Today's Teamster News 12.13.14

Teamster News
While Cromnibus Waits, Teamsters Object to Pension Plan  Roll Call   ...the Senate might not be able to hold its final vote on the measure until Monday...Teamsters Object. With the fiscal 2015 spending bill on track for action, the Teamsters union is weighing in with a last-ditch effort to get lawmakers to reject the measure. A statement from Teamsters President Jim Hoffa pointed to pension changes in the measure, which the union said would result “in an untold number of retirees losing a substantial percentage of their fixed income should reductions be required.” The Teamsters are also objecting to the controversial hours of service rules in the bill...
34-Hour Restart Changes: House Passes Spending Bill; Eyes On Senate  Commercial Carrier Journal   ...First, it removes the requirement that drivers’ 34-hour restarts include two 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. periods. Second, it removes the one-per-week limit of the restart’s use. It also requires FMCSA to produce a study to show how the restart provisions improve safety. The stay of enforcement of the rules will end after Sept. 30, 2015, and after FMCSA provides its report justifying the rules...
Reid Announces Weekend Votes After Blockade (Updated)  Roll Call   ...Reid also said that absent an agreement, the Senate would vote at 1 a.m. Sunday to limit debate on the cromnibus spending package...
CRomnibus Disaster Signals a Sad New Normal in D.C.  The Fiscal Times   ...Under the bill, trustees would be enabled to cut pension benefits to current retirees, reversing a 40-year bond with workers who earned their retirement packages...
Sysco Poised To Complete $8.2B Merger With US Foods  New York Post   ...Sysco is poised to complete the $8.2 billion merger with its closest rival, US Foods, but at a much stiffer price than expected, The Post has learned. America’s biggest food-service provider, Sysco is selling assets worth $5 billion to Performance Food Group (owned by Steve Schwarzman-led Blackstone Group) to win regulatory approval, two sources said. That is equal to roughly one-quarter of US Foods’ revenue...
Congressman Urges Cooperation Between Teamsters And Giant Eagle Distributor  WFMJ   ...Representative Ryan as sent letters pleading with the Tamarkin Company and Teamsters Local 377  to “quickly and efficiently negotiate a fair resolution to the ongoing labor dispute. The result of an impasse is simply not in the best interests of the workers, the company or this community,” writes Ryan...
State AFL-CIO opposes Bill de Blasio's horse carriage ban  New York Daily News   ... A resolution passed Friday by the state AFL-CIO says New York City's carriage industry provides 300 good middle-class jobs. The major statewide labor coalition is the latest of several union groups to vow to fight the mayor's proposal...
Trade
Growing U.S. trade deficit with China cost 3.2 million jobs between 2001 and 2013, with job losses in every state  Economic Policy Institute   ...a growing U.S. goods trade deficit with China has the United States piling up foreign debt, losing export capacity, and losing jobs, especially in the vital but under-siege manufacturing sector...
Obama 'more optimistic' about Pacific trade deal  The Hill   ...President Obama said Thursday he believes the odds for striking a Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement are "significantly higher than 50-50" in a meeting Thursday with his export council...
State Battles
Warren County Votes To Become Right To Work County  WBKO   ...Fiscal Court approved a right to work ordinance on the first reading Thursday morning with a vote of 5-1, democrat Tommy Hunt was the lone magistrate against it...
Jury still out on Michigan's growth, lack of since becoming right-to-work state  WNEM.com   …Woods said right-to-work isn't creating jobs in Michigan. "Michigan still ranks in the top 10 states in unemployment rate at 7.1 percent," she said...
Rex Sinquefield’s million-dollar donation heralds new craziness in Missouri  Kansas City Star   ...many Missouri Republicans are very nervous about Sinquefield’s ostentatious bankrolling of his personal slate of candidates for the 2016 statewide ticket...
NJ AFL-CIO supports ‘Buy America’ bills  PolitickerNJ   ...Urgently needed legislation that will give American-made products and U.S. workers a fair shake in the domestic marketplace cleared another legislative hurdle on Thursday, December 11, when it was released by the Assembly Budget Committee...
GOP may seek last push for Pa. action  TribLive   ...[Pennsylvania] Lawmakers could make a final push to privatize state liquor stores, reform the public pension system and end government collection of union dues from paychecks — proposals Wolf opposes...
The Koch Wall Street Crusade To Rob Pensions Is Underway  PoliticusUSA   ...despite sending his state into an economic tailspin after squandering a budget surplus and cutting services to provide unimaginable tax cuts for the rich, Kansas governor Sam Brownback is robbing employee pensions to cover the state’s devastating budget shortfalls...
Koch brothers group files suit against Calif. AG, refuses to disclose donors  Legal Newsline   ...nonprofit group founded by the Koch brothers is challenging California Attorney General Kamala Harris’ threat to take its state tax-exempt status unless it discloses the identities of its donors...
War on Workers
Ruling Lets Work Email Be Used To Organize Unions  New York Times   ...Calling that ruling “clearly incorrect,” the current majority noted how technology had transformed daily habits. “The workplace is ‘uniquely appropriate’ and ‘the natural gathering place’ for such communications,” the board wrote, “and the use of email as a common form of workplace communication has expanded dramatically in recent years.”...
The Vanishing Male Worker: How America Fell Behind  New York Times   ...Working, in America, is in decline. The share of prime-age men — those 25 to 54 years old — who are not working has more than tripled since the late 1960s, to 16 percent. More recently, since the turn of the century, the share of women without paying jobs has been rising, too. The United States, which had one of the highest employment rates among developed nations as recently as 2000, has fallen toward the bottom of the list...
Wage Theft Costing Workers Millions of Dollars  RH Reality Check   ...The lost wages in those two states represent $20 million in lost income per week in New York and $29 million in lost income per week in California...
Construction Worker Killed After Roof Collapsed  WGTU   ...A 51-year-old West Branch man was killed after falling through the roof of a building...
Miscellaneous
Verizon's New, Encrypted Calling App Comes Pre-Hacked For The NSA  Bloomberg Businessweek   ...Verizon is the latest big company to enter the post-Snowden market for secure communication, and it's doing so with an encryption standard that comes with a way for law enforcement to access ostensibly secure phone conversations...

Today's Teamster News 08.26.13

Congress, Public Waking Up to Trans-Pacific Partnership  Nation of Change   ...Members of Congress are starting to pay attention to the upcoming, secretly negotiated Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) “trade” agreement that isn’t really about trade. And the public is also becoming aware that this runaway job-loss express train is coming straight at us...
America's Outsourcers to be Reclassified as Manufacturers  Economic Populist   ...Don't like the trade deficit, low GDP and the public outrage over the offshore outsourcing?  Change the accounting method to make it go away!  Such is the agenda of government statisticians it appears...
Walmart's Latest 'Buy America' Sham  Huffington Post   ...Walmart's growing control of the grocery sector is pushing down wages throughout food production...
Governors applaud Made in the USA, but do their laws support American manufacturing?  manufacture this   ...Eight governors were quick to applaud Wal-Mart for their U.S. manufacturing efforts. But do their states' laws promote U.S. manufacturing through “buy America” provisions for state public works projects?...
Fast-Food Workers Will Strike On August 29 — Here's What You Need to Know  PolicyMic   ...Fast-food workers and labor groups are now calling for a $15/hour minimum wage and many are also asking for opportunities to unionize. Beginning with walk-outs in individual fast-food restaurants last year, the movement has progressed from the local to a national scale. A national strike by fast-food employees is set to take place on August 29...
Dr. King, The March on Washington, and Full Employment  Jared Bernstein Blog   ...[f]ifty years ago, the unemployment rate was 5 percent for whites and 10.9 percent for blacks, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Today, it is 6.6 percent for whites and 12.6 percent for blacks...
Elizabeth Warren May Control Larry Summers's Fate  Bloomberg   ...Warren indicated that Summers was too friendly to Wall Street, where he has made a lot of money as a consultant during his time away from government...
ObamaCare's architects reap windfall as Washington lobbyists  The Hill   ...ObamaCare has become big business for an elite network of Washington lobbyists and consultants who helped shape the law from the inside...
Cash Hoarders Devastate Economy The Real News   ..The wealthiest Americans are sitting on trillions of dollars in cash. They aren't reinvesting,...
Oregon Man Holds Up Bank For $1, Waits To Be Arrested To Get Health Care  Liberaland   ...Timothy Dean Alsip, 50, is homeless and needed health care, so he allegedly robbed a bank so he could medical attention...
REPORT: American Workers Have Seen A ‘Lost Decade’ In Wage Growth  ThinkProgress   ...Despite productivity gains of nearly 25 percent from 2000 to 2012, “wages were flat or declined for the entire bottom 60 percent” of the workforce, according to a new report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI)...
Colin Powell On Republican Voting Restrictions: ‘It’s Going To Backfire’  ThinkProgress   ...These kinds of procedures that are being put in place to slow the process down, and make it likely that fewer Hispanics and African Americans might vote I think is going to backfire, because these people are going to come out and do what they have to do in order to vote and I encourage that...
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman files Donald Trump 'University' $40 million fraud suit  Daily News   ...Schneiderman’s office accuses Trump of defrauding more than 5,000 people nationwide through his “Trump University” that offered free seminars to help them get rich by teaching real estate-investing techniques used by the billionaire developer-turned-reality TV star...
The AFL-CIO Is Exploring New Investments in Alt-Labor and Texas Organizing  The Nation   ...the past two decades have seen an explosion in the number of “alt-labor” groups organizing and mobilizing workers outside of traditional union representation or bargaining; such groups currently mostly rely on union or foundation funding...
Private lobbyists get public pensions in 20 states  Associated Press   ...hundreds of lobbyists in at least 20 states ... get public pensions because they represent associations of counties, cities and school boards, an Associated Press review found. Legislatures granted them access decades ago on the premise that they serve governments and the public. In many cases, such access also includes state health care benefits...
Child poverty in Britain is causing 'social apartheid'  The Guardian   ...Britain risks "sleepwalking into a world where inequality becomes so entrenched that our children grow up in a state of social apartheid", according to a leading charity...

Today's Teamster News 05.16.13

Upcoming Trans-Pacific Partnership Looks Like Corporate Takeover  Huffington Post   ...TPP's negotiations are being held in secret with details kept secret even from our Congress. But giant corporations are in the loop... 
Blame Citizens United for the IRS scandal Salon   ...The real outrage is why these political groups have tax-exempt status in the first place...

Unions mobilize as labor board faces paralysis in Obama’s second term The Hill ...Labor is mounting an all-out push to fill the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) as the agency faces the prospect of being sidelined for the rest of President Obama’s second term...

Obama Student Loan Policy Reaping $51 Billion Profit  Huffington Post   ...The Obama administration is forecast to turn a record $51 billion profit this year from student loan borrowers, a sum greater than the earnings of the nation's most profitable companies and roughly equal to the combined net income of the four largest U.S. banks by assets...
U.S. Senate Passes Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) with Buy America Amendment Included. manufacture this ...The Merkley/Brown amendment #866 included in the legislation would ensure that American-made iron, steel, and manufactured goods are used in projects financed by a new Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Authority (WIFIA) program whenever they are available and competitively priced...
U.S. tax dollars promote Monsanto's GMO crops overseas: report  Reuters   ...U.S. taxpayers are footing the bill for overseas lobbying that promotes controversial biotech crops developed by U.S.-based Monsanto Co and other seed makers, a report issued on Tuesday said...

The reason France has gone into double-dip recession  The Guardian     ...This isn't a uniquely French problem – EU nations of various political hues are in trouble because of a fixation on austerity...
Texas Fertilizer Explosion Victims in No Mood to Pay Property Taxes  ABC News   ...After a fertilizer plant explosion destroyed part of a small city last month, the leaders of West, Texas, find themselves in the difficult financial position of having to collect property taxes from residents whose homes were destroyed...
Missouri legislation could weaken public labor unions  St. Louis Post-Dispatch   ...The Missouri Legislature is sending a bill to Gov. Jay Nixon that would make public employee unions ask their members each year if they want to continue being members...
Michigan bill would impose fines on unions for illegal picketing  Lansing State Journal   ... Individuals and labor unions could face steep fines for engaging in illegal pickets if the Michigan Legislature takes up a bill that a Republican lawmaker recently reintroduced...
$483M tax windfall brightens Michigan's budget picture  Detroit Free Press   ...The state of Michigan will have more than $640 million in unanticipated revenues to work with as it finalizes the 2013-14 budget, John Nixon, the state budget director, said after yesterday’s revenue estimating conference at the state Capitol. But the bulk of that money will be “one-time money” that the state can’t build into ongoing budgets...
Health advocates oppose NC Senate smoking bill  Associated Press   ...Health advocates say a North Carolina Senate bill would repeal hundreds of local and community college rules restricting smoking outdoors...
Defense furloughs clobber Arizona employees  Arizona Republic   ...Thousands of civilian defense employees across Arizona will face sharp reductions in work and pay through the rest of the fiscal year as the Department of Defense implements furloughs…
New Jersey Property Taxes Rise to Record as Growth Slows  Bloomberg News   ...New Jersey’s average residential property-tax bill rose 1.6 percent to a record $7,885 last year as most towns abided by Governor Chris Christie’s 2 percent cap on the levies, slowing the growth rate, according to state data...
Why are women so absent from Georgia leadership?   Atlanta Journal-Constitution   ...None of Georgia’s eight statewide constitutional offices, from governor through agriculture commissioner, is held by a woman. None of the five members of the state Public Service Commission, elected statewide to regulate utilities, is a woman. Likewise, none of Georgia’s 16 seats in Congress — 14 in the House and two in the Senate — is held by a woman. For those keeping score at home, that’s zero for 29...
Illinois passes law to make Busch divest beer distributorship  Chicago Tribune   ...A bill that will require Anheuser-Busch to sell its minority stake in Chicago's City Beverage has passed the Illinois Senate. Anheuser and the Illinois Liquor Control Commission have been involved in a string of litigation on this issue since the commission blocked the world's largest brewer from acquiring City Beverage in 2010...
Pa. Dems line up to run vs. hobbled Corbett  Politico   ...Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett may be the most vulnerable incumbent governor in the country — and Keystone State Democrats are lining up to challenge him...
U.S. DOT Allowing Unsafe Mexico-Domiciled Truck Companies to Participate in NAFTA Pilot Program Threatening Safety of Motorists  IBT   ...The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, the agency within the U.S. Department of Transportation charged with overseeing the cross-border long-haul Pilot Program on North American Free Trade Agreement Trucking Provisions, has not taken definitive action to bar participation of unsafe Mexico-domiciled motor carriers...
Teamster Taxi Operator Shares His Experiences at Unity Conference  Teamsters Local 117   …Local 117 is on the forefront of a new effort by the Teamsters Union to organize thousands of taxicab operators across the country...