Trade
Secret Negotiations Hide the TPP’s Most Damaging Provisions Economy in Crisis ...Under the proposed agreement, American laws regarding labor, environmental or financial issues would apply to companies based in America, but foreign companies operating in the U.S. could challenge these laws in a secret international tribunal if they felt these laws affected their ability to do business. ..
WTO in Seattle - 15 Years Ago Huffington Post ...it's clear that the WTO and NAFTA-style trade deals were never about economics or shared prosperity. They are really about power relationships. Who will have the power to claim any new gains created through work?...
State Battles
Voter ID Laws Are Now In 17 More States Than They Were In 2000 Five Thirty Eight ...It's gotten a lot harder to vote...
Scott Walker Runs Ad Supporting Equal Pay After Repealing Wisconsin's Equal Pay Law Huffington Post ...Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) released an ad on Tuesday in which his female lieutenant governor applauds his support for equal pay for women -- just two years after the governor signed a bill repealing the state's equal pay law...
New York State Allows Water Grab Natural Resources News Service ...Painted Post siphons water from a shallow, rain-dependent aquifer it shares with several neighboring communities, including the town of Corning. In 2012 the village signed a five-year deal reportedly worth up to $20 million with a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell to sell up to 1 million gallons a day used to frack Shell’s natural gas wells in Pennsylvania. The village has called the sale a routine disposal of “surplus property.”...
Has privatization failed Texas utility customers? Electric Light & Power ...Relative to U.S. electricity prices, Texas electricity prices during the deregulation and privatization period (2002-2011) rise four times faster than increases in Texas electricity prices before deregulation (1970-2001). The Texas electricity market is much less efficient now as a result of deregulation...
Minority Voter Suppression In North Carolina Witnessed Firsthand Politicususa ...on Thursday, October 23rd [] I voted in Winston-Salem at the Forsyth County Government Center. Several African-American voters told me they were told by people outside the polling place that it would take two hours to vote. I, a clearly upper-middle-class white man, was told forty-five minutes to an hour; it took fifty-five minutes...
War on Workers
$17.27 an Hour, With Benefits, While Training? Welcome to Union Apprenticeship in Indiana We Party Patriots ... Lee Culver of United Association (Plumbers) Local 210 said there was plenty of opportunity in his union and claimed they “struggled to get good applicants.” The five-year apprenticeship does not cost the students a dime. Rather, they earn $17.27 with benefits while they train....
Workers at Amazon.com logistics centers in Germany on strike again in wage dispute Associated Press ...The ver.di union said Monday workers at Amazon's logistics centers in Bad Hersfeld, Leipzig, Rheinberg and Graben will be off the job through the end of Wednesday's late shift, while those at Werne through Tuesday's late shift...
One worker killed, 3 injured when facade falls from building WGN-TV ...This morning, the building is barricaded and its owner is facing citations for having work performed by unlicensed contractors without permits...
Branson spaceship explosion: The 'missed' warnings The Telegraph ...Sir Richard Branson’s company and US authorities were repeatedly warned about safety issues surrounding Virgin Galactic’s rocket engine system...
Showing posts with label contracting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label contracting. Show all posts
Sunday, November 2, 2014
Thursday, September 11, 2014
Today's Teamster News 09.11.14
Teamster News
Teamsters Score Victory For Investor Rights At Sysco teamster.org ...The Teamsters Union scored a major victory for Sysco [NYSE: SYY] shareholders when the board of directors agreed this week to adopt the union’s proposal to amend company by-laws and provide shareholders with the right to call a special meeting. In 2015, a quorum of Sysco investors owning 25 percent of the company’s outstanding shares will be empowered to call a special meeting of shareholders...
Teamsters aim to organize FedEx Freight Indy drivers Indianapolis Star ...The Teamsters union is trying to whip up pro-union sentiment among 250 local FedEx Freight drivers as it lays the groundwork for a possible unionization vote...
NM Jail Employees In Union To Receive Retroactive Raise Corrections One ...It is the first contract for Teamsters Local 492 of Albuquerque, which was elected by jail employees to represent county detention sergeants, detention officers and booking specialists. The raise is for all union members regardless of their salary level...
Detroit's Creditors Are Morally Bankrupt (opinion) teamster.org ...Detroit city worker retirees have given more than their fair share when it comes to making pension concessions. So have current municipal employees. Together, they helped Motor City officials earlier this year cobble together a “grand bargain” as part of the city’s bankruptcy plan. But evidently, that’s still not enough for some...
Trade
U.S. groups leery of fast-track trade deals demand transparency Reuters ...More than 500 U.S. organizations on Wednesday urged the Obama administration to ditch the system of congressional authority to fast-track trade negotiations, demanding a more transparent method of handling trade negotiations...
U.S. Commerce Drops Duties On Turkish Steel Rebar Imports, Confirms Mexican Duties Reuters ...The U.S. Commerce Department on Tuesday dropped a preliminary decision to impose anti-dumping duties on steel rebar imports from Turkey while it confirmed anti-dumping duties on Mexican material of up to 66.7 percent...
State Battles
Gov. Brown Signs Bill Requiring Paid Sick Leave For Millions Of Workers CBS Los Angeles ...Assembly Bill 1522, known as The Healthy Workplaces, Healthy Families Act of 2014, requires employers to provide paid sick leave to any employee who works in California for 30 or more days within a year from the commencement of employment starting on or after July 1, 2015...
Federal Panel Suggests Koch-Tied Judge Overreached When He Halted Walker Probe Center for Media and Democracy ...Tuesday's hearing suggested the 7th Circuit judges were wary of a federal court cutting off a state criminal investigation, being conducted under state law, and overseen by state courts...
Court Hears Arguments On Secret Scott Walker Investigation MSNBC ...A 7th Circuit Court of Appeals panel heard oral arguments Tuesday from Wisconsin prosecutors and attorneys for the conservative political group Wisconsin Club for Growth State prosecutors had been investigating since 2012 whether Walker and his campaign staff illegally coordinated with conservative groups to raise and spend campaign dollars in a way that skirted state contribution limits...
Minneapolis Leaders Consider $15-An-Hour Minimum Wage Minneapolis Star Tribune ...The new effort comes six weeks after the statewide minimum wage went up from $7.25 to $8 an hour — on its way to $9.50 in 2016.Cano is taking a measured approach. She said that process would begin with an update to the city’s rules for how it pays its contractors, then be expanded to include a higher minimum wage for all people working in Minneapolis, similar to Seattle’s recent minimum wage boost...
Tennessee Hasn't Inspected Tobacco Farms Since 2006 The Tennessean ...unlike some other states, Tennessee has virtually no oversight of child labor on tobacco farms. The Tennessee Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the state agency charged with inspecting and enforcing safety and sanitation standards on the state's farms, has conducted no tobacco farm inspections since December 2006...
Homeowners steamrolled as Florida courts clear foreclosure backlog Center for Public Integrity ...“The state’s entire court system has been compromised,” says Matt Weidner, an outspoken foreclosure defense lawyer who practices in Tampa and St. Petersburg and blogs about the system. “They’re stripping away private property rights and transferring billions of dollars in assets from individuals to large entities...”
War On Workers
Senate advances Paycheck Fairness Act The Hill ...Senate Republicans decided not to block the advancement of the Paycheck Fairness Act. Democrats needed 60 votes to advance the legislation procedurally; the tally was 73-25 on Wednesday. The move will once again tie up the Senate in debate for days...
Republicans Make Big Advances Thanks to Citizens United American Prospect ...the ruling has significantly benefited Republican candidates for state legislatures -- especially in North Carolina and Tennessee...
Bible College President Admits He Used Foreign Students As Slave Labor crooks and liars ...Miller forced foreign students at his supposedly Christian "Bible college" to live in substandard living conditions, work long hours for little or no pay, and - when students complained - he threatened them with deportation...
Worker Killed After Being Run Over By Trash Truck Tulsa's Channel 8 ...On Wednesday morning a Sand Springs sanitation worker lost his life while on the job...
Worker Killed In Johnston County Oil Rig Accident KTEN ...The sheriff's office says a man was killed when something went horribly wrong at an oil rig in Mannsville, Oklahoma...
Police and fire unions sue City of Indianapolis over alleged contract violations Fox 58 ...Lawyers for the unions accuse city officials of violating union contracts. According to the lawsuit, the city plans to get rid of the current HMO advantage plan beginning this January. The plan would be replaced by a health savings account or (HSA)...
At The Uber For Home Cleaning, Workers Pay A Price For Convenience Washington Post ...At the end of a five-hour trip back and forth, averaged out, he has made $10 an hour, without any taxes being withheld, as they would be if he were an employee. What’s more, he doesn’t get workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance, time off or retirement benefits — all the perks and protections of working for a traditional business...
U.S. mortgage applications fall to lowest since Dec 2000: MBA Reuters ...Applications for U.S. home mortgages fell last week to the lowest since December 2000 as interest rates rose for the first time in four weeks, an industry group said on Wednesday...
Elizabeth Warren: Jamie Dimon Gets $8.5 Million Raise for Illegal Conduct at JPMorgan Wall Street on Parade ...despite the misconduct at these banks that generated tens of billions of dollars in settlement payments by the companies, not a single senior executive at these banks has been criminally prosecuted...
Senators and Other Experts to Appeals Court: NSA's Phone Records Program Is a Massive Invasion of Privacy Electronic Frontier Foundation ...Senators Ron Wyden, Mark Udall, and Martin Heinrich—members of the committee charged with overseeing the NSA—write that they “have seen no evidence that the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records has provided any intelligence of value that could not have been gathered through means that caused far less harm to the privacy interests of millions of Americans.”...
When A ‘Contractor’ Is Really A Cheated Employee (opinion) Tacoma News Tribune ...‘Worker misclassification” is a dry term that smacks of paperwork mistakes and picayune regulations. But as a multi-state McClatchy Newspaper investigation has revealed, it’s often a deliberate scheme to cheat laborers out of wages and defraud the public...
Miscellaneous
Union Members Remember 9/11 By Rebuilding The World Trade Center AFL-CIO ...As millions of Americans took a moment this morning to remember the tragedy that occurred 11 years ago on Sept. 11 in New York City, Virginia and Pennsylvania, military veterans who’ve found careers through the Ironworkers, Laborers (LiUNA), Heat and Frost Insulators and Bricklayers (BAC) are rebuilding the World Trade Center in New York...
Teamsters Score Victory For Investor Rights At Sysco teamster.org ...The Teamsters Union scored a major victory for Sysco [NYSE: SYY] shareholders when the board of directors agreed this week to adopt the union’s proposal to amend company by-laws and provide shareholders with the right to call a special meeting. In 2015, a quorum of Sysco investors owning 25 percent of the company’s outstanding shares will be empowered to call a special meeting of shareholders...
Teamsters aim to organize FedEx Freight Indy drivers Indianapolis Star ...The Teamsters union is trying to whip up pro-union sentiment among 250 local FedEx Freight drivers as it lays the groundwork for a possible unionization vote...
NM Jail Employees In Union To Receive Retroactive Raise Corrections One ...It is the first contract for Teamsters Local 492 of Albuquerque, which was elected by jail employees to represent county detention sergeants, detention officers and booking specialists. The raise is for all union members regardless of their salary level...
Detroit's Creditors Are Morally Bankrupt (opinion) teamster.org ...Detroit city worker retirees have given more than their fair share when it comes to making pension concessions. So have current municipal employees. Together, they helped Motor City officials earlier this year cobble together a “grand bargain” as part of the city’s bankruptcy plan. But evidently, that’s still not enough for some...
Trade
U.S. groups leery of fast-track trade deals demand transparency Reuters ...More than 500 U.S. organizations on Wednesday urged the Obama administration to ditch the system of congressional authority to fast-track trade negotiations, demanding a more transparent method of handling trade negotiations...
U.S. Commerce Drops Duties On Turkish Steel Rebar Imports, Confirms Mexican Duties Reuters ...The U.S. Commerce Department on Tuesday dropped a preliminary decision to impose anti-dumping duties on steel rebar imports from Turkey while it confirmed anti-dumping duties on Mexican material of up to 66.7 percent...
State Battles
Gov. Brown Signs Bill Requiring Paid Sick Leave For Millions Of Workers CBS Los Angeles ...Assembly Bill 1522, known as The Healthy Workplaces, Healthy Families Act of 2014, requires employers to provide paid sick leave to any employee who works in California for 30 or more days within a year from the commencement of employment starting on or after July 1, 2015...
Federal Panel Suggests Koch-Tied Judge Overreached When He Halted Walker Probe Center for Media and Democracy ...Tuesday's hearing suggested the 7th Circuit judges were wary of a federal court cutting off a state criminal investigation, being conducted under state law, and overseen by state courts...
Court Hears Arguments On Secret Scott Walker Investigation MSNBC ...A 7th Circuit Court of Appeals panel heard oral arguments Tuesday from Wisconsin prosecutors and attorneys for the conservative political group Wisconsin Club for Growth State prosecutors had been investigating since 2012 whether Walker and his campaign staff illegally coordinated with conservative groups to raise and spend campaign dollars in a way that skirted state contribution limits...
Minneapolis Leaders Consider $15-An-Hour Minimum Wage Minneapolis Star Tribune ...The new effort comes six weeks after the statewide minimum wage went up from $7.25 to $8 an hour — on its way to $9.50 in 2016.Cano is taking a measured approach. She said that process would begin with an update to the city’s rules for how it pays its contractors, then be expanded to include a higher minimum wage for all people working in Minneapolis, similar to Seattle’s recent minimum wage boost...
Tennessee Hasn't Inspected Tobacco Farms Since 2006 The Tennessean ...unlike some other states, Tennessee has virtually no oversight of child labor on tobacco farms. The Tennessee Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the state agency charged with inspecting and enforcing safety and sanitation standards on the state's farms, has conducted no tobacco farm inspections since December 2006...
Homeowners steamrolled as Florida courts clear foreclosure backlog Center for Public Integrity ...“The state’s entire court system has been compromised,” says Matt Weidner, an outspoken foreclosure defense lawyer who practices in Tampa and St. Petersburg and blogs about the system. “They’re stripping away private property rights and transferring billions of dollars in assets from individuals to large entities...”
War On Workers
Senate advances Paycheck Fairness Act The Hill ...Senate Republicans decided not to block the advancement of the Paycheck Fairness Act. Democrats needed 60 votes to advance the legislation procedurally; the tally was 73-25 on Wednesday. The move will once again tie up the Senate in debate for days...
Republicans Make Big Advances Thanks to Citizens United American Prospect ...the ruling has significantly benefited Republican candidates for state legislatures -- especially in North Carolina and Tennessee...
Bible College President Admits He Used Foreign Students As Slave Labor crooks and liars ...Miller forced foreign students at his supposedly Christian "Bible college" to live in substandard living conditions, work long hours for little or no pay, and - when students complained - he threatened them with deportation...
Worker Killed After Being Run Over By Trash Truck Tulsa's Channel 8 ...On Wednesday morning a Sand Springs sanitation worker lost his life while on the job...
Worker Killed In Johnston County Oil Rig Accident KTEN ...The sheriff's office says a man was killed when something went horribly wrong at an oil rig in Mannsville, Oklahoma...
Police and fire unions sue City of Indianapolis over alleged contract violations Fox 58 ...Lawyers for the unions accuse city officials of violating union contracts. According to the lawsuit, the city plans to get rid of the current HMO advantage plan beginning this January. The plan would be replaced by a health savings account or (HSA)...
At The Uber For Home Cleaning, Workers Pay A Price For Convenience Washington Post ...At the end of a five-hour trip back and forth, averaged out, he has made $10 an hour, without any taxes being withheld, as they would be if he were an employee. What’s more, he doesn’t get workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance, time off or retirement benefits — all the perks and protections of working for a traditional business...
U.S. mortgage applications fall to lowest since Dec 2000: MBA Reuters ...Applications for U.S. home mortgages fell last week to the lowest since December 2000 as interest rates rose for the first time in four weeks, an industry group said on Wednesday...
Elizabeth Warren: Jamie Dimon Gets $8.5 Million Raise for Illegal Conduct at JPMorgan Wall Street on Parade ...despite the misconduct at these banks that generated tens of billions of dollars in settlement payments by the companies, not a single senior executive at these banks has been criminally prosecuted...
Senators and Other Experts to Appeals Court: NSA's Phone Records Program Is a Massive Invasion of Privacy Electronic Frontier Foundation ...Senators Ron Wyden, Mark Udall, and Martin Heinrich—members of the committee charged with overseeing the NSA—write that they “have seen no evidence that the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records has provided any intelligence of value that could not have been gathered through means that caused far less harm to the privacy interests of millions of Americans.”...
When A ‘Contractor’ Is Really A Cheated Employee (opinion) Tacoma News Tribune ...‘Worker misclassification” is a dry term that smacks of paperwork mistakes and picayune regulations. But as a multi-state McClatchy Newspaper investigation has revealed, it’s often a deliberate scheme to cheat laborers out of wages and defraud the public...
Miscellaneous
Union Members Remember 9/11 By Rebuilding The World Trade Center AFL-CIO ...As millions of Americans took a moment this morning to remember the tragedy that occurred 11 years ago on Sept. 11 in New York City, Virginia and Pennsylvania, military veterans who’ve found careers through the Ironworkers, Laborers (LiUNA), Heat and Frost Insulators and Bricklayers (BAC) are rebuilding the World Trade Center in New York...
Monday, June 2, 2014
Today's Teamster News 06.02.14
Trade
US food safety association flags up potential negatives of TTIP Global Meat News ...Food safety in the meat industry could be negatively affected by the result of the current Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) talks between the US and the European Union, according to the Center for Food Safety (CFS) in the US...
EU-US clash over financial services in TTIP EurActiv ... The US Ambassador to the EU told the European Commissioner for Trade today (15 May) that there is hardly any chance that financial services will be included in a future Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)...
State Battles
How Local Governments Are Using Their Purchasing Power to End Sweatshop Labor The Nation ...Last month, to commemorate the anniversary of the deadly Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh, the city of Madison, Wisconsin, launched a contracting policy that commits the city’s vendors to promote fair labor standards...
A New Teacher Union Movement is Rising Portside ...A revitalized teacher union movement is bubbling up in the midst of relentless attacks on public schools and the teaching profession...
The War on Workers
QE, Bailouts, And Families Struggling To Buy Food Testosterone Pit ...In 2013, as the S&P 500 index, including dividends, shot up 32.4% – after an already blistering 16% in 2012 – and as the Fed’s trillions inflated just about every asset class, from modernist paintings to farmland, well just then, 23% of the families with kids and 19% of the families without kids in America reported difficulties buying food...
Walmart Associates From All Over The World Arrive In Northwest Arkansas Sunday 5News ...The Walmart shareholders and associates stay at the University of Arkansas in the dorms. All of the events and meals take place on campus, with the biggest event being the 7 a.m. Friday shareholders meeting at Bud Walton Arena...
A New Rallying Cry for Retail Workers: $25,000 a Year Bloomberg ...Walmart Moms head to the headquarters of Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) for the retailer’s annual shareholder meeting on June 6. The union-supported group is asking for $25,000 a year for full-time work...
N.S.A. Collecting Millions of Faces From Web Images New York Times ...The National Security Agency is harvesting huge numbers of images of people from communications that it intercepts through its global surveillance operations for use in sophisticated facial recognition programs, according to top-secret documents...
Miscellaneous
U.S. to unveil sweeping rules to cut power plant pollution Reuters ...The U.S. power sector will need to emit 30 percent less carbon dioxide by 2030 than it did in 2005, according to new federal regulations - the centerpiece of the Obama administration's climate change strategy - to be unveiled on Monday...
Study Examines Efficacy of Taxes on Sugary Drinks New York Times ...A new study of how taxes might be used to curb consumption of sugary drinks suggests that applying a tax based on the amount of calories contained in a serving rather than its size would be more effective...
US food safety association flags up potential negatives of TTIP Global Meat News ...Food safety in the meat industry could be negatively affected by the result of the current Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) talks between the US and the European Union, according to the Center for Food Safety (CFS) in the US...
EU-US clash over financial services in TTIP EurActiv ... The US Ambassador to the EU told the European Commissioner for Trade today (15 May) that there is hardly any chance that financial services will be included in a future Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)...
State Battles
How Local Governments Are Using Their Purchasing Power to End Sweatshop Labor The Nation ...Last month, to commemorate the anniversary of the deadly Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh, the city of Madison, Wisconsin, launched a contracting policy that commits the city’s vendors to promote fair labor standards...
A New Teacher Union Movement is Rising Portside ...A revitalized teacher union movement is bubbling up in the midst of relentless attacks on public schools and the teaching profession...
The War on Workers
QE, Bailouts, And Families Struggling To Buy Food Testosterone Pit ...In 2013, as the S&P 500 index, including dividends, shot up 32.4% – after an already blistering 16% in 2012 – and as the Fed’s trillions inflated just about every asset class, from modernist paintings to farmland, well just then, 23% of the families with kids and 19% of the families without kids in America reported difficulties buying food...
Walmart Associates From All Over The World Arrive In Northwest Arkansas Sunday 5News ...The Walmart shareholders and associates stay at the University of Arkansas in the dorms. All of the events and meals take place on campus, with the biggest event being the 7 a.m. Friday shareholders meeting at Bud Walton Arena...
A New Rallying Cry for Retail Workers: $25,000 a Year Bloomberg ...Walmart Moms head to the headquarters of Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) for the retailer’s annual shareholder meeting on June 6. The union-supported group is asking for $25,000 a year for full-time work...
N.S.A. Collecting Millions of Faces From Web Images New York Times ...The National Security Agency is harvesting huge numbers of images of people from communications that it intercepts through its global surveillance operations for use in sophisticated facial recognition programs, according to top-secret documents...
Miscellaneous
U.S. to unveil sweeping rules to cut power plant pollution Reuters ...The U.S. power sector will need to emit 30 percent less carbon dioxide by 2030 than it did in 2005, according to new federal regulations - the centerpiece of the Obama administration's climate change strategy - to be unveiled on Monday...
Study Examines Efficacy of Taxes on Sugary Drinks New York Times ...A new study of how taxes might be used to curb consumption of sugary drinks suggests that applying a tax based on the amount of calories contained in a serving rather than its size would be more effective...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)