Today's Teamster News 06.18.14

Teamsters
Assemblyman joins Teamsters in Taylor Farms protest  Tracy News   ...call for worker equality was shouted outside Taylor Farms Pacific on MacArthur Drive on Thursday by members of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. The group gathered in large numbers to protest the alleged mistreatment of company employees...
Obama sides with Teamsters in employment non-discrimination order  TeamsterNation   ...President Obama today is signing an order forbidding federal contractors from discriminating against employees because of their sexual orientation, a policy supported by the Teamsters Union...
Teamster Women's Conference To Be Held September 4-6  teamster.org   ...The 2014 Teamster Women's Conference will be held September 4-6, 2014 in Chicago. For details about this conference, click here...
Trade
Trade deals, Investment Treaties and the Death of Democracy – How companies sue whole nations and win.  Golem XIV   ...there is a growing discontent and a determination to question mainstream assurances and find new answers...
State Battles
GDP Numbers Confirm Wisconsin’s Lagging Growth  WI Budget Project   ...Wisconsin’s GDP growth of 4.5% over the last three years has been well below the national average of 6.1%...
A $13.13 Minimum Wage Means 1.2 Million NYers Earn An Extra $100/Week Gothamist ...New York's $8/hour ($9 by 2016) continues to be the lowest of any major city, a fact noted by Comptroller Scott Stringer, who just released a report [PDF] detailing the effects of raising the minimum wage in the city to $13.13/hour: 1.2 million New Yorkers would receive an extra $100/week...
Princeton considering ordinance to protect workers from wage theft The Star-Ledger ...Those seeking landscaping permits to do work in Princeton will first need to acknowledge federal and state wage theft laws pertaining to their employees if the governing body adopts an ordinance that ties the two together...
War on Workers
A Small Increase in Inflation Squeezes U.S. Workers  New York Times   ...Average hourly earnings for private sector American workers rose about 49 cents an hour over the last year, to $24.38 in May. But that wasn’t enough to cover inflation over the year, so in real or inflation-adjusted terms, hourly worker pay fell 0.1 percent over the last 12 months...
A manager agrees – bargaining is better (opinion)  Fort Wayne Journal Gazette   ...The most important and consistent feature of collective bargaining is not disagreement about work rules or compensation – it is problem-solving. ..
The US Chemical Safety Board's Turmoil Is Playing With Public Safety  truthout   ...Inside this fight is a tale of ambition, manipulation and personal games that put public safety and the prevention of chemical accidents at risk...
Fed Issues Surreptitious SNAP Payments to Bankster Welfare Queens At Taxpayer Expense   Wall Street Examiner   ...This is a direct giveaway to the banks at the expense of US taxpayers. The banks will shift as much of their excess cash as they can, subject to the $10 billion per bank limit, from their regular deposit accounts at the Fed (aka reserves) to these higher interest paying term deposits. This is cash which the Fed has given them for free in the first place...
Raise the Minimum Wage to Help Economy, IMF Tells U.S. NBC News ...The International Monetary Fund released its annual review of the U.S. economy on Monday and called on the U.S. to raise its federal minimum wage rate...
Uber Drivers Protest Their Dick Boss  Gawker   ...They're not just protesting autonomous taxis. Uber's drivers say "they feel exploited, don't earn enough money and are taken for granted."...

Today's Teamster News 06.14.14

Teamster News
SEPTA Commuter Rail Union on Strike  NBC10   ...Four hundred workers at the Southeast Pennsylvania Transportation Authority's regional rail system (including Teamsters BLET and IBEW members) went on strike Saturday morning, shutting down 13 train lines that carry commuters to the suburbs and Philadelphia International Airport...
Town Of Clinton Approves 2 Percent Raises For Police, Public Works Unions  NJ.com   ...Elected officials approved this week contracts with the town's public works and police unions, giving members of each 2 percent raises. The new PBA contract calls for that raise each of four years and is retroactive to Jan. 1. The Teamsters contract does the same, but is in effect for five years...
De Blasio’s Approval Rating Improves, Poll Finds  New York Times   ...His plan to terminate the carriage-horse industry in Central Park remains broadly unpopular, with two-thirds of voters saying he should allow the horses to stay, an opinion that cut across gender, racial and political lines...
Trade
What Do You Think About Trade? The WTO Wants to Hear from You  AFL-CIO Now   ...The World Trade Organization (WTO) is conducting a “public forum”—a short poll with leading questions about what people think about trade and how it affects their lives. While it’s sad that this is what passes for public involvement in trade policy, it is important to let the WTO, a powerful international institution, know what you think...
Council Calls on Japan to Alter Position on Trans Pacific Partnership  ThePigSite   ...The National Pork Producers Council says, unless Japan significantly alters its demands, US agriculture will not be in a position to support the Trans Pacific Partnership, Bruce Cochrane writes...
How Big Pharma (and others) began lobbying on the Trans-Pacific Partnership before you ever heard of it  Sunlight Foundation   ...In 2009 ... 28 organizations filed 59 lobbying reports mentioning the (TPP, the) then far-off trade agreement. Almost half of those organizations were pharmaceutical companies or associations...
State Battles
Fighting To Increase The Minimum Wage To $15 Per Hour, Wage Action Protest Held In Worcester  MassLive   ...Chanting rhymes the likes of, "Low pay is not okay!" a few dozen advocates for increasing the minimum wage gathered in front of the Tobias Boland Way Walmart for one hour Thursday night in hopes of bringing attention to the issue...
North Carolina is still suing Facebook, wants to pass law banning public from knowing what else it’s doing  Pando   ...legislators in North Carolina — whose $86 billion public pension fund is the 7th largest in America – are proposing to statutorily bar the public from seeing details of the state’s Wall Street transactions for at least a decade. That time frame is significant: according to experts, it would conceal the terms of the investment agreements for longer than the statute of limitations of various securities laws...
AFSCME Helping Chicago Cab Drivers Push For Greater Voice  Chicago Tribune   ...The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union is joining up with Chicago cab drivers to try to help give cabbies a stronger voice in negotiating with Mayor Rahm Emanuel's administration to raise fares, lower costs and push for greater regulation of the nascent ride-share industry...
Map: How A $10.10 Minimum Wage Could Affect Workers In Every Congressional District  Washington Post   ...Raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 would have widely varied impact on the nation’s congressional districts, according to a new report. There is a more than fourfold gap between districts where the impact would be largest and smallest...
War On Workers
Federal regulators cite contractors after worker's death in Amazon warehouse  Fortune   ...Federal regulators have cited five companies for “serious” labor violations after a temp worker died at an Amazon warehouse in New Jersey six months ago, according to a statement released on Friday...
Remember the Problems With Mortgage Defaults? They’re Coming Back With Student Loans  New York Times   ...“robo-signing” is making a comeback, this time in student loans. Robo-signing refers to a practice in which bank employees signed blizzards of documents selling mortgages to another investor without properly verifying who actually owned them...
What If Your Ability To Stay In This Country Depended On Your Employer?  The Nation   ...Every year, US companies invite thousands of special guests from abroad into the labor market, and they arrive clutching visas that will provide them short-term jobs in food processing, farmwork and other seasonal sectors...
HowardCenter Workers Speak About Wages, Work Conditions  Burlington Free Press   ...Allison Segar has worked at the HowardCenter for 16 years, and said she is paid less now than she was 17 years ago when she immigrated to America from England...

Today's Teamster News 05.08.14

Teamster News
Richmond Ikea Labor Dispute Heads Into Year Two--With No End In Sight  The Province   ...The seasons and the calendar may have changed, but the labor dispute at Ikea's Richmond store remains as workers get set to mark a year on the picket line. About 300 members of Teamsters Local 213 have been surviving on strike pay...
York City approves new Teamsters contract  York Dispatch   ..."Both parties made concessions. Both parties got things," said Tom Ray, the city's deputy business administrator for human resources. According to the city's 2014 budget, 58 of the city's 364 employees are members of the Teamsters union...
Trade
Hollywood Boycott Threatens Trans Pacific Partnership  Huffington Post   ...A Hollywood boycott is threatening the Obama administration's Trans Pacific Partnership agreement. The southeast Asian nation of Brunei, a would be member of the TPP, is under fire from Hollywood...
State Battles
Koch Brothers And Big Utilities Campaign To Unplug Solar Power  Los Angeles Times   ...The Koch brothers have a new ploy to protect the traditional energy business that helped make them the planet's fifth and sixth richest humans...
State Ad Campaign Spreads Word Of Wage Theft  The California Report   ...Waiters earning only tips. Car wash workers not paid until customers drive up. Farm workers paid for fruit picked, rest breaks not included. Most of us have a sense this thing happens a lot--but it's not legal...
Conflicting Rulings Cloud Wisconsin Campaign Finance Inquiry  New York Times   ...An investigation into possible campaign finance violations involving conservative groups in Wisconsin and Gov. Scott Walker’s campaign committee has become entangled in back-to-back federal court rulings on whether it should continue...
War On Workers
U.S. Companies Often Assume Black Job Applicants Do Drugs  Huffington Post   ...More than any other group, black applicants are being turned away by U.S. companies under the implicit assumption that they are using illegal drugs, according to a new study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)...
Last year, 25 hedge fund managers earned more than double every kindergarten teacher combined  Vox   ...it's good to be a successful hedge fund manager: the top 25 earned a collective $21.1 billion this year...
Former NFL Cheerleader Sues Jets, Alleging Wage Theft  Al-Jazeera   ...The New York Jets have become the fourth National Football League (NFL) team to be sued by former cheerleaders alleging wage-theft and other labor-law violations...
CEOs Are Spending More And More Of Their Company's Money On Vacations Think Progress   ...Corporate CEOs are back to using company jets for personal travel after the practice dipped briefly following the financial crisis, Bloomberg reports. "Non-business travel expenses" increased for the third straight year...
Charter Schools Are Cheating Your Kids: New Report Reveals Massive Fraud, Mismanagement, Abuse  Salon.com   ...Just in time for National Charter School Week, there's a new report highlighting the predictable perils of turning education into a poorly regulated business...
Miscellaneous
Wide Majorities Losing Faith In John Roberts' Supreme Court, Want Term Limits  Huffington Post   ...An overwhelming majority of voters would support sweeping reforms to the Supreme Court, as trust and confidence in the institution has eroded in recent years, according to a new survey...

Teamsters fight for pregnant women in US and Canada

Teamsters want to make sure pregnant women are treated with fairness at work.

In Canada, Teamsters have taken up the cause of a pregnant rail worker who was sent home without pay. In the United States, the Teamsters are lobbying Congress to pass the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.

In both cases, Teamsters are working to make sure all pregnant women are given lighter, safer assignments at work if they need them.

Canadian Teamsters are fighting on behalf of our sister Marie-Eve Ethier, a Canadian National yardmaster and conductor, who was recently pregnant. She  assembles trains in the rail yard. That's dangerous for a pregnant woman and her colleagues -- she could experience nausea or her blood pressure could drop. Her doctor advised her to take a preventive withdrawal.

Sister Ethier asked Canadian National to assign her tasks that were less risky to her health. Instead, the employer sent her home.

The Teamsters took up her cause. Said Teamsters Canada President Robert Bouvier,

Why would women who fall under Quebec law be entitled to compensation and those subject to federal legislation not? Although this is admittedly a complicated case, it doesn't change the fact that there's injustice here and we at Teamsters believe that as soon as there's injustice, it needs to be rectified immediately.

Teamsters Canada explains:

Éthier did not qualify for compensation provided for under provincial law because her employer is subject to federal law. She was thus deprived of income for six months due to this loophole... 

Since the Canada Labour Code provides no compensation in such a case, the Teamsters are asking that a certain paragraph of Quebec's Act respecting occupational health and safety also apply to workers whose employers are governed by the Canada Labour Code.

So the Teamsters sent a legal team to the Commission des lesions professionnelles (CLP), Quebec's Committee on Occupational Injuries. They asked that a certain paragraph of Quebec's law on occupational health and safety also apply to workers whose employers are governed by the Canada Labour Code.

If the Teamsters don't prevail, Bouvier vowed to fight the case all the way to the Supreme Court. It's not just Ethier who would benefit. So would many Canadian women who work in transportation -- air, rail, road and maritime.

U.S. Teamsters are fighting the same fight. The Teamsters have signed a letter with 10 other labor organizations urging Congress to pass the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. The letter states:

All too often, non-union and union pregnant workers’ requests for workplace accommodations are denied and these workers are fired, forced to go on unpaid leave or quit rather than jeopardize their pregnancies.  Out of economic necessity, some women continue to perform strenuous work duties that compromise their maternal health - when a simple accommodation can be made: drinking water, access to bathrooms, a stool to sit on or less strenuous lifting. 

 Countless stories tell how women are pushed out or fired due to pregnancy.  Once fired, they lose wages and health care – at a time when financial security is needed the most.  Take for example, the pregnant retail worker in Indiana who was denied light duty and as a result suffered pregnancy complications. Ultimately, she was fired for requesting a reasonable accommodation.  

According to the Labor Project for Working Families, the bill would:

...make it unmistakably clear that pregnant women cannot be forced off the job simply because they need temporary reasonable accommodations.

The fight for working families never ends...

Today's Teamster News 03.18.12

Year-over-year Change in Public and Private Payroll Employment  Calculated Risk   ...American bosses added 2.021 million jobs in the year ended in February. That's a 1.5 percent job growth pace. It's the fastest bout of hiring since January 2007...
Barriers to Change, From Wall St. and Geneva  New York Times   ...Financial institutions, eager to maintain their profitable status quo, have lobbied hard against change. As a result, too-big-to-fail institutions have become even bigger and more powerful...
Under Siege, Wis. Gov. Walker Faces Defeats, Blunders—and Looming Recall  In These Times   ...People are upset about the state’s terrible economic performance, the governor is under investigation in a John Doe probe, he faces a recall election this spring, and people are really upset by all of his cutbacks," Kraig added...
Pension Case Headed directly to Florida Supreme Court  WCTV   ...In another setback to Gov. Rick Scott and the other defendants, and another victory for Florida’s public workers, the First District Court of Appeal has granted the Florida Education Association’s request that last week’s pension decision be certified directly to the Florida Supreme Court for final determination. ... “This could help hundreds of thousands of middle-class Florida families who have seen their incomes tumble while the governor and legislative leaders handed out tax giveaways to corporations.”
Hundreds gather for Capitol rally against bill on unions  Atlanta Journal Constitution   ..."This is an extreme attack on our basic democratic rights," said Ben Speight of Teamsters Local 728, who attended the rally. "It's also an attempt to bankrupt and destroy our unions."...
Coors Is Tasteless, Say Teamsters on St. Patrick's Day  Teamsters Joint Council 7   ...More than 100 Teamsters marched in the St. Patrick's Day parade today to raise awareness about anti-immigrant behavior, worker abuse and discrimination by DBI Beverage, the distributor of products by Coors Brewing Co. in Northern California...

Today's Teamster News 03.03.12

State files response to right-to-work lawsuit  Post-Tribune   ...State officials have said that a lawsuit seeking to block the recently signed right-to-work legislation should fail because officials can’t be sued, according to a brief filed Friday in the U.S. District Court in Hammond...
State reduces visits to violent criminals on probation  Tampa Bay Online   ...Cost-saving measures by the Florida Department of Corrections have ended surprise home visits by probation officers to thousands of violent criminals and drug offenders who are under court-ordered supervision...
More time for Hostess  New York Post   ...A bankruptcy judge postponed a hearing set for March 5 after Hostess Brands requested a two-week extension while it continues to negotiate with its unions...
Will Wall Street Ever Face Justice? (opinion)  New York Times   ...after the savings-and-loan debacle of the late 1980s, more than 1,000 bank and thrift executives were convicted of felonies. But today the rate of federal prosecutions for financial fraud is less than half of what it was then...
Is Drug War Driven Mass Incarceration the New Jim Crow  Forbes   ...there is no denying that if your goal were to consign African Americans to a permanent underclass—one which the rest of us would be culturally and legally permitted to discriminate against in employment, housing, voting rights, and government benefits—the war on drugs would be a great way to do it...
Mansion servant enslaved by uber-rich New York family for six years  Sideshow   ...A wealthy New York woman is facing criminal charges after being accused of keeping an illegal immigrant as an indentured servant and forcing her to live in a closet for nearly six years...

Bass Pro's corporate profile: Fishy

Rally Girl (an avid angler) submits a guest post about outdoor outfitter Bass Pro Shops:

Racial discrimination has been an ugly feature of corporate America for many years. But for the first time we're hearing a corporation expressly say why it discriminates against minority workers.

Managers at Bass Pro Shops, a leading retailer of outdoor gear, in Texas, Indiana and Louisiana noted that “African American candidates ‘did not fit the corporate profile.’”

Huh?

That's according to the EEOC, which is suing Bass Pro  for discriminating against minority employees.

Dave Jamison at the Huffington Post reports:

Describing the lawsuit as both "major" and "nationwide," the EEOC alleges that the retailer discriminated against minority applicants, retaliated against employees who spoke out about what they considered unfair hiring practices, and destroyed internal records related to hiring. Certain non-white applicants, the agency claims, were not given jobs because they did not fit the Bass Pro brand.

"Bass Pro has been discriminating in its hiring since at least November 2005," the EEOC said in a release.

Minority job seekers, the agency said, were "routinely denied" positions as cashiers, sales associates, team leaders, supervisors and managers at Bass Pro stores.

What’s more, Bass Pro received a total of $500 million in taxpayer subsidies in exchange for promises of economic revitalization. Bass Pro said it would be an economic development anchor and major tourist destination, according to the Public Accountability Initiative, a research group in Buffalo, N.Y. According to a study produced by PAI,

• A Mesa, AZ development anchored by a Bass Pro has been described as a "ghost town" and "dead" and spurred the state to pass a ban on retail subsidies.
• A taxpayer-subsidized Harrisburg, PA Bass Pro is struggling to attract tenants to the mall it anchors, leading to lawsuits, stalled renovations, and increasing stigma. Though the Bass Pro was expected to hire 300-400 employees according to initial projections, it had hired only 101 employees three years after opening.
• A Bass Pro-anchored mall in Cincinnati, OH, is only 35% leased and has been described as "positively post-apocalyptic" and "pretty much on life support" by visitors.
• Taxpayers in cities across the country have been left with high levels of debt and fiscal stress as a result of Bass Pro projects.

Now we're wondering which communities meet Bass Pro’s corporate profile and which don’t.

You go girls: A million women sue Wal-Mart

Here’s Betty Dukes, who started the class-action lawsuit charging Wal-Mart with violating the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

AP’s Paul Elias has the story:

Her dual roles have turned her into a civil rights crusader for the
company's many critics, who have dubbed the legal battle "Betty v. Goliath." It
is a far cry from where Dukes expected to be when she enthusiastically accepted
an offer in 1994 to work the cash registers part-time for $5 an hour. She
dreamed of turning around a hard life by advancing, through work and
determination, into Wal-Mart corporate management. Read the whole thing here.