Teamster airline mechanics fight for safety

Members of the Teamsters Aviation Mechanics Coalition (TAMC) came to Washington last week to air their grievances and fight to improve airline safety.

TAMC members held several Capitol Hill meetings.

TAMC Chairman Chris Moore led the effort to meet with a bipartisan group of policy experts and legislative staff. He was joined by International Representative and TAMC Board Member Bob Fisher; Gary Kagel, a member of the TAMC Steering Committee from Local 769; Tom Reid, a TAMC Steering Committee member from Local 210; and Greg Unterseher, a business agent from Local 1224.

The TAMC requested that global drug testing standards be brought into uniform parity so that testing can be fair and equal for all airline mechanics.Airline repair stations exist all over the world and many carriers based in the U.S. outsource their repairs to foreign countries.Each nation has different standards for their drug testing, some of which are lower that the standards in the U.S.

Additionally, the TAMC lobbied for a moratorium on the certification of new repair stations worldwide following three consecutive reports by the U.S. Office of the Inspector General detailing an extensive failure by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to properly oversee existing repair stations.The TAMC believes that if the FAA cannot oversee existing repair stations, new ones should not be certified until all of the existing stations are able to be examined for compliance on a regular basis.

Moore was pleased with the meetings and is hopeful that action on these items can happen soon:

Our number-one goal is to improve safety and conditions for airline mechanics and the flying public. To that extent, these past two days have been full of productive and informative meetings with policy makers across the political spectrum and I’m hoping we can get some attention paid to these issues.

Captain David Bourne, Director of the Teamsters Airline Division, applauded the efforts of the TAMC to pressure lawmakers on airline safety issues:

I’m grateful for the work of the entire TAMC. The FAA needs to remember their commitment to the safety of the flying public. The efforts of the TAMC are important in keeping the spotlight on these issues.

The TAMC represents more than 18,000 aviation mechanics and related workers at seven airlines, including United, ExpressJet, Frontier, Horizon Air, NetJets, Piedmont Airlines and UPS. The Coalition will continue to fight for good working conditions for airline mechanics and safer skies.
For more information, visit www.teamsterair.org/tamc.

Today's Teamster News 01.17.15

Teamsters
Teamster Pilots With Allegiant Air Authorize Strike  teamster.org   ...Pilots at Allegiant Air, represented by the Airline Professionals Association (APA) Teamsters Local 1224, voted overwhelmingly, 465-8, today to authorize a strike against Allegiant Air. The 10-day voting period closed at 12:00 p.m. EST today, with 98 percent of voting Allegiant Air pilots voting “Yes” to authorize the union to call a strike if necessary...
At Hunts Point Market, Awaiting Word on Strike as Talks Continue  New York Times   ...Many of the workers said they were prepared to carry out the first strike at the market in nearly 30 years if contract talks between their union, Teamsters Local 202, and management failed to resolve differences between the two sides over proposed wage increases and health care contributions...
Teamsters Leader Daniel Grace Lauds Governor-Elect Wolf for Barring Yuengling  teamster.org   ...The leader of Philadelphia-based Teamsters Local 830 today lauded the decision of Governor-Elect Tom Wolf to exclude Yuengling Beer products from his inaugural ball in Harrisburg next Tuesday, Jan. 20...
Teamsters Support Administration’s Push For Paid Leave  teamster.org   ...The Teamsters encourage a workplace that grants dignity and respect to all workers and the union applauds the Obama administration for pushing forward with an agenda that calls for hardworking Americans to receive paid sick time. We also support an executive order that would give federal employees six weeks paid time off after giving birth...
Labor Agreements Inked With City Unions  Daily Sun News   ...The Sunnyside City Council, at its first meeting in 2015 this past Monday, authorized agreements with the city’s office/clerical and public works collective bargaining units. Both agreements include a change to the health insurance premiums, from a 70 percent employer/30 percent employee cost to a 75/25 split. Both agreements also include additional longevity pay based on years of service...
CN Reaches Tentative Labour Agreement With Teamsters Union Representing Rail Traffic Controllers  American Journal Of Transportation   ...The four-year agreement would provide wage increases and benefit improvements to approximately 180 employees. Details of the agreement are being withheld pending ratification by union members. The union is expected to announce the results of the ratification vote before the end of February 2015...
North Versailles Township Police Get Raises, To Pay For Health Insurance  Pittsburgh Tribune Review   ...North Versailles Township police will get annual raises for the next four years under a new contract township commissioners approved Thursday...
Trade
What You Need To Know When Obama Talks Trade  Campaign for America's Future   ...President Obama is likely to use the State of the Union to push for passage of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the rigged “fast track” trade promotion authority...
Dana Milbank: Cracks in the GOP foundation (opinion)  Washington Post   ...On Tuesday morning, a group of tea-party conservatives met in the Capitol complex to complain about Republican plans to pass “trade promotion authority,” giving Obama greater ability to negotiate trade deals with less congressional say-so...
‘Corporate Wolves’ Will Exploit TTIP Trade Deal, MPs Warned  The Guardian   ...The controversial TTIP trade deal between Europe and the US could depress workers’ wages by £3,000 a year and allow “corporate wolves” to sue the government for loss of profit, MPs have heard...
EU Consultation On Corporate Sovereignty In TAFTA/TTIP Shows 145,000 Against It; European Commission Carries On Anyway  Techdirt   ...As well as the unanimity of the rejection, what is striking is the fact that 145,000 citizens replied to a consultation on an obscure aspect of trade agreements that most people had never heard of a year ago. That alone bespeaks an unprecedented engagement by the public -- something rare enough at a time when people are generally disenchanted with politicians and their grand projects...
Say No To Dangerous Trade Pacts (opinion)  The New American   ...Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders ...  rightly insists that TPP “is much more than a free trade agreement.” If he understands this, other senators and congressmen can see it as well...
EPA Wants To Map Radioactive Waste In Bridgeton Landfill  St. Louis Post Dispatch   ...The Environmental Protection Agency wants tests of the Bridgeton Landfill to map radioactive contamination. The decision takes a step back from past pronouncements by the EPA, which had said the waste was contained within fenced areas of the adjacent West Lake Landfill...
State Battles
To Pay For His Failed Experiment With Trickle-Down Economics, Kansas Governor Could Raid The School Budget  Think Progress   ...Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (R) is reportedly getting ready to propose some form of revenue increases as part of a plan to fix the nearly $900 million budget hole his tax cuts created for the state. But whatever cracks are emerging in his anti-tax facade, the conservative governor’s response to the budget crisis is more likely to focus on spending for the state’s already flailing schools...
Opting Out Of Unions Gets Boost In States  Wall Street Journal   ...A new wave of bills that would allow workers to opt out of joining unions is expected from Maine to New Mexico as Republicans look to capitalize on statehouse gains to put new limits on organized labor...
War on Workers
Obama expands parental leave for federal workers  Washington Post   ...President Obama signed a presidential memorandum Thursday directing agencies to allow federal workers to take six weeks of advanced paid sick leave to care for a new child or ill family members...
Majority of U.S. public school students are in poverty  Washington Post   ...For the first time in at least 50 years, a majority of U.S. public school students come from low-income families, according to a new analysis of 2013 federal data, a statistic that has profound implications for the nation...
Holder limits seized-asset sharing process that split billions with local, state police  Washington Post   ...Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. on Friday barred local and state police from using federal law to seize cash, cars and other property without warrants or criminal charges...
United Airlines Moves To Outsource Labor At 28 Airports  Denver Post   ...The jobs that have the potential to be affected in this latest move fall into the category of "airport operations," which includes baggage-handing ramp workers and inside customer service agents, among others, depending on the airport...
Worker Killed Near Rocks State Park, Officials Say  Havre de Grace Patch   ...At 1:30 p.m., two workers were at the base of a ravine on MD Route 24 at Saint Clair Bridge Road when a jersey wall fell on one and debris injured another...
Miscellaneous
'All Labor Has Dignity': King's Other Legacy (opinion)  Huffington Post   ...As we mark Dr. King's 86th birthday, it is my hope that Americans will remember another less-celebrated element of his dream -- a belief in the importance of unions, labor rights and robust worker voice...

Today's Teamster News 01.13.15

Teamsters
Teamsters Call On Apple, Yahoo, Ebay, Zynga, Genetech, Amtrak To Support Compass Trans. Drivers  teamster.org   ...Rome Aloise, International Vice President and President of Teamsters Local 853 in San Leandro, Calif., sent letters to the CEOs of six East Bay-area companies this week, asking them to support the unionization efforts of the drivers that transport their employees. The drivers, employees of Compass Transportation, are seeking union representation and a contract...
More Silicon Valley Shuttle Drivers Look To Unionize  USA Today   ...The Teamsters have contacted the CEOs of six Silicon Valley-area companies — Amtrak, Apple, eBay, Genentech, Yahoo and Zynga — to tell them that its drivers want to join a union...
Teamsters vote to authorize strike over commercials contract  Los Angeles Times   ...A contract dispute between commercial producers and Teamsters Local 399 has escalated, raising the prospect of the first Hollywood strike by the union in nearly two decades...
State, Owner Negotiate Next Steps Involving Landfill Fire  St. Louis Public Radio   ...Bridgeton Landfill owner Republic Services has agreed to install two temperature monitoring probes in the landfill's north quarry, near radioactive waste at the adjacent West Lake Landfill. The agreement came after Attorney General Chris Koster took more legal action against Republic Services this week, out of concern that the underground fire in the landfill's south quarry might be spreading north, closer to the area of radioactivity...
Trade
Voters Not Congress Should Decide TPP Trade Pact (opinion)  truthout   ...We need to slow the TPP (Trans Pacific Pact) approval process down until after the 2016 elections. After the final full terms are made public, the voters should decide this issue using our democratic electoral processes. We need this to be a campaign issue in the Senate, House and Presidential elections. It will increase voter turnout (which is good for American democracy) and give the decision real legitimacy...
State Battles
Contractors unite to fight right-to-work  Milwaukee Business Times   ...More than 300 private businesses and private-sector skilled trade representatives from across Wisconsin have joined forces to support the newly formed Wisconsin Contractor Coalition and oppose so-called right-to-work legislation...
Steven Walters: Right-to-work fight would "distract" from Walker presidential bid   Gazette Xtra   ...Controversy over any right-to-work bill wouldn't end in Wisconsin's Capitol but could undercut his all-but-announced candidacy for president...
As White House defends unions, states go on the attack  alJazeera America   ...In state legislatures around the country, newly strengthened Republican majorities are expected to push right-to-work legislation and other policy initiatives feared by the labor movemen. Wisconsin, long considered a union stronghold, will also consider right-to-work legislation this year. So might New Mexico, West Virginia and Missouri, among others...
From Awful To Calamitous: Sam Brownback’s Second Term Is Off To A Terrible Start  Salon.com   ...the anti-tax crusader has little choice but to contemplate revenue increases — and according to the Wichita Eagle, Brownback is considering a range of options, including increased taxes on cigarettes and alcohol, ending some exemptions for sales and income taxes, increasing sales taxes, delaying further income tax cuts, and altering his tax law’s requirement that tax rates go down further if revenue increases by more than two percent...
War on Workers
House Budget Chair Signals Big Social Security Reforms A-Coming  Talking Points Memo   ...[U.S. Rep. Tom] Price, whose predecessor Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) never put forward major reform proposals in his otherwise ambitious budgets, offered means-testing and increasing the eligibility age as possibilities. He also hinted at privatizing Social Security...
United Studies Outsourcing Up To 2,000 Airport Jobs  Wall Street Journal   ...United Continental Holdings Inc. on Monday said it may outsource up to 2,000 jobs at 28 U.S. airports, including Atlanta, Miami, St. Louis and West Palm Beach, Fla., to vendors who would perform the duties at lower cost...
The US 'manufacturing renaissance' doesn't exist, says new report  The Guardian   ...the United States may have added only about one new manufacturing job in the last few years for every five that were lost during the financial crisis and the recession that followed...
Buffett’s BNSF Railway Considering Safer Oil Tank Cars  Insurance Journal   ...BNSF Railway Co., the railroad owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., is reconsidering a plan to buy 5,000 oil-tank cars built to new safety standards after some customers voiced concern about the initiative...
DuPont Workers May Have Been Exposed to Toxic Gas for Years  Associated Press   ...Records show that employees at a Houston-area pesticide plant where a poisonous gas killed four workers in November may have been exposed to dangerous fumes for years...
Miscellaneous
U.S. bus lines added routes in 2014, airline flights fell: study  Reuters   ...Stagnating middle-class incomes and the widening income gap in America have boosted business at bus companies, which cost less than flying or driving. ...[and] a significant part of the boost in bus business comes from younger Americans, who are turned off by extra security at airports and "are used to traveling on a shoestring budget."...
Barney Frank: Unions key to income equality (opinion)  Portland Press Herald   ...for capitalism to thrive, society must not have more economic inequality than is necessary; at some point too much inequality becomes economically damaging – and potentially destabilizing as well. America has been in that latter situation for more than a decade…

Today's Teamster News 11.04.14

Teamster News
Sysco Drivers In Missouri Vote To Join Teamsters Local 41  teamster.org   ...Sysco drivers voted to join Teamsters Local 41 in Kansas City, Mo. There are 43 drivers in the bargaining unit and the vote count announced today was 25-14...
Hoffa Makes Final GOTV Push At Worksites Around Detroit  teamster.org   ...Teamster General President Jim Hoffa pounded the pavement today across the Detroit metro area, encouraging hundreds of members to exercise their right to vote in tomorrow's election...
Deadly Driving  Fleet Owner   ...What's so hard about coming up with a rational set of training standards for new commercial truck drivers? Apparently the task is so difficult that the Dept. of Transportation has failed to respond to two specific demands from Congress to up the requirements for obtaining a truck driving license for more than 20 years. It has taken so long that the Teamsters and a few safety interest groups have now turned to the courts for a remedy...
Sysco Doesn't See US Foods Deal Closing This Year  Market Watch   ...Sysco Corp. said Monday that it doesn't expect its pending acquisition of US Foods to close before the first quarter of next year...
Trade
Corporations Aren't People And They Aren't Nation States, Either (opinion)  Huffington Post   ...Despite what some politicians say, corporations aren't people. But, even worse, when it comes to the world's biggest trade deals, corporations are actually treated like nation states. Thankfully, a major storm is brewing that could put a crack in this fundamental pillar of the existing free trade regime...
State Battles
SKW = Scott Walker  Crooks & Liars   ...prosecutors have stated that Walker is at the center of another "criminal scheme". This secondary investigation is about the illegal collaboration between Walker's campaign and dark money groups. Walker hasn't denied doing this...
David Perdue: 'Sure, We Closed Plants All The Time'  Daily Kos   ...Said Perdue: “Sure, we closed down plants all the time. I mean, but it was never in direct relationship to things going on offshore.”...
Even Without Voter ID Laws, Minority Voters Face More Hurdles To Casting Ballots  Mother Jones   ...Nationally, African Americans waited about twice as long to vote in the 2012 election as white people (23 minutes on average versus 12 minutes); Hispanics waited 19 minutes. White people who live in neighborhoods whose residents are less than 5 percent minority had the shortest of all wait times, just 7 minutes...
Kansas Tax Cuts Fail Again, As New Revenue Numbers Plague Sam Brownback But Help Paul Davis (opinion)  Kansas City Star   ..the Brownback tax-cut “experiment” is not working and Kansas voters need to oust him at the polls on Tuesday. The tax cuts are bleeding the state of needed funds to pay for high-quality public services to the people of Kansas. If the revenue problems continue, the next governor is going to have to cut services to the people — and certainly halt proposed bigger tax reductions in their tracks...
Holder sends poll watchers to 18 states  The Hill   ...The Department of Justice plans to send federal monitors to 18 states to watch for discrimination against voters. Monitors will head to Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, North Carolina, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin...
War on Workers
JP Morgan Under Criminal Investigation for Foreign Exchange Trading Abuses   naked capitalism   ...J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. said the Justice Department is conducting a criminal investigation of its foreign-exchange-related matters and bumped up a figure measuring the bank’s potential legal costs by $1.3 billion, according to a regulatory filing that the bank released Monday...
The New York Fed Has Contracted JPMorgan to Hold Over $1.7 Trillion of its QE Bonds Despite Two Felony Counts and Serial Charges of Crimes  Wall Street on Parade   ...During the period in which JPMorgan has been the trusted custodian of a major part of the assets of the U.S. central bank, it has been repeatedly charged with serial crimes...
More Protests, Concern Over Growth Of Oil Trains In Washington  NBC News   ...Thursday's meeting was moved to the Red Lion Hotel on Evergreen Park Drive after it became clear that there wouldn't be enough room to hold it at the Department of Ecology offices in Lacey, said Lisa Copeland, the agency's communications manager. A meeting was held in Spokane earlier this week, a city also seeing growing train traffic...
Supreme Court Rejects Challenge to Senate Filibuster Rule  Wall Street Journal   ...The Supreme Court on Monday declined to review whether the Senate’s filibuster rule violates the Constitution, denying without comment an appeal filed by a public interest group and four House Democrats...
Uber Charges Man $539 For 18-Mile Trip  yahoo.com   ...Many Halloween partiers opted to pay a driver instead of risking the cost of a DUI, but a Denver man who used Uber the popular car service paid a much, much higher price than he ever thought possible...
Worker killed in Marshall power line accident  Charleston Gazette   ...One worker was killed and another seriously hurt in an electric power line accident Monday afternoon in Marshall County, authorities said...
Charlotte-based worker killed by falling tape measure  wsoctv.com   ... A man delivering sheet rock to a construction site in New Jersey was killed Monday when a tape measure fell 50 stories and hit him on the head, authorities said...
Miscellaneous
Voting Information  League of Women Voters   ...Click on the link and enter your address for personalized voting information including the address of your polling place, hours you can vote and voter registration information...
Waiting For Keystone  Al-Jazeera America   ...Baker, a city a few miles from the North Dakota border, home to a little less than 2,000 residents, makes clear why: It’s bustling thanks to the ancillary effects of the oil industry, mainly drilling in eastern Montana and western North Dakota. Hotels are full, real estate prices are high, and the population is slowly growing...
NSA Phone Program Faces Key Court Test  The Hill   ...Along with other high-profile court cases challenging the constitutionality of the NSA’s spying, civil liberties advocates are sensing that the wind is at their backs, even as Congress has failed to push legislation past the finish line...

Today's Teamster News 10.08.14

Teamster News
Teamsters Warehouse Workers Face a Bankruptcy Court Designed to Protect Bosses, Not Workers  In These Times   ...The Keene, New Hampshire-based C&S Wholesale Grocers’s actions could prove to be an immediate threat to the livelihoods of about 1,100 Teamster members in the Mid-Atlantic region, the latest in a series of damaging anti-union maneuvers by the company. The action also highlights the growing market power of C&S, a low-profile company that has quietly grown into the nation’s largest warehousing corporation...
Investors, activists press eBay, others to break up with ALEC  Reuters   ...Civic groups such as Common Cause and the Environmental Defense Fund and unions including the International Brotherhood of Teamsters wrote to the e-commerce company's management asking it to reconsider involvement in ALEC because of what they called its "extreme agenda."...
Trade
TTIP Could Weaken Chemical Rules, Environmental Groups Say  Wall Street Journal   ...environmental groups worry the chemical industry will use these procedures to delay or block new restrictions or bans on chemicals that pose a threat to people or the environment...
TPP Talks Slated For Oct. 25 As Nations Scramble For Deal  law360   ...The Australian government announced Thursday that it will host a meeting of Trans-Pacific Partnership trade ministers this month to tackle outstanding provisions on intellectual property, agricultural market access, state-owned enterprises and other areas as negotiators race to close major parts of the pact by year's end...
State Battles
Walker administration denies complaint seeking to raise minimum wage  Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel   ...Gov. Scott Walker's administration has denied a complaint by a labor group seeking to force an increase in Wisconsin's minimum wage...The state law requires that Wisconsin's minimum wage "shall not be less than a living wage."...
Rochester Borough Says No To Police Outsourcing  Insurance News   ...After comments about sacrificing safety for potential savings, officials decided Tuesday to halt a conversation with the township about contracting out police services...
City To Ponder Raise For Contractor Workers  News Journal   ...Wilmington City Council will take action next month on an ordinance that will require employees of city contractors to get paid at least $10.10 an hour...
War On Workers
Freight Train Drivers Report Falling Asleep On The Job  CBC   ...Train operators in Canada’s burgeoning freight rail industry report falling asleep at the controls and coming to work exhausted at an alarmingly high rate, according to an ongoing CBC News investigation into rail safety...
43 Missing Students, a Mass Grave and a Suspect: Mexico’s Police  New York Times   ...they are among 43 students reported missing after deadly clashes with the police on Sept. 26, when at least six student protesters and bystanders were killed in the restive, rural state of Guerrero, one of the poorest in the country and long afflicted by political, social and criminal upheaval...
Las Vegas Schools Groan From Growing Pains  New York Times   ...Schools in this suddenly robust community are so packed these days that 13 of them stay open 12 months a year. Children go to classes and eat lunch in cramped, windowless trailers, bustling with restless students. Thousands more take online classes at home, and school district administrators, desperate for space, are looking to abandoned strip malls for classrooms...
The Great Wage Slowdown Of The 21st Century  New York Times   ...The typical American family makes less than the typical family did 15 years ago, a statement that hadn’t previously been true since the Great Depression...
American Agriculture's Child Labor Problem  KCET   ...Fourteen hour days with no pay, very little food, routinely beaten and whipped by overseers before being locked away in cramped quarters every night. The fact that U.S. companies were reaping the benefits of this slave labor was outrageous. But what's more disturbing is the fact that child labor exploitation isn't only occurring outside of America. It happens here, too. And it's not entirely illegal...
Construction worker dies on the job  KCCI News   ...Authorities say a construction worker has died after he was pinned under a piece of equipment in northwest Iowa...
Tualatin worker dies after being struck by large metal plates, state agency says  Oregon Live   ...A 27-year-old man hit by large metal plates while working at a Tualatin manufacturing business Monday morning has died, according to the Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Division...
Is Your Dentist Ripping You Off?  Mother Jones   ...more and more young dentists are taking jobs with chains, many of which set revenue quotas for practitioners. This has created some legal backlash: In 2012, for example, 11 patients sued (PDF) a 450-office chain called Aspen Dental, claiming that its model turns dentists into salespeople...
Microsoft’s Windows 10 has permission to watch your every move  Tech Worm   ...“Microsoft collects information about you, your devices, applications and networks, and your use of those devices, applications and networks. Examples of data we collect include your name, email address, preferences and interests; browsing, search and file history; phone call and SMS data; device configuration and sensor data; and application usage.”...
Government Set Up A Fake Facebook Page In This Woman’s Name  Buzzfeed   ...A DEA agent commandeered a woman’s identity, created a phony Facebook account in her name, and posted racy photos he found on her seized cell phone. The government said he had the right to do that...

Today's Teamster News 09.30.14

Teamster News
Gov. Brown Signs Protections For Temp Workers Into Law  teamster.org   ...Gov. Jerry Brown signed AB 1897 into law Sunday. The new law, which goes into effect Jan. 1, 2015, will hold companies accountable for serious violations of the rights of workers on their premises that are committed by their own labor suppliers...
Teach-in this weekend about Bill Gates' burning, radioactive landfill in Missouri  TeamsterNation   ...There's only one place in the country where a landfill fire smolders hundreds of away a nuclear dump site, and there are hundreds of Teamsters families living near it...
Parents, Health Officials Search For Answers About Sick Kids  St. Louis Post-Dispatch   ...Kirbi Pemberton pulled her 7-year-old daughter out of Rose Acres Elementary School in Maryland Heights this year over her concerns about potential health risks from the nearby radioactive West Lake Landfill...
Woot! Local 117 Teamsters ratify Fred Meyer contract!  TeamsterNation   ...Great news from Washington State, where our brothers and sisters from Teamsters Local 117 voted on Saturday to ratify a contract with Fred Meyer, a subsidiary of Kroger, Inc. They stood together and bargained a contract that maintains affordable health care and protects members against subcontracting...
Teamsters win arbitration award giving Corrections’ employees 9.8% raises over two years  The News Tribune   ...The ruling in favor of the Teamsters provides pay raises of 5.5 percent in July 2015 and another 4.3 percent in 2016 — with additional raises of 2.5 percent for select positions. About 6,000 employees at the Department of Corrections are covered by the Teamsters contract...
Trade
History’s largest trade agreements are being negotiated in secret  Aljazeera America   ...For the past four years, Froman and Selig have headed the U.S. team of unelected representatives secretly negotiating history’s two biggest trade agreements. If both treaties — drafted on behalf of 1.6 billion people — are approved, they will regulate almost three-quarters of all trade and investment in the world. The deals would void national legislation on environmental policy, labor rights, financial regulation and intellectual property...
Voters Will Oppose Politicians Who Support “NAFTA-Style” Trade Deals  Trade Reform   ...the polling overwhelmingly shows that the public “gets it” that these “trade” agreements have been used to send jobs out of the country and force wages down...
China's Tech Factories Turn To Student Labor  Wall Street Journal   ...Schools send thousands of teenagers here to put together electronic devices for some of the world's largest brands. Many students say they are given no choice. "I was suddenly told I had to spend the summer making computers or I couldn't graduate," said a 16-year-old girl surnamed Xiao...
State Battles
Early voting in Ohio blocked (UPDATED)  SCOTUS Blog   ...With just sixteen hours before polling stations were to open in Ohio, the Supreme Court on Monday afternoon blocked voters from beginning tomorrow to cast their ballots in this year’s general election...
Large Oil Company Bolts From ALEC  National Journal   ...Occidental Petroleum sent a letter Friday to an investment-management company indicating its intention to sever ties with ALEC, a conservative coalition of state legislators and major corporations that actively opposes environmental regulations...
Expedia under fire over membership to rightwing lobby group Alec  Guardian   ...Expedia, the world’s largest online travel company, has declined to follow the lead of other big internet firms, instead choosing to remain a member of a controversial rightwing lobby group that works against climate change legislation...
Silicon Valley's Done With American Legislative Exchange Council  U.S. News   ...ALEC takes a conservative, national political approach down to the state level through model bills that do the bidding of big, corporate interests which provide the funding. ALEC bills are generally promoted word for word at the state level by GOP legislators on issues ranging from information technology to renewable energy...
45 Million Americans Still Stuck Below Poverty Line: Census  Huffington Post   ...Median household income barely budged last year, edging up to $51,939 from $51,759 in 2012, the Census Bureau noted separately. Median income is still far from the $56,436 in 2007 and the all-time high of $56,895 in 1999...
Taxis In Washington DC Losing Their Identity With Modern Makeover As Drivers Compete With Car-Sharing App Uber  ABC News   ...The car-sharing service launched in San Francisco in 2010 has since gone global, invariably causing a chorus of complaint and sparking legal challenges from local cab industries...
Arguments Set This Week In Arkansas Voter ID Case  Times Record   ...Arkansas’ highest court is set to take up a case this week that could decide whether the state’s voters will be required to show photo identification at the polls in the November election...
War On Workers
FAA Approves Drone Use For Hollywood Productions, Sets Guidelines – Update  Deadline Hollywood   ...The FAA has approved the limited use of drones as camera platforms for film and TV productions, opening the skies to swarms of small, camera-mounted planes and mini-helicopters over film locations across the country. Unmanned aerial cameras are legal elsewhere in the world, but have been prohibited for commercial use in the U.S. until now...
Finally, the Truth About the A.I.G. Bailout (opinion)  New York Times   ...the government has never provided a plausible explanation for why the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which had enormous leverage over banks like Goldman thanks to its role as their regulator, didn’t lean on them to accept less than 100 cents on the dollar in their payouts from A.I.G...
Almost Three-Quarters Of Big Companies To Increase Outsourcing  Computer Weekly   ...Almost three quarters of global businesses will increase their investment in outsourced services, according to research by KPMG. The research also indicates that more firms are taking advantage of global delivery models including functions such as finance, procurement and HR delivered centrally, often offshore...
Philadelphia zoo worker killed after being pinned under golf cart, report says  South Jersey Times   ...The 57-year-old employee became trapped under the cart around 11 a.m. at the zoo, located on West Girdard Avenue. He was then taken to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, where he died, according to the report...
Trump Seeks Pact To End Union Pension To Save Atlantic City Casino  Reuters   ...Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc is seeking to impose a new contract on its unionized workers and end pension contributions as part of a plan backed by billionaire Carl Icahn to save the Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey...
Miscellaneous
NTSB: Truck showed no signs of trying to avoid North Texas softball team's bus  Dallas Morning News   ...National Transportation Safety Board investigators said Sunday that the truck drove through the median for 820 feet on a shallow angle before colliding with the bus. It did not brake or appear to take any action to avoid the crash. They found no apparent problems with the truck’s brakes...
Walmart Faults Tracy Morgan for Not Wearing Seatbelt During Car Accident (Exclusive)  Hollywood Reporter   ...Among nine affirmative defenses, Walmart says that injuries "were caused, in whole or in part, by plaintiffs' failure to properly wear an appropriate available seatbelt restraint device."...
Will More Coal, Oil Trains Rumble Through Northwest?  Public News Service   ...About two dozen projects have been proposed in the past two years to move the Northwest toward becoming a transportation hub for coal, oil and gas to Asia...

Today's Teamster News 08.18.14

Trade
 What Happens in Geneva ... The Mammoth Global Trade Agreement You’ve Never Heard Of  In These Times   ...our governments are negotiating further deregulation of the financial sector, solely in the interests of large financial corporations,” says Daniel Bertossa, senior policy and advocacy officer at Public Services International (PSI), a global public-sector union federation based in France...
US trade officials say it’s their way or the highway on TPP  CIO   ...Certification means that the US can refuse to bring an agreement with a country into force until the country has altered its laws to satisfy the US understanding of its obligations under the agreement...
War on Workers
What the NLRB Announcement on McDonald's Means  AFL-CIO   ...Historically McDonald's has claimed it has no authority over wages or complaints of workers' rights violations at its franchise locations because that is up to the individual owners, but the NLRB general counsel determined McDonald's could be liable as a joint employer in these kinds of situations...
Seeking New Start, Finding Steep Cost  New York Times   ...Millions of unemployed Americans like Mr. DeGrella have trained for new careers as part of the Workforce Investment Act, a $3.1 billion federal program that, in an unusual act of bipartisanship, was reauthorized by Congress last month with little public discussion about its effectiveness. Like Mr. DeGrella, many have not found the promised new career...
Report Says I.R.S. Inaction May Have Increased Fraud Risk  New York Times   ...A government investigator said Thursday that the Internal Revenue Service failed to do background checks on some private contractors who handled confidential information, exposing more than a million taxpayers to a risk of fraud and identity theft...
Ferguson Unrest Shows Poverty Grows Fastest in Suburbs  Bloomberg   ...In Ferguson, Missouri, a community of 21,000 where the poverty rate doubled since 2000, the dynamic has bred animosity over racial segregation and economic inequality...
Across Asia's borders, labor activists team up to press wage claims  Reuters   ...Negotiations over pay and working conditions have typically remained within national borders, but activists are now bringing more muscle to the table and putting more pressure on employers and governments by using shared experiences in nearby markets...
Miscellaneous
Transporting Bakken crude by rail a volatile situation  Chronicle Times   ...As federal regulators continue investigating why tank cars on three trains carrying North Dakota crude oil have exploded in the past year, energy experts say part of the problem might be that some producers are deliberately leaving too much propane in their product, making the oil riskier to transport by rail...
Bank Overseer PwC Faces Penalty and Sidelining of Regulatory Consulting Unit  New York Times  ...The giant consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers occupies a position of trust on Wall Street, acting as a shadow regulator of sorts that promises the government an impartial look inside the world’s biggest banks. But the firm — hired and paid by the banks it examines — has now landed in the regulatory spotlight for obscuring some of the same misconduct it was supposed to unearth...

Today's Teamster News 08.14.14

Teamster News
BLET organizes Illinois Railway short line workers  teamster.org   ...The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) scored a short line organizing victory last week as a majority of workers at Illinois Railway voted to make the BLET their designated collective bargaining representative...
Teamster at US Foods Seeks Information About Merger  teamster.org   ...Frank Rinetti, a Teamster member and employee of US Foods, recently sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) seeking information about the proposed Sysco-US Foods merger and he also outlines his concerns about the merger's impact on jobs...
Union teamsters met Wednesday, will vote Thursday  KERO Bakersfield   ...GET union employees met Wednesday to discuss the proposal from GET...
Trade
Five Tests Walmart Must Pass to Show its 'Made In America' Street Cred  manufacture this   ...If Walmart is truly serious about its pledge to help American manufacturers, the corporation will slash its imports into the U.S...
Country-Of-Origin-Labeling Dispute Threatens U.S. Exports, Jobs  The Hill   ...A long list of U.S.-manufactured goods and agricultural products are being threatened by a trade dispute about whether U.S. Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) requirements discriminate against our bordering countries’ meat products. Absent quick action to settle the dispute, the governments of Canada and Mexico—currently the two largest markets for U.S. exports—could impose $2 billion in retaliatory tariffs that would endanger thousands of American jobs...
State Battles
Corporate front groups pushing laughable “National Employee Freedom Week” and other anti-union effort  eclectablog   ... “National Employee Freedom Week”... encourages union members to become freeloaders by leaving their unions while the unions continue to bargain for on their behalf for better wages, better working conditions, and better benefits...
Floridians tried to stop gerrymandering, and Republicans gerrymandered anyways. We’re about to see who wins.  Washington Post   ...If it passes muster with the courts in anything like its present form, it will have been a pretty major victory for the GOP in overcoming the so-called Fair Districts amendments -- and an equally large setback for redistricting reformers seeking to rein in partisan gerrymandering...
Christie: GOP governors to spend millions in Maine  Associated Press   ...New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie returned to Maine on Tuesday to help raise money for Gov. Paul LePage and predicted that the Republican Governors Association would spend millions of dollars in the state this fall to help LePage win a second term...
Record number of labor candidates prep to run for public office at New Jersey State AFL-CIO Labor Candidates School  Politicker NJ   ...A record-sized class of rank-and-file union members representing 23 local unions from across all sectors of the labor movement took part in the New Jersey State AFL-CIO Labor Candidates School August 9-10, 2014, at the Rutgers University Inn and Conference Center in New Brunswick...
The Big Money Behind Walker’s Campaign  Express Milwaukee   ...Walker returned to the deep pockets of his recall mega-contributors, including Las Vegas gambling billionaire Sheldon Adelson and his wife, Miriam. Adelson donated $250,000 to Walker in 2012...
Labor and small businesses team up on California franchising law  MSNBC   ...the theory appears to be that protecting franchisors against the threat of closure will make it easier for them to do things like raise workers’ wages...
War On Workers
Electric Worker Hit By Train, Killed In Edmond  KWTV   ...The train was traveling southbound when it hit and killed Edmond Electric Worker, Bob Waterson Tuesday evening. Edmond city officials say Waterson was with the company for more than 34 years...
Rail CEOs to Investors: "Bomb Trains" Safe At Almost Any Speed  DeSmog Blog   ...Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) recently said it would proceed with plans to increase speeds for oil-by-rail unit trains in Devil’s Lake, N.D. to 60 MPH from 30 MPH, despite opposition from local officials...
What’s Lost in the Market Basket Stories  Economic Policy Institute   ...they have succeeded by taking a distinctly high-road approach: the company takes care of its workers, paying decent wages, offering benefits to full- and part-time staff, and providing employees with a profit-sharing plan. At the same time, Market Basket still offers prices lower than its competitors, Walmart included...
Union Workers In Maine Join Protest Of FairPoint Outsourcing Plans  Portland Press Herald   ...Hundreds of unionized FairPoint Communications Inc. workers in Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire staged “informational protests” Tuesday to educate customers about the negative impact of company plans to boost outsourcing, union representatives said...
For Largest U.S. Companies, Jobs Growth Has Lagged Profits, Revenues  Reuters   ...From 2001 to 2013, inflation-adjusted revenue at 100 of the largest publicly traded companies grew 71 percent and inflation-adjusted operating profit rose 150 percent. Global headcount reported in company financial filings rose 31 percent...
Los Angeles To Vote On Killing Major Wall Street Deal As City Drowns In Financial Fees  International Business Times   ...Los Angeles lawmakers were expected to vote Wednesday on a proposal to renegotiate or terminate an interest rate swap deal from the mid-2000s that critics say now costs the city millions of dollars a year in fees. If successful, the initiative could make the city the nation's largest to challenge ballooning Wall Street levies that accompany similar interest rate swap deals throughout the nation...
Front and center: Amendment 3 pushes teacher tenure into the spotlight  Southeast Missourian   ...if teachers have been teaching in the same district for five years, they're granted due process rights by statute. "Before that, they're at-will," Meyer said. Five years, she said, is probably the longest probationary period used around the country...
Miscellaneous
Does Your Boss Know You’re Reading This? Surveillance Technology Boosts Efficiency But Creates Workplace Issues  Atlanta Journal-Constitution   ...There are few laws and court cases to help companies or workers understand the limits, leaving some gray areas for protection of employees’ privacy...

Walker 'economic development' agency gives taxpayer money to companies that outsource jobs

Wisconsin job-killer Gov. Scott Walker created a new economic development agency that took taxpayer money and gave it to companies to send jobs out of Wisconsin.

We're not kidding.

Greg Neumann at WKOW reported recently that two companies received millions of dollars from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation to create jobs, then laid off Wisconsin workers and sent the work overseas.

At least two companies that received financial awards from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) later outsourced jobs to foreign countries, with one of those companies receiving a second WEDC award after the fact. 

A 27 News investigation has uncovered that both the Eaton Corporation and Plexus Corporation received millions of dollars in financial awards from WEDC, only to later lay off workers whose jobs were taken by employees at the companies' foreign facilities. 

In 2011, WEDC awarded Eaton Corp. with up to $1 million in tax credits if the company met job creation and retention goals at its manufacturing facility in Menomonee Falls.  WEDC officials say the company has received $190,000 in tax credits so far. 

This is even more incredible: After Eaton moved 163 jobs from a Pewaukee plant to Mexico, the WEDC gave the company another $1.36 million in tax credits for the same Pewaukee plant!<

Another company, Plexus, accepted $4.7 million in tax credits and then laid off 116 workers after sending their jobs overseas.

The editors at the Racine Journal-Times were aghast. In an editorial, they wrote,

 Don’t take Wisconsin money, then send Wisconsin jobs overseas...

This is astonishing, but not nearly as astonishing as what Maley, the WEDC spokesperson, said to Neumann of WKOW.com: “If a company makes a business decision to move some of its jobs out of the state — despite our best efforts — we will continue to work with that company to ensure that as many jobs as possible remain in Wisconsin.” 

What’s that saying about fool me once, shame on you? Just how far backwards is the WEDC willing to bend for Eaton or for Plexus? 

Not surprisingly, according to WKOW,

Members of the board of directors for two companies that outsourced Wisconsin jobs after accepting financial incentives from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation have donated close to $20,000 to Gov. Scott Walker's campaigns since 2005.  

Today's Teamster News 05.16.14

Teamster News
Teamsters say Scott Brown lied to their face  Manchester Union Leader   ...The local Teamsters chapter is accusing Republican U.S. Senate candidate Scott Brown of lying to their face over his support of the Keystone XL pipeline...
Teamsters 'out & looking militant' support supersized global fast food strike  TeamsterNation   ...Teamsters took to the streets along with striking fast food workers today, escalating the global movement for fair wages for all workers and the right to join a union...
Teamster presence felt at 9/11 Memorial Museum  TeamsterNation   ...Teamster Local 282 member Manny Rodriguez donated his Teamsters jacket to the 9/11 Memorial Museum, the hard hat he wore at Ground Zero and a sculpture of the twin towers burned from World Trade Center steel...
Newburgh PBA, Teamsters, Slam Police Administration  Mid Hudson News   ...The City of Newburgh's PBA claims there is a turf war among crime factions in the city, with bullets flying day and night and the city administration, including Police Chief Michael Ferrera, is doing nothing about it...
Teamsters Reveal What's Really Happening at National Express  teamster.org   ...Evelina Moultrie, a Durham driver in Charleston, S.C., and a member of Teamsters Local 509 in West Columbia, S.C., told the Board about issues with overcrowding, as well as insects and mold on the buses...
Airgas Drivers Join Teamsters Local 25  teamster.org   ...Local 25 in Boston recently organized a group of 17 tankhaul workers who deliver air cylinders to commercial entities in the area...
Trade
Elizabeth Warren Reveals Inside Details of Trade Talks  The Nation   ... “I actually have had supporters of the deal say to me ‘They have to be secret, because if the American people knew what was actually in them, they would be opposed.’”...
Second Anniversary of Colombia Pact Spotlights Administration's Failed Promise of Labor Rights Improvements, Now Recycled to Defend TPP Negotiations with Vietnam amid Worker Riots  Public Citizen   ...Undeterred by the ongoing repression of Colombian workers, U.S. trade negotiators are in Vietnam at this very moment in attempt to negotiate via the TPP an expansion of the FTA model to Vietnam, despite the country’s widespread labor abuses...
State Battles
Report indicates Wisconsin added 28,000 jobs last year  Wisconsin Radio Network   ...Figures submitted by the state to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show Wisconsin added just over 28,000 private sector jobs in 2013. It’s the lowest rate of growth for the state since Walker took office, bringing the total number of job created during the governor’s first three years in office to just under 92,000. That’s less than half of the 250,000 private sector jobs Walker promised to help create...
North Carolina Voters Want To End Partisan Gerrymandering  Think Progress   ...By a wide margin, North Carolina voters say they want to replace their state's current system of political gerrymandering with a non-partisan redistricting option, according to a new poll...
I Attended An ALEC Convention And Found An Alternate Universe  Bill Moyers   ...Last week I traveled to Missouri to attend my second American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) conference. As a state legislator from Wisconsin, I joined ALEC last year...
America's Most Gerrymandered Congressional Districts  Washington Post   ...This election year, we can expect to hear a lot about Congressional district gerrymandering, which is when political parties redraw district boundaries to give themselves an electoral advantage...
War On Workers
Biggest fast food strike ever attracts global support  MSNBC   ...A year and a half ago, it was 200 striking workers in a single city. As of this week, it’s a global movement. On Thursday, thousands of fast food workers across the United States initiated the latest in a series of day-long strikes against their employers...
Boeing conducted unfair practices against U.S. engineers: labor board  Reuters   ...The U.S. National Labor Relations Board said on Thursday that Boeing Co (BA.N) committed unfair labor practices against its unionized engineers near Seattle and in Portland, Oregon, when it photographed and videotaped workplace marches in 2012...
Median Net Worth Of Grads Under 40 With Student Debt Is Only $8,700  Los Angeles Times   ...The financial travails of people under 40 with student loan debt extend far beyond the college loans themselves, according to a new study...
Miscellaneous
FCC Votes For Plan To Kill Net Neutrality  Huffington Post   ...On Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission voted in favor of a proposal that would rewrite the rules that govern how traffic flows on the internet, issuing a blow to the principle of net neutrality...

Today's Teamster News 04.29.14

Teamster News
Truckers Plan 2-Day Strike At LA, Long Beach Ports  CBS News   ...Truck drivers who haul cargo in and out of the twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach planned to go on a two-day strike beginning Monday that they said was not directed at the busy ports themselves but at the companies that employ drivers...
Latest Strike By The Truckers At The Port Could Be More Disruptive  KPCC   ...Some truck drivers for companies that move cargo in and out of the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are beginning a two-day strike Monday morning...
In holding pattern for Teamsters' job action in Abbotsford  BC Local News   ...Strike action by Teamsters Local 31 could begin as early as this afternoon, although school district superintendent Kevin Godden said the local hasn't provided any details about "the nature, location or specific time."...
Cerberus Loots Bankrupt Airlines Health Care Account  Huffington Post   ...Private equity firm Cerberus Business Finance, LLC is looting a bankrupt airline that for 66 years ferried troops and equipment to war zones in the Middle East and Southeast Asia...
Trade
Anti-TPP Activists Protest Obama Speech in Malaysia  Democracy Now   ... On Sunday, Obama faced protest at a public event in Malaysia over the Trans-Pacific Partnership...
Obama Fails To Seal Trans-Pacific Partnership Deal  Daily Star   ...No deal. That best sums up United States President Barack Obama's stops in Japan and Malaysia, where bilateral Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations failed to end in an agreement...
Trans-Pacific Partnership Trade Pact Must Be Rejected By U.S. (LTE)  Arizona Daily Star   ...Byron Schlomach's article, "Arizona's future depends on international trade," April 21, implies that all international trade agreements are good for Arizona and the United States. Some are good and some are not so good. The Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade agreement, or TPP, is one of those not good for the state or nation...
State Battles
Missouri House Republican Leaders Continue To Push For 'Right-To-Work' Bill  Lake Expo   ...The prospect of a second vote on "right to work" remain uncertain, but state House Republican leaders said they will continue to work on trying to gather enough votes to advance the measure...
War on Workers
Survey Details Struggles Of Syracuse's Low-Wage Workers  Syracuse Post-Standard   ...Low-wage workers in the Syracuse area struggle with conditions that can cause health problems and make it hard to climb the economic ladder, according to a new survey...
One Year After Rana Plaza  New York Times   ...A horrendous building collapse last April in Bangladesh killed more than 1,100 garment workers. Labor groups, Western clothing companies, the Bangladeshi government and others have made progress towards preventing similar tragedies, but more needs to be done...
Restaurant Workers: 'Stop Wage Theft'  Workers World   ...In a powerful demonstration of support, dozens of people marched into Liberato restaurant in the Bronx, demanding better wages and working conditions for the workers on April 19...
Miscellaneous
Student Debt "Celebrated" Outside The Dept. of Education  Open Media Boston   ...The campaign for a debt-free future hit out at growing levels of student-debt in a rally outside the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) in Boston on Friday...

Today's Teamster News 03.01.14

Teamster News
Listen to Teamster Nation News  teamster.org  ...Introducing the inaugural episode of Teamster Nation News, the Teamster's new podcast. Teamster Nation News is your weekly stop for key Teamster news for working families. Thanks for listening and be sure to subscribe...
CEO's Lavish Pay Trimmed At McKesson, A Teamster Employer  TeamsterNation   ...McKesson CEO John Hammergren took a 'voluntary' $45 million cut to his pension after shareholders said 'no more' to his lavish wages at the company's annual meeting in August...
Teamsters, First Student in Seattle reach agreement  Seattle Times   ...After a daylong negotiation, Teamsters Local 174, which represents about 450 bus drivers for Seattle Public Schools, has reached a fully recommended tentative settlement with First Student, a private contractor that provides busing for the district. The agreement means that bus service will continue uninterrupted...
Teamsters back to work Sunday: Bay Valley strike ends  Sauk Valley Media   ...Dan Dring, vice president of human resources and operations for the Green Bay, Wis.-based company, said the workers of Teamsters Local 722 had voted earlier in the day to approve the contract...
Teamsters Airline Division Statement on GAO 2014 Aviation Workforce Report  teamster.org   ...Teamsters Airline Division Director Capt. David Bourne issued an official statement on the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) 2014 Aviation Workforce report, “Current and Future Availability of Airline Pilots”…
Teamsters Celebrate Women’s History  teamster.org   ...March is Women’s History Month, a time to reflect upon and celebrate the contributions American women have made to society. Teamster women have made significant contributions to the work force over the years, bravely fighting for economic and social justice...
Teamsters: Single Mothers Struggling Even More To Support Families   teamster.org   ...Women trying to support a family on their own are having a harder time doing so, according to a new report that details the plight of the working poor. As this nation enters Women’s History Month, single mothers are disproportionately struggling to make ends meet, and the document shows conditions are getting worse for them, not better...
Trade
U.S. staring contest with Japan stretches out Pacific trade pact   Reuters  ...A standoff between the United States and Japan is holding up talks on a sweeping Pacific free trade pact and a lack of authority to push an eventual deal through the U.S. Congress without amendment may be undercutting Washington's hand...
How TPP Would Harm You at the Drug Store and on the Internet  Truthout   ...A law affecting content on the Internet that was rejected by Congress shows up in a trade agreement designed to bypass and override Congress. Small, innovative companies that manufacture low-cost, generic drugs find their products blocked...
EU-U.S. trade talks face growing hostility, ministers warn  Reuters   ...Free-trade talks between the United States and the European Union are in danger of being derailed by populist groups opposing everything from globalization to multinationals, EU ministers and business leaders said on Friday...
State Battles
Fifteen States Move to Curb Reckless Outsourcing  In the Public Interest   ...Lawmakers in Iowa, Kansas and Oregon join movement to improve transparency and accountability, keep taxpayer in control of their services...
State will lose if RTW passes (Opinion)  News-Leader   ...The Missouri House may pass “Right to Work” and may override Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto, but Missouri will be the loser. An example is the new Boeing passenger aircraft plant. Billions in lucrative concessions were given, but Boeing needed the skilled union workers available. Building huge passenger aircraft is entirely too risky to hire low-wage, unskilled laborers and train them to standards...
No sign of expansion at plant where UAW dealt loss   Associated Press   ...Friday marks the end of the two-week period within which U.S. Sen. Bob Corker promised Volkswagen would announce another line at its factory in Tennessee if workers there rejected representation by the United Auto Workers union...
Walker Supporter Says Governor Needs To 'Tell The Truth' About Emails  Wisconsin Public Radio   ...Seymer calls it a serious violation of Wisconsin's open records law to have a campaign making these decisions...
War on Workers
Poultry workers, industry take fight to Capitol Hill over proposal to speed processing lines  Washington Post   ...Poultry workers, chicken industry lobbyists and food-safety advocates have been converging on Capitol Hill in recent weeks with dueling efforts to either boost or kill a proposal to overhaul the way the $60 billion-a-year poultry industry operates processing plants...
A Third Of America’s Most Successful Corporations Pay Less Than A 10 Percent Income Tax Rate   ThinkProgress   ...The average effective income tax rate for giant, profitable companies from 2008 to 2012 was just 19.4 percent...
Thousands More New York City Workers Will Now Get Paid Sick Days  ThinkProgress   ...The New York City Council overwhelmingly passed an expansion of paid sick days...
5 'Good' Jobs that Require Lots of Education and Training and Shockingly Pay Little More than Minimum Wage  AlterNet   ...You will never guess which highly skilled professions pay poverty wages...
Medical Marijuana Workers Have The Same Labor Rights As Everyone Else, Feds Say  Huffington Post   ...The next time a pot shop gets a visit from the feds, it won't necessarily be from drug enforcement agents looking to shut the operation down. It might just come from workplace regulators making sure that labor laws are being followed...
Miscellaneous
Bank Allegedly Neglects Foreclosed Houses In Black And Latino Neighborhoods  ThinkProgress   ...Housing discrimination advocates filed a complaint against a fourth major bank for failing to maintain foreclosed homes in non-white neighborhoods...
U.S. Retail Chains See First Profit Decline Since Recession  Bloomberg   ...The results paint a grim picture of an industry hit hard by the sluggish job recovery and slow wage growth, which have turned U.S. consumers into a nation of penny pinchers...
Gold Fix Study Shows Signs of Decade of Bank Manipulation  Bloomberg   ...The London gold fix, the benchmark used by miners, jewelers and central banks to value the metal, may have been manipulated for a decade by the banks setting it, researchers say...
Citigroup reports fraud in Mexico unit, lowers 2013 results  Reuters   ... Citigroup Inc (C.N) said on Friday that it has discovered at least $400 million in fraudulent loans in its Mexico subsidiary and said employees may have been in on the crime...
Poorly Regulated, High-Speed 'Bomb Trains' Are One Crash Away from Devastating Towns in NYC Suburbs  AlterNet   ...Few residents of the city's bucolic 'burbs know of the huge risks whirring by at top speeds...
NSA surveillance hurting tech firms' business  USA Today   ...The National Security Agency, and revelations about its extensive surveillance operations — sometimes with the cooperation of tech firms — have undermined the ability of many U.S. companies to sell products in key foreign countries, creating a fissure with the U.S. government and prompting some to scramble to create "NSA-resistant" products...
Swiss Bank That Facilitated U.S. Tax Evasion Continues To Avoid Prosecution  Real News   ...Although Credit Suisse helped ultra-wealthy Americans evade taxes, the bank will face no prosecution due to Swiss bank secrecy laws and a heedless U.S. Justice department...

Today's Teamster News 01.05.14

Welcome to the New America: Low-Wage Nation  Common Dreams   ...More and more, Americans are trapped in the uncertainty and injustice that immigrant workers know all too well, whether they’re here on temporary work visas cleaning luxury condos or undocumented and scrambling for daily construction jobs. Increasingly, from an economic standpoint, office parks and store aisles in America are coming to resemble the street corners where day laborers gather and the labor camps where guest workers are trapped...
The Strange Case of American Inequality  Project Syndicate   ...unless something – and it will need to be something major – returns the US to its pre-2008 growth trajectory, future economic historians will not regard the Great Depression as the worst business-cycle disaster of the industrial age. It is we who are living in their worst case...
The Skills Shortage Myth: A Public Relations Tool for Bad Corporate Citizens  Economic Policy Institute   ...the existence of skill shortages ...  exists mostly in the minds of those wanting access to low-wage, indentured servants or public subsidy for the training that firms should be doing themselves...
NSA statement does not deny 'spying' on members of Congress  The Guardian   ...The National Security Agency on Saturday released a statement in answer to questions from a senator about whether it “has spied, or is … currently spying, on members of Congress or other American elected officials”, in which it did not deny collecting communications from legislators of the US Congress to whom it says it is accountable...
Bankruptcy Filings Fall 13% in 2013  Credit Slips   ...The monthly decline continues a long-term trend of falling bankruptcy filing rates. Filings are currently running around 3.3 per 1,000 persons...
Manufacturing Growth to Help Propel U.S. Expansion: Economy  Bloomberg   ...Factory purchasing managers said orders were the strongest since April 2010, helping explain why companies such as General Motors Co. (GM) and Ford Motor Co. (F) are taking on more workers in response to rising sales...
Forget Mega-Corporations, Here’s The Mega-Network  TechCrunch   ...Corporations are arguably more powerful today than ever before. But the economy isn’t dominated by a handful of megalithic conglomerates. it consists of hundreds or thousands of smaller, more specialized firms...
The Secrets of White Collar Prisons  DuJour   ...Bernie Kerik, Jack Abramoff and Dennis Kozlowski—three of the most high-profile men to be on the inside—smash the perception that prison life is anything like "Club Fed"...
Brother, Can You Spare $91.44 Billion?  Economic Populist   ...Wall Street got $91.44 billion in bonuses for 2013.  The 98% of us want those bonuses paid back to the victims of the financial crisis...
Outsourcing Pays Big to Private Companies While Americans Suffer  Economic Populist   ...These same contractors obtaining overpriced contracts through privatization pay their workers little.  There are now two contract workers per federal employee and that ratio is getting worse. ... Privatization of government is creating a nation of wage slaves...
An Error Message for the Poor  New York Times   ...students of anti-poverty programs remember a litany of automation and contracting meltdowns — some of them prolonged, even epic. Florida, 1992-93. Michigan, 1998-99. Colorado, 1998-2002. Texas, 2006-7. Indiana, 2007-9. The Colorado Benefits Management System is particularly memorable: When first implemented, it reportedly refused food stamps to anyone who did not have a driver’s license from Guam...
OP-ED: NAFTA’s 20 Years of Unfulfilled Promises  Inter Press Service   ...Under NAFTA, cheap subsidised corn from the United States flooded Mexico, making it impossible for millions of Mexican farmers to compete. Government support previously given to small farmers was withdrawn and directed to big agricultural exporting corporations instead...
Boeing machinists approve contract securing 777X jet  Reuters  ...Boeing's machinists on Friday narrowly approved a crucial labor contract that secured thousands of jobs and billions of dollars of economic activity for Washington state but will cost workers their pensions...
Housing tear-downs on the rise as real estate rebounds  Los Angeles Times   ...The rebounding housing market has sparked the demolitions. In November, the median price for a home in Southern California was $385,000, up nearly 20% compared with the same month a year earlier, according to research firm DataQuick...