberg BNA ...Congress is about to take up proposals to block the National Labor Relations Board from implementing changes in its representation case rules and procedures set to take effect April 14...
Being a poor corporate citizen is hurting McDonald’s Washington Post …McDonald’s, that once-great American symbol of ingenuity and ruthless efficiency, is having some major difficulties, as its plummeting profits and recent C-suite shake up can attest…
Accident In The Zoo Interchange: 33-Year-Old Construction Worker Killed; Investigation Underway WITI ...A construction worker was killed while working on the Zoo Interchange project near 91st Street in Milwaukee on Saturday morning, February 28th...
Worker Killed At Natchitoches Parish Paper Mill KSLA ...Natchitoches Parish authorities have confirmed with KSLA News 12 that a man was killed in a paper mill accident...
Miscellaneous
Maine Bill Takes On NSA Spying With Transpartisan Support Tenth Amendment Center ...A bill filed in the Maine Senate late last week represents a transpartisan effort taking on the surveillance state. The legislation would not only support efforts to turn off NSA’s water in states where a physical NSA facility is located, but would also have immediate practical effects on how surveillance is used in some situations...
Teamsters ratify four-year contract at AMR nwLaborPress.org …Members of Teamsters Portland Local 223 and Vancouver Local 58 ratified a new four-year collective bargaining agreement at American Medical Response (AMR). The 450-member bargaining unit provides ambulance service to Multnomah and Clackamas counties in Oregon, and Clark and Cowlitz counties in Washington...
Bus Drivers Ratify New Contract With First Student WTOC ...After several long months of negotiations, Savannah First Student employees represented by Teamsters have overwhelmingly ratified their new contract, 117 to four, according to a spokesperson from Teamsters 728...
Teamsters Want Mexican Trucking Row Revisited In TPP Law360 …The International Brotherhood of Teamsters on Monday publicly called on U.S. trade officials to use the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks to reopen deliberations on Mexico's cross-border trucking services, blasting the administration's move to open the border to Mexican truckers earlier this year...
Teamsters To Protest Republic Services Teamsters Local 728 ...On Wed., March 4 at 12 p.m., sanitation workers who work for Republic Services, Inc. [NYSE: RSG] will hold an informational picket to educate the public on the company's human rights violations. Workers at Republic allege that Republic has broken federal laws that protect workers' rights, by unilaterally changing pay and working conditions without negotiating with their union...
S.F. politician calls for labor peace at bus stops USA Today …With labor unions in negotiations with the transportation companies that ferry Silicon Valley tech workers, a San Francisco legislator is calling on the city to consider "labor harmony" when granting permits to corporate shuttles...
Coming detraction: Tax credit ax? Boston Herald …Sean O’Brien, president of Teamsters Local 25, drivers for the movie biz, [said] “Through the tax credit, we have created an industry where people can make a good living and provide for their families,” he said...
Miller, State Attorneys General Join FTC In Challenging Sysco-US Foods Merger Storm Lake Pilot Tribune ...Attorney General Tom Miller and a bipartisan group of state attorneys general today joined the Federal Trade Commission's administrative complaint challenging a proposed merger between food distribution giants Sysco and US Foods...
Canadian National Railway and the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, representing rail traffic controllers, reach a collective agreement Yahoo! News ...The collective agreement covering about 185 rail traffic controllers expired on December 31, 2014...
Trade
Japanese official: Adding currency rules would kill Pacific trade pact Reuters …Any effort to add rules against currency cheating in a 12-nation Pacific trade pact would mean the end of negotiations, a senior Japanese negotiator said on Tuesday...
TPP Free Trade Agreement Would Increase Cost of Medicine In Mexico, Peru, Chile, And Other Countries Latin Times …TPP -- the Trans-PacificPartnership -- is making waves from Peru to Australia, concerning public health officials and consumer advocates. TPP, which would expand trade in 11 Pacific Rim countries, includes draft provisions for unprecedented expansion of pharmaceutical patent protection that could drive up the cost of medicine...
Let's Debate The Trans-Pacific Partnership -- History's Largest Trade Deal -- Before OKing It (opinion) Los Angeles Times ...If you haven't heard much about the TPP, that's part of the problem. It would be the largest trade deal in history — involving countries stretching from Chile to Japan, representing 792 million people and about 40% of the world economy. Yet it's been devised in secret, with a disproportionate amount of advice coming from corporations and Wall Street. This secrecy is the norm since NAFTA...
State Battles
Gov. Rauner asks community to back right to work in 'voter empowerment agenda' address Chicago Sun Times ...Rauner, who has in recent weeks focused on an agenda to allow “right to work” zones in targeted areas of the state, spent much of his address selling that point. It had one Illinois union saying Rauner held a “political obsession with crushing the unions that advocate for the middle class.”...
What a Right-to-Work Law Could Mean For Wisconsin Unions WUWM ...nion membership would likely fall in Wisconsin, if the state enacts such a measure It’s the trend, according to Cheryl Maranto. She’s a management professor at Marquette University. Maranto says union numbers tend to drop in right-to-work states, partly because many unions think it’s futile to expand into new workplaces there...
Minnesota Jobs Committee chair working to bring businesses from Wisconsin to Minnesota State Representative Pat Garofalo ...In light of legislation passed by the Wisconsin State Senate and being debated in the Wisconsin State Assembly that would make Wisconsin a "Right To Work" state, Job Growth and Energy Affordability Committee Chairman Rep. Pat Garofalo, R-Farmington, has extended an invitation to two Wisconsin businesses offering assistance relocating their headquarters to Minnesota...
Right To Work For Less: Gov. Scott Walker Wants To Lower Worker Pay In Wisconsin (opinion) Washington Post ...Look, there are no perfect institutions in America, and unions are no exception. But they exist for a critically important reason: to balance out the inherent power of employers over workers and, thus, to enforce a more equitable distribution of the fruits of growth. In this regard, it is not a coincidence that as unions have diminished in numbers and power, the earnings of the middle class have stagnated...
Bill restricting union dues collection fails but not dead yet in Pa. Senate PennLive ...An attempt to pass a controversial amendment to a bill that would restrict union dues collection from state and school employees' paychecks narrowly failed in the state Senate on Monday. But most likely, we haven't seen the last of this amendment to this so-called paycheck protection bill...
Common Construction Repeal May Require Further Study Indiana Public Media ...The Indiana House easily approved legislation repealing the state’s common construction wage, and the bill’s support in the Senate looks strong. That means pushing the issue to summer study committee could be opponents’ best hope...
Bill Would Reestablish N.H. Minimum Wage, Raise It To $10 An Hour By 2018 NHPR ...Under the bill backed by seven Democratic state Senators, the increased minimum wage would take effect at the beginning of 2016. The bill calls for further increases to $9 an hour in 2017 and $10 an hour in 2018...
War on Workers
NLRB Election Rules Near Test in Congress; Changes Said to ‘Streamline' Board Process Bloomberg BNA ...Congress is about to take up proposals to block the National Labor Relations Board from implementing changes in its representation case rules and procedures set to take effect April 14...
Being a poor corporate citizen is hurting McDonald’s Washington Post …McDonald’s, that once-great American symbol of ingenuity and ruthless efficiency, is having some major difficulties, as its plummeting profits and recent C-suite shake up can attest…
Accident In The Zoo Interchange: 33-Year-Old Construction Worker Killed; Investigation Underway WITI ...A construction worker was killed while working on the Zoo Interchange project near 91st Street in Milwaukee on Saturday morning, February 28th...
Worker Killed At Natchitoches Parish Paper Mill KSLA ...Natchitoches Parish authorities have confirmed with KSLA News 12 that a man was killed in a paper mill accident...
Miscellaneous
Maine Bill Takes On NSA Spying With Transpartisan Support Tenth Amendment Center ...A bill filed in the Maine Senate late last week represents a transpartisan effort taking on the surveillance state. The legislation would not only support efforts to turn off NSA’s water in states where a physical NSA facility is located, but would also have immediate practical effects on how surveillance is used in some situations...
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