Sunday, November 2, 2014

Today's Teamster News 11.02.14

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...