TEAMSTERS
Teamsters At Sysco Back in Negotiations Today After Unanimous Strike Vote Local 117 ...Teamster warehouse workers and drivers who are employed at the major food service conglomerate Sysco have voted unanimously to authorize a strike. Union members voted 150-0 in favor of authorizing a strike after the Company allegedly committed a series of Unfair Labor Practices. The National Labor Relations Board is investigating Sysco for charges of bad-faith bargaining, unilateral changes in working conditions, and worker intimidation...
LA-based port truck driver to join President Obama at White House Summit on Worker Voice AJOT ...On Wed., October 7, a port truck driver who was misclassified for years as an “independent contractor” but fought for – and won – the right to be classified as an employee and is now a member of Teamsters Local 848, will be a panelist at the first ever “White House Summit on Worker Voice.” The professional driver, a husband and father to two young children, who was fired for filing a claim for Wage Theft with the California Labor Commissioner, now works for Eco Flow Transportation...
County to consider contract that includes raise for jail staff Merced Sun Star ...A group of Merced County jail and detention center employees would see their first pay raise in six years under an agreement to be considered Tuesday by the Merced County Board of Supervisors. The county has been in negotiations since May with Unit 12 of Teamsters Local Union 856, which represents more than a dozen unarmed and nonsworn employees of jails and juvenile detention centers...
A Strike May Park San Francisco's Tech Buses Gizmodo ...San Francisco’s tech workers may be looking for a new ride to work if their shuttle bus drivers go on strike over contract negotiations. At a meeting yesterday in San Leandro, leaders of the Teamsters Local 853 advised members to be prepared for a strike if there’s no progress on the contract proposal that the union approved and sent to Compass Transportation back in August. The proposal would increase pay and improve benefits for drivers...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Obama’s trade deal faces stiff headwinds The Hill ...The White House’s announcement Monday of an international trade deal covering 40 percent of the world’s economy sets the stage for a bruising, months-long congressional battle that is already spilling into the 2016 presidential race. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), an agreement between the U.S. and 11 other nations from Asia to Latin America, faces stiff headwinds in both parties...
Vilsack: TPP text available in next 30 days Capital Press ...U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership will be made available in the next 30 days. Farmers and members of Congress will be able to read the final text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership in the next 30 days, the head of the USDA says. Lawyers are “scrubbing the text” of the trade deal between the United States and 11 other countries, making sure it is accurate...
China Responds Cautiously To TPP Deal, Which Analysts Say Will Bring Pressure For Faster Reforms IBTimes ...China has reacted cautiously to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal (TPP), which U.S. President Barack Obama said explicitly was designed to prevent “countries like China” from writing "the rules of the global economy." China’s Ministry of Commerce said it took an “open-minded attitude” to the deal, though Chinese analysts said it would increase pressure on Beijing to introduce further economic reforms...
The Meat Industry Is Licking Its Chops Over Obama's Massive Trade Deal Mother Jones ...The US meat industry scored a big victory this week when world leaders hammered out an agreement that would reduce trade barriers across the Pacific: from the United Sates, Canada, Mexico, Peru, and Chile on this side to Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Malaysia, Brunei, Vietnam, and Singapore on the other. So how would the TPP affect Big Meat in the United States? The industry is currently facing stagnant domestic demand for its product as Americans eat less meat. The TPP would open markets...
Breast Cancer Patient Arrested for Protesting TPP: "This is Price Gouging at the Cost of Lives" Democracy Now ...The United States and drug companies had pressed for longer monopolies on new biotech drugs, while multiple countries opposed the push, saying it could deny life-saving medicines to patients who cannot afford high prices. The compromise reportedly includes monopolies of between five and eight years. Last week in Atlanta, Zahara Heckscher, a cancer patient, disrupted TPP negotiations and was arrested...
The Trans-Pacific Pact Would Kill Jobs and Consumer Protection (opinion) New York Times ...The TPP includes investor protections also found in NAFTA that incentivize American job offshoring by eliminating risks otherwise associated with producing in low-wage countries. It would drive down our wages by putting Americans in competition with Vietnamese workers who make less than 65 cents per hour...
Three million #noTTIP signatures delivered to EU Commission in London The Economic Voice ...Over three million signatures from across Europe calling for TTIP to be scrapped were submitted to representatives of the European Commission in London at 11.30 am this morning, in the shadow of a 6 metre high inflatable TTIP Trojan Horse. The Trojan Horse symbolised that while TTIP is presented as a 'trade deal,' critics argue that it actually constitutes an unprecedented corporate power grab...
IMF warns of stagnation threat to G7 economies The Guardian ...The International Monetary Fund is warning that the weak recovery in the west risks turning into near stagnation after cutting its global economic growth forecast for the fourth successive year. In its half-yearly update on the health of the world economy, the Washington-based fund predicted expansion of 3.1% in 2015, 0.2 points lower than it was expecting three months ago...
Tens of thousands protest government free-market measures for biggest demo in a year US News & World Report ...Tens of thousands of workers are demonstrating through Brussels to protest the free-market regulations and austerity measures that the center-right government has been pushing through during its first year in office. Belgium's three main unions joined hands Wednesday behind a common platform arguing that the government of Prime Minister Charles Michel is promoting big companies at the expense of the workforce...
IndustriALL Union files ILO complaint against Thailand Reuters ...IndustriALL, a global labor union with 50 million members, has filed a complaint against Thailand at the International Labour Organization in Geneva, the union said on Wednesday. The complaint, sent to the ILO's committee on freedom of association, details 18 cases of worker and labor abuses, IndustriALL said in a statement...
Cambodian Garment Workers Rally for Minimum Wage Raise Solidarity Center ...Some 21,000 garment workers from six unions at more than 60 factories across Cambodia dedicated their 30-minute lunch breaks to rallies calling for a higher minimum wage. The monthly minimum wage for garment and footwear workers is $128. Last year, Cambodia’s garment exports totaled $5.7 billion...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
W.Va. Gov. Tomblin Announces $100 Million Statewide Budget Cut WSAZ ...West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin on Monday announced a plan to save the state nearly $100 million. Tomblin said it is needed to curb the loss from declining coal and natural gas revenue. The governor said most state agency spending will be cut by 4 percent. Tomblin said the fiscal year deficit currently exceeds more than $250 million...
Gov. Brown signs bill aimed at eliminating gender wage gap LA Times ...California took a major step Tuesday toward closing the lingering wage gap between men and women, as Gov. Jerry Brown signed one of the toughest pay equity laws in the nation. Women in California who work full time are paid substantially less — a median 84 cents for every dollar — than men, according to a U.S Census Bureau report this year...
California minimum wage measure seeks to tap into income inequality worries SacBee ...Proponents of a statewide ballot measure to raise California’s minimum wage signaled Tuesday that their effort will seize on unrest over income distribution and frame the wage debate as one of fairness. In the first major event in support of the proposed initiative, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee and Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said they would lead the union-funded endeavor to hike the state’s base wage to $11...
Little Rock Workers Convene City's First Wage Board NPR ...As part of a national movement to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, some Little Rock workers plan to convene the city’s first wage board Tuesday. Little Rock’s four-member board is made up of Democratic State Representatives Charles Blake and Vivian Flowers, the chair of Arkansas Community Organizations Donna Massey, and Revered Stephen Copley, who led the recent voter-approved effort to gradually raise the minimum wage in Arkansas to $8.50 by 2017...
U.S. LABOR
Al Jazeera America becomes the latest new media organization to unionize The Guardian ...Al Jazeera America’s digital newsroom became the latest new media organization to unionize on Tuesday. Staff voted in favour 32 to 5, the National Labor Relations Board declared after counting the ballots cast by eligible employees. Al Jazeera America is the latest of a number of newsrooms to unionize this year...
Pot growers at Maryland company get union representation Business Journal ...Bethesda Biomedical Inc., awaiting state approval for a license to grow marijuana and operate a medical marijuana dispensary, has reached an agreement with the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 400 to represent its employees. The agreement covers wages, health care, a retirement pension and other benefits for Bethesda Biomedical’s future employees...
UAW threatens strike at Fiat Chrysler U.S. operations Reuters ...United Auto Workers members are planning to strike at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV U.S. plants as soon as Wednesday evening, the first work stoppage since 2007, threatening to bring manufacturing to a halt. A strike at its U.S. operations could cost the automaker $40 million a week in operating profit, said Sean McAlinden, chief economist with the Center for Automotive Research...
With Sanders at the Helm, Lawmakers Lobby for Labor Common Dreams ...With organized labor increasingly under attack in the U.S., a handful of lawmakers is pushing to make it easier for workers to join unions, allowing them to pool their collective power to bargain for better wages, benefits, and working conditions. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) on Tuesday unveiled new legislation, dubbed the Workplace Democracy Act, which would expedite the process for forming labor unions and penalize companies that delay negotiations...
Neoliberalism is crushing your mailman: The myth of the postal service’s financial ruin Salon ...The truth is that almost all of the postal service’s losses can be traced back to a single change in the law made by the Republican Congress in 2006. That year, the Congress passed the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 (PAEA). Under the terms of PAEA, the USPS was forced to “prefund its future health care benefit payments to retirees for the next 75 years...
This Is What The World's Largest Companies Are Making Off Their Employees Huffington Post ...You’re going to want a raise after reading this. Marketing firm MVF Global has calculated the “true value” of employees around the world, and maybe not surprisingly there is a pretty large gap between what workers at the world’s largest companies are paid and what they're actually worth to the company...
The US Tells Other Countries to Respect Unions—Shouldn’t the US Do the Same? The Nation ... While the just-announced Trans-Pacific Partnership deal is flawed on many levels, it includes language that requires countries such as Vietnam to recognize and respect the right to form independent trade unions. Yet, while the US government tells other countries to respect the right to organize unions and collectively bargain, those rights have been under assault here...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Immigrant Rights Groups Will Start Protesting Obama Again Huffington Post ...Several immigrant rights groups announced Tuesday that they will spend a week protesting the deportation and detention policies of President Barack Obama, timed to mark the one-year anniversary of his announcement of executive actions to expand deportation relief. Obama, who has presided over more deportations than any other president, has long faced protests from immigrant rights activists...
Freedom for 6,000 Federal Prisoners The Atlantic ...About 6,000 federal inmates whose long sentences were reduced last year will be released at the end of October, marking the start of the most substantial effort yet to reduce America’s gargantuan prison population. The U.S. Sentencing Commission, an independent judicial agency that oversees federal sentencing guidelines, first voted in April 2014 to reduce federal drug guideline sentences in an effort to curb prison overcrowding and excessive punishments...
Showing posts with label IMF. Show all posts
Showing posts with label IMF. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 7, 2015
Friday, July 24, 2015
Today's Teamster News 07.24.15
Teamsters
Teamsters Canada: Stand Firm on Supply Management Teamster.org ...In advance of the final stages of Trans Pacific Partnership Negotiations (TPP), Teamsters Canada President Francois Laporte sent a letter today to International Trade Minister Ed Fast urging him to defend Canada’s Dairy Industry and to “make clear, as Canadian governments have done for many years in many trade talks, that our dairy supply management is ‘off the table’”...
Contractor/Employee Debate Heating up at Ports Truckinginfo ...Are drivers who handle the drayage of intermodal containers into and out of the nation's ports employees or independent contractors? The controversy was visible this week at ports on both coasts. The Teamsters union has been active in trying to get independent contractors at the ports declared employees...
Teamsters' bi-coastal drayage 'misclassification" protests heat up JOC.com ...The Teamsters are deploying a bi-coastal strategy to challenge what the union charges is misclassification of drayage truck drivers as independent contractors, an indication of how the issue has expanded far beyond the San Pedro Bay area. In Los Angeles-Long Beach, the Teamsters launched their sixth strike against Pac 9 Transportation, while in Savannah the union was supporting drivers who attended a public hearing by the Georgia Senate on employee misclassification...
Global Labor & Trade
U.S. diplomat pushes Canada for dairy, poultry access as TPP talks intensify Globe & Mail ...The top U.S. diplomat in Canada is wading into the debate over whether Ottawa is negotiating in good faith at major Pacific Rim trade talks, saying this country must come to the table as soon as possible with concrete proposals to offer foreign farmers more access to its heavily protected dairy and poultry sector...
IMF: Unionization, Higher Wages Reduce Income Inequality Solidarity Center ...he notion that unionization and higher wages decrease income inequality is a fundamental premise of the Solidarity Center and our allies. But now a surprising source has reached the same conclusion: the International Monetary Fund (IMF). “The decline in unionization is related to the rise of top income shares and less redistribution, while the erosion of minimum wages is correlated with considerable increases in overall inequality”...
Obama Administration Hype About a TPP Vote in 2015 Does Not Comport with Fast Track Timelines Public Citizen ...TPP proponents are eager for Congress to vote on a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal in late 2015. But to do so, given Fast Track’s statutorily-required timeframe of notice periods and pre-vote reports, TPP negotiations – and the TPP text itself – must be completed by the end of July. If notice to Congress of intent to sign the TPP were sent by August 1, a final TPP vote could be held the last week Congress is in session in December...
'Shrewd' Canada playing long game as TPP trade talks begin in Maui CBC News ...As Canada's lead negotiator Kirsten Hillman and the rest of her Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiating team sit down with their counterparts in Maui, Hawaii this weekend, they may sense pounding from more than just the nearby surf. The game has changed since trade negotiators from 12 Pacific Rim countries met in Guam last April. The Americans, who'd been busily deal-fixing without a mandate to back it up, are now armed with fast-track negotiating authority...
Anonymous hacks US Census Bureau over TTIP agreement, leaking employee details online International Business Timess ...The reason for the cyber-attack is the recent Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), both of which are top priorities for the Obama administration and promise a radical reform of the global politico-economic system, with integration and convergence of major Atlantic and Pacific nations...
Putting Business First: How TTIP Changes the Rules of the Game (opinion) TeleSUR ...TTIP would cut tariffs and lower regulatory barriers to make trade easier between the two countries. According to The Telegraph, it would be the biggest trade agreement of its kind, affecting one quarter of global trade. And yet despite this, no one is totally sure of what TTIP will actually do for the EU, because it is such an unusual trade agreement. Not only are the two parties involved exceptionally large, but the nature of the agreement is – according to the CEPS, “more like a wide-ranging regulatory agreement, with some elements of classical trade agreements as well”...
Administration Desperate to Announce Deal on Trans-Pacific Partnership: There May Be an Announcement, But a Real Deal? One Congress Would Approve? (opinion) Public Citizen ...Unless the Obama administration can not only announce a final Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal by the start of August, but also by then complete a TPP text and give notice to Congress of intent to sign it, a U.S. congressional vote on TPP almost certainly will be pushed into the politically perilous 2016 presidential election year...
Do not undermine efforts to combat human trafficking (opinion) The Hill ...both the Obama administration and the U.S. Congress could be poised to take a terrible step backwards in the struggle against the global scourge of human trafficking by weakening a key amendment to the Fast Track trade authority bill. Even more shocking are reports that the State Department is set to compromise its own Trafficking in Persons report to “upgrade” Malaysia without merit for narrow economic interests...
Many Greeks blame their economic plight on austerity-minded Germans USA Today ...As this economically distressed nation faces even more austerity measures, many citizens are taking their frustration out on hard-nosed Germany. The hashtag #BoycottGermany has been trending in the country since Germany took the lead in demanding tough bailout terms that have hiked taxes and slashed pensions. Tourist agencies report vacation cancellations that include many Germans...
Myanmar Officially Recognizes Trade Union Confederation Solidarity Center ...The government has officially recognized the Confederation of Trade Unions of Myanmar (CTUM), and registered the federation as representing “all Myanmar.” In a ceremony today, CTUM President Maung Maung and other union leaders received the registration papers, with Maung Maung thanking “everyone who made this vision of ours come true”...
Strikes, Labor Slowdowns Add up to Summer of Woe in Italy ABC News ...Italy's summer of woe is getting worse — as tourists face record-high temperatures, labor slowdowns, one strike at the Pompeii archaeological site and another at Alitalia that forced the cancellation of dozens of flights. Alitalia cancelled 15 percent of its flights Friday because of a walkout by pilots and flight attendants. Further south, hundreds of tourists lined up for hours in the sun Friday outside the gates of Pompeii, near Naples, after unions called a wildcat strike...
State & Living Wage Battles
The rapid success of Fight for $15: 'This is a trend that cannot be stopped' The Guardian ...When 200 New York restaurant workers walked out in the nation’s first-ever fast-food strike in late 2012, they were widely mocked for demanding minimum pay of $15 an hour, with some critics saying their demand was absurdly out of reach, akin to visiting Mars. But this week a New York state panel appointed by Governor Andrew Cuomo recommended establishing a $15 minimum wage for the state’s 180,000 fast-food workers...
Regional petition drive kicks off to repeal prevailing wage law Midland Daily News ...The debate over Michigan’s prevailing wage law has been somewhat contentious and that spilled over at the Associated Builders and Contractors Greater Michigan Chapter office on Thursday. Kicking off a regional petition drive to repeal Michigan’s prevailing wage law, Rep. Gary Glenn, R-Midland, Jimmy Greene, president/CEO ABC Greater Michigan Chapter and ABC-Michigan CEO Chris Fisher held a press conference promoting the regional petition drive to repeal the prevailing wage law...
Facing Lawsuits, North Carolina Relaxes Voter ID Rules Care2.com ...North Carolina passed one of the most comprehensive and toughest voter suppression laws in the country. The law targeted every demographic that had made the state one of the most progressive in the nation. At the time of passage, Republicans held all branches of government for the first time since reconstruction and were determined to reverse any progress made since then. The aggressive assault on voters led to several lawsuits against the state...
Virginia Odds and Ends Public Policy Polling ...There is even more overwhelming support from Virginians on another pair of pieces of progressive legislation. 64% in the state think all workers should get a minimum number of paid sick days, with only 19% opposed to that concept. And an equal 64% think borrowers should be able to deduct their student loan payments on their state income taxes, to just 20% against that...
Hillary Clinton to Back $15 Fast-Food Minimum Wage in New York New York Times ...Hillary Rodham Clinton on Friday will use a speech focused on growing the economy to endorse a $15-an-hour minimum wage proposal for fast-food workers recommended by a New York panel, a person briefed on her plans said. The remarks from Mrs. Clinton will come in the city where the fast-food workers’ labor effort first started several years ago. A panel created by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Wednesday recommended the change...
Meet ALEC’s Little Brother, ACCE The Nation ...So how has the American Legislative Exchange Council, a powerful lobby serving right-wing interests at the state level, responded to this resurgence of local democracy? With a systematic effort to destroy it. ALEC task force director Cara Sullivan recently explained to a room full of local officials that when it comes to citizen movements supporting job creation and higher wages, “perhaps the biggest threat comes from the local level”...
'Dark Cloud' of ALEC Converges at Annual Corporate-Political Lovefest Common Dreams ...Fighting to protect dark money. Attacking federal efforts to rein in carbon pollution. Undermining local democracy. These are just some of the "hot topics" on the agenda this week as conservative lawmakers, corporate lobbyists, and top GOP candidates from around the country gather in San Diego for the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)'s annual meeting...
U.S. Labor
Ford, UAW start optimistic contract talks Michigan Radio ...The United Auto Workers and Ford Motor Company are officially in talks for their next four-year contract. This time, the kickoff ceremony was held off Ford and UAW premises. The event at Ford follows last week's contract kickoff at General Motors and Fiat Chrysler. Analysts believe the talks with Fiat Chrysler could be the most problematic. The automaker has the highest number of workers being paid the "tier two" wage...
Verizon, CWA union lock horns over pension benefits Fierce Telecom ...Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union continue to be at odds over how to structure pension benefits for a new labor contract. The current contract expires on Aug. 1. In a new update post on the union negotiations, the CWA said that Verizon's pension proposals are not acceptable. "After listening to 5 minutes worth of their retrogressive and insulting pension presentation/proposal, the Union made it clear to the Company that we are looking for improvements to the Pension Plans"...
AFSCME: Governor trying to force work stoppage Rock River Times ...The state’s largest employees’ union says Gov. Bruce Rauner wants to try and force a strike or lockout while the union works to enact legislation to block a work stoppage and bring in a third party arbitrator. That’s according to an AFSCME Council 31 bargaining update posted to the Capitol Fax blog as a contract extension nears an end with no agreement in sight...
NLRB considering union's latest complaint against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin TribLive ...A discrimination charge filed against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin last month could be joining an earlier union complaint at a trial in front of a federal judge in Pittsburgh in September. An August trial on the earlier charge alleging hospital officials acted illegally by taking self-scheduling duties away from workers has been moved to Sept. 2. The complaints were filed by technicians and licensed practical nurses who formed a union at the hospital about a year ago...
In Indiana, Employers Can Fire Workers for Being Gay or Trans—and They Do, All the Time The Nation ...Decades worth of national and local surveys have found that gay and lesbian workers report widespread job bias. In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey of more than 1,000 LGBT adults, 21 percent believed they’d been treated unfairly by an employer because of their identity, and 23 percent said they’d received poor service at a restaurant, hotel, or place of business. Transgender people seem to have it the worst: In a landmark 2011 nationwide survey of 6,450 transgender and gender-nonconforming folks, 90 percent said they had been mistreated at work; 47 percent said they’d been fired, not hired or not promoted...
Applications for unemployment aid plunge to 42-year low USA Today ...The number of Americans filing initial applications for unemployment benefits fell to a 42-year low last week in the latest sign the labor market is poised for further gains. Even so, there are some signs of ongoing weakness in the job market. The unemployment rate fell in June mostly because many of the unemployed stopped looking for work, rather than found jobs. The proportion of Americans working or looking for work fell to a 38-year low...
Company To Pay Record-Breaking Damages For Telling Pregnant Woman She Couldn’t Do Her Job Anymore Think Progress ...This week, the auto parts retailer AutoZone dropped its challenge to a verdict ordering it to pay a record-breaking $185 million in damages to a former employee who claimed she was demoted and fired for being pregnant. Rosario Juarez was hired by AutoZone in 2000 and was eventually promoted to store manager in 2004. But when she became pregnant in September of 2005, she says her manager told her, “Congratulations…I guess,” adding, “I feel sorry for you”...
Social Justice & Other News
U.S. House bars funding for 'sanctuary' cities for immigrants Reuters ...The U.S. House of Representatives voted on Thursday to deny funding to cities that do not report undocumented immigrants to federal authorities, setting off outcry from the White House and immigration advocates. The bill, approved by a vote of 241 to 179 largely along party lines, was largely a Republican response to the recent killing of a San Francisco woman, allegedly at the hands of an immigrant man...
Robert Reich: It Would Be a Mistake For Progressives to Split Along 'Black Lives Matter' & 'Economic Justice' Lines Alternet ...Racial inequalities are baked into our political and economic system. Police brutality against black men and women, mass incarceration disproportionately of blacks and Latinos, housing discrimination that has resulted in racial apartheid across the nation, and voter suppression all reveal deep structures of discrimination that undermine economic inequality. Our only hope for genuine change is if poor, working class, middle class, black, Latino, and white come together in a powerful movement to take back our economy and democracy...
How Did ‘Driving While Black’ Turn Deadly for Sandra Bland? The Nation ...If the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by Darren Wilson was, as The New York Times put it, “simply the spark that ignited years of pent-up tension and animosity in the area,” then Bland’s response upon being stopped came from a similar place of pent-up tension. She didn’t bow and scrape and defer to the increasingly aggressive officer, as some are suggesting she should have. Sometimes a person or a people have just had enough...
Holder's Legacy: Mass Incarceration and Protection of Killer Cops, Part II (opinion) Truthout ...Eric Holder has been praised as a "civil rights"-oriented attorney general, but the only rights he has championed are those of the bankers, white vigilantes and killer cops. Holder refused to press charges against millionaire banking executives who, he assured Wall Street, 'were too big to jail.' Blacks have to make do with their Miranda warning rights - if they are lucky enough to survive an encounter with the police...
Teamsters Canada: Stand Firm on Supply Management Teamster.org ...In advance of the final stages of Trans Pacific Partnership Negotiations (TPP), Teamsters Canada President Francois Laporte sent a letter today to International Trade Minister Ed Fast urging him to defend Canada’s Dairy Industry and to “make clear, as Canadian governments have done for many years in many trade talks, that our dairy supply management is ‘off the table’”...
Contractor/Employee Debate Heating up at Ports Truckinginfo ...Are drivers who handle the drayage of intermodal containers into and out of the nation's ports employees or independent contractors? The controversy was visible this week at ports on both coasts. The Teamsters union has been active in trying to get independent contractors at the ports declared employees...
Teamsters' bi-coastal drayage 'misclassification" protests heat up JOC.com ...The Teamsters are deploying a bi-coastal strategy to challenge what the union charges is misclassification of drayage truck drivers as independent contractors, an indication of how the issue has expanded far beyond the San Pedro Bay area. In Los Angeles-Long Beach, the Teamsters launched their sixth strike against Pac 9 Transportation, while in Savannah the union was supporting drivers who attended a public hearing by the Georgia Senate on employee misclassification...
Global Labor & Trade
U.S. diplomat pushes Canada for dairy, poultry access as TPP talks intensify Globe & Mail ...The top U.S. diplomat in Canada is wading into the debate over whether Ottawa is negotiating in good faith at major Pacific Rim trade talks, saying this country must come to the table as soon as possible with concrete proposals to offer foreign farmers more access to its heavily protected dairy and poultry sector...
IMF: Unionization, Higher Wages Reduce Income Inequality Solidarity Center ...he notion that unionization and higher wages decrease income inequality is a fundamental premise of the Solidarity Center and our allies. But now a surprising source has reached the same conclusion: the International Monetary Fund (IMF). “The decline in unionization is related to the rise of top income shares and less redistribution, while the erosion of minimum wages is correlated with considerable increases in overall inequality”...
Obama Administration Hype About a TPP Vote in 2015 Does Not Comport with Fast Track Timelines Public Citizen ...TPP proponents are eager for Congress to vote on a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal in late 2015. But to do so, given Fast Track’s statutorily-required timeframe of notice periods and pre-vote reports, TPP negotiations – and the TPP text itself – must be completed by the end of July. If notice to Congress of intent to sign the TPP were sent by August 1, a final TPP vote could be held the last week Congress is in session in December...
'Shrewd' Canada playing long game as TPP trade talks begin in Maui CBC News ...As Canada's lead negotiator Kirsten Hillman and the rest of her Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiating team sit down with their counterparts in Maui, Hawaii this weekend, they may sense pounding from more than just the nearby surf. The game has changed since trade negotiators from 12 Pacific Rim countries met in Guam last April. The Americans, who'd been busily deal-fixing without a mandate to back it up, are now armed with fast-track negotiating authority...
Anonymous hacks US Census Bureau over TTIP agreement, leaking employee details online International Business Timess ...The reason for the cyber-attack is the recent Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), both of which are top priorities for the Obama administration and promise a radical reform of the global politico-economic system, with integration and convergence of major Atlantic and Pacific nations...
Putting Business First: How TTIP Changes the Rules of the Game (opinion) TeleSUR ...TTIP would cut tariffs and lower regulatory barriers to make trade easier between the two countries. According to The Telegraph, it would be the biggest trade agreement of its kind, affecting one quarter of global trade. And yet despite this, no one is totally sure of what TTIP will actually do for the EU, because it is such an unusual trade agreement. Not only are the two parties involved exceptionally large, but the nature of the agreement is – according to the CEPS, “more like a wide-ranging regulatory agreement, with some elements of classical trade agreements as well”...
Administration Desperate to Announce Deal on Trans-Pacific Partnership: There May Be an Announcement, But a Real Deal? One Congress Would Approve? (opinion) Public Citizen ...Unless the Obama administration can not only announce a final Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal by the start of August, but also by then complete a TPP text and give notice to Congress of intent to sign it, a U.S. congressional vote on TPP almost certainly will be pushed into the politically perilous 2016 presidential election year...
Do not undermine efforts to combat human trafficking (opinion) The Hill ...both the Obama administration and the U.S. Congress could be poised to take a terrible step backwards in the struggle against the global scourge of human trafficking by weakening a key amendment to the Fast Track trade authority bill. Even more shocking are reports that the State Department is set to compromise its own Trafficking in Persons report to “upgrade” Malaysia without merit for narrow economic interests...
Many Greeks blame their economic plight on austerity-minded Germans USA Today ...As this economically distressed nation faces even more austerity measures, many citizens are taking their frustration out on hard-nosed Germany. The hashtag #BoycottGermany has been trending in the country since Germany took the lead in demanding tough bailout terms that have hiked taxes and slashed pensions. Tourist agencies report vacation cancellations that include many Germans...
Myanmar Officially Recognizes Trade Union Confederation Solidarity Center ...The government has officially recognized the Confederation of Trade Unions of Myanmar (CTUM), and registered the federation as representing “all Myanmar.” In a ceremony today, CTUM President Maung Maung and other union leaders received the registration papers, with Maung Maung thanking “everyone who made this vision of ours come true”...
Strikes, Labor Slowdowns Add up to Summer of Woe in Italy ABC News ...Italy's summer of woe is getting worse — as tourists face record-high temperatures, labor slowdowns, one strike at the Pompeii archaeological site and another at Alitalia that forced the cancellation of dozens of flights. Alitalia cancelled 15 percent of its flights Friday because of a walkout by pilots and flight attendants. Further south, hundreds of tourists lined up for hours in the sun Friday outside the gates of Pompeii, near Naples, after unions called a wildcat strike...
State & Living Wage Battles
The rapid success of Fight for $15: 'This is a trend that cannot be stopped' The Guardian ...When 200 New York restaurant workers walked out in the nation’s first-ever fast-food strike in late 2012, they were widely mocked for demanding minimum pay of $15 an hour, with some critics saying their demand was absurdly out of reach, akin to visiting Mars. But this week a New York state panel appointed by Governor Andrew Cuomo recommended establishing a $15 minimum wage for the state’s 180,000 fast-food workers...
Regional petition drive kicks off to repeal prevailing wage law Midland Daily News ...The debate over Michigan’s prevailing wage law has been somewhat contentious and that spilled over at the Associated Builders and Contractors Greater Michigan Chapter office on Thursday. Kicking off a regional petition drive to repeal Michigan’s prevailing wage law, Rep. Gary Glenn, R-Midland, Jimmy Greene, president/CEO ABC Greater Michigan Chapter and ABC-Michigan CEO Chris Fisher held a press conference promoting the regional petition drive to repeal the prevailing wage law...
Facing Lawsuits, North Carolina Relaxes Voter ID Rules Care2.com ...North Carolina passed one of the most comprehensive and toughest voter suppression laws in the country. The law targeted every demographic that had made the state one of the most progressive in the nation. At the time of passage, Republicans held all branches of government for the first time since reconstruction and were determined to reverse any progress made since then. The aggressive assault on voters led to several lawsuits against the state...
Virginia Odds and Ends Public Policy Polling ...There is even more overwhelming support from Virginians on another pair of pieces of progressive legislation. 64% in the state think all workers should get a minimum number of paid sick days, with only 19% opposed to that concept. And an equal 64% think borrowers should be able to deduct their student loan payments on their state income taxes, to just 20% against that...
Hillary Clinton to Back $15 Fast-Food Minimum Wage in New York New York Times ...Hillary Rodham Clinton on Friday will use a speech focused on growing the economy to endorse a $15-an-hour minimum wage proposal for fast-food workers recommended by a New York panel, a person briefed on her plans said. The remarks from Mrs. Clinton will come in the city where the fast-food workers’ labor effort first started several years ago. A panel created by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Wednesday recommended the change...
Meet ALEC’s Little Brother, ACCE The Nation ...So how has the American Legislative Exchange Council, a powerful lobby serving right-wing interests at the state level, responded to this resurgence of local democracy? With a systematic effort to destroy it. ALEC task force director Cara Sullivan recently explained to a room full of local officials that when it comes to citizen movements supporting job creation and higher wages, “perhaps the biggest threat comes from the local level”...
'Dark Cloud' of ALEC Converges at Annual Corporate-Political Lovefest Common Dreams ...Fighting to protect dark money. Attacking federal efforts to rein in carbon pollution. Undermining local democracy. These are just some of the "hot topics" on the agenda this week as conservative lawmakers, corporate lobbyists, and top GOP candidates from around the country gather in San Diego for the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)'s annual meeting...
U.S. Labor
Ford, UAW start optimistic contract talks Michigan Radio ...The United Auto Workers and Ford Motor Company are officially in talks for their next four-year contract. This time, the kickoff ceremony was held off Ford and UAW premises. The event at Ford follows last week's contract kickoff at General Motors and Fiat Chrysler. Analysts believe the talks with Fiat Chrysler could be the most problematic. The automaker has the highest number of workers being paid the "tier two" wage...
Verizon, CWA union lock horns over pension benefits Fierce Telecom ...Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) union continue to be at odds over how to structure pension benefits for a new labor contract. The current contract expires on Aug. 1. In a new update post on the union negotiations, the CWA said that Verizon's pension proposals are not acceptable. "After listening to 5 minutes worth of their retrogressive and insulting pension presentation/proposal, the Union made it clear to the Company that we are looking for improvements to the Pension Plans"...
AFSCME: Governor trying to force work stoppage Rock River Times ...The state’s largest employees’ union says Gov. Bruce Rauner wants to try and force a strike or lockout while the union works to enact legislation to block a work stoppage and bring in a third party arbitrator. That’s according to an AFSCME Council 31 bargaining update posted to the Capitol Fax blog as a contract extension nears an end with no agreement in sight...
NLRB considering union's latest complaint against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin TribLive ...A discrimination charge filed against ACMH Hospital in East Franklin last month could be joining an earlier union complaint at a trial in front of a federal judge in Pittsburgh in September. An August trial on the earlier charge alleging hospital officials acted illegally by taking self-scheduling duties away from workers has been moved to Sept. 2. The complaints were filed by technicians and licensed practical nurses who formed a union at the hospital about a year ago...
In Indiana, Employers Can Fire Workers for Being Gay or Trans—and They Do, All the Time The Nation ...Decades worth of national and local surveys have found that gay and lesbian workers report widespread job bias. In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey of more than 1,000 LGBT adults, 21 percent believed they’d been treated unfairly by an employer because of their identity, and 23 percent said they’d received poor service at a restaurant, hotel, or place of business. Transgender people seem to have it the worst: In a landmark 2011 nationwide survey of 6,450 transgender and gender-nonconforming folks, 90 percent said they had been mistreated at work; 47 percent said they’d been fired, not hired or not promoted...
Applications for unemployment aid plunge to 42-year low USA Today ...The number of Americans filing initial applications for unemployment benefits fell to a 42-year low last week in the latest sign the labor market is poised for further gains. Even so, there are some signs of ongoing weakness in the job market. The unemployment rate fell in June mostly because many of the unemployed stopped looking for work, rather than found jobs. The proportion of Americans working or looking for work fell to a 38-year low...
Company To Pay Record-Breaking Damages For Telling Pregnant Woman She Couldn’t Do Her Job Anymore Think Progress ...This week, the auto parts retailer AutoZone dropped its challenge to a verdict ordering it to pay a record-breaking $185 million in damages to a former employee who claimed she was demoted and fired for being pregnant. Rosario Juarez was hired by AutoZone in 2000 and was eventually promoted to store manager in 2004. But when she became pregnant in September of 2005, she says her manager told her, “Congratulations…I guess,” adding, “I feel sorry for you”...
Social Justice & Other News
U.S. House bars funding for 'sanctuary' cities for immigrants Reuters ...The U.S. House of Representatives voted on Thursday to deny funding to cities that do not report undocumented immigrants to federal authorities, setting off outcry from the White House and immigration advocates. The bill, approved by a vote of 241 to 179 largely along party lines, was largely a Republican response to the recent killing of a San Francisco woman, allegedly at the hands of an immigrant man...
Robert Reich: It Would Be a Mistake For Progressives to Split Along 'Black Lives Matter' & 'Economic Justice' Lines Alternet ...Racial inequalities are baked into our political and economic system. Police brutality against black men and women, mass incarceration disproportionately of blacks and Latinos, housing discrimination that has resulted in racial apartheid across the nation, and voter suppression all reveal deep structures of discrimination that undermine economic inequality. Our only hope for genuine change is if poor, working class, middle class, black, Latino, and white come together in a powerful movement to take back our economy and democracy...
How Did ‘Driving While Black’ Turn Deadly for Sandra Bland? The Nation ...If the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by Darren Wilson was, as The New York Times put it, “simply the spark that ignited years of pent-up tension and animosity in the area,” then Bland’s response upon being stopped came from a similar place of pent-up tension. She didn’t bow and scrape and defer to the increasingly aggressive officer, as some are suggesting she should have. Sometimes a person or a people have just had enough...
Holder's Legacy: Mass Incarceration and Protection of Killer Cops, Part II (opinion) Truthout ...Eric Holder has been praised as a "civil rights"-oriented attorney general, but the only rights he has championed are those of the bankers, white vigilantes and killer cops. Holder refused to press charges against millionaire banking executives who, he assured Wall Street, 'were too big to jail.' Blacks have to make do with their Miranda warning rights - if they are lucky enough to survive an encounter with the police...
Wednesday, July 15, 2015
Today's Teamster News 07.15.15
Teamsters
Teamsters Urge Airgas Investors to Vote Against Directors Teamster.org ...In a letter to Airgas stockholders, Teamsters General Secretary-Treasurer Ken Hall is urging shareholders to withhold support for all three independent directors standing for re-election at the company’s Annual Meeting on August 4, 2015, in Philadelphia. "These long-tenured directors, who each joined the board in 1999, and serve together on the board’s Governance and Compensation Committee, have failed to implement a proposal to declassify the board of directors"...
California bill would protect carriers from misclassification claims — if they settle with drivers CCJ ...California lawmakers are considering a misclassification amnesty program for drayage companies that would relieve port drayage companies from liability for penalties associated with misclassification of drivers as independent contractors if the company enters into a settlement agreement with the state before 2017. The Teamsters-backed bill stipulates the agreement would also require the motor carrier to convert independent contractor truckers to employee drivers...
Growing Labor Movement Shakes Up Silicon Valley KQED ...Silicon Valley companies are reluctant to discuss the issue of wages and their relationships with their service workers. And they refuse to discuss the recent labor agitation and organizing. But they have to be aware of the increased activism. In February, for example, shuttle bus drivers for Yahoo, Apple, Genentech, eBay and Zynga voted to joined the Teamsters union...
Senator Feinstein: Safety first, not bigger trucks (opinion) The Hill ...the Senate Appropriations Committee recently approved an amendment to allow even longer trailer trucks on our highways. This provision stands in stark contrast to highway safety, putting the profits of trucking companies ahead of personal safety. The Teamsters Union opposed this amendment too, arguing that our highways are not designed for the larger configurations...
Global Labor & Trade
Japan minister says TPP deal without some nations possible The Mainichi ...Japan's minister in charge of a 12-country Pacific Rim free trade initiative said Tuesday one possible option is to reach a broad agreement without some members that are unwilling to end negotiations at the next ministerial meeting later this month in Hawaii. Economic and Fiscal Policy Minister Akira Amari did not name the countries he thinks could be excluded from a Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, but Canada and New Zealand are said to be lagging behind...
Trans-Pacific Partnership deal in sight, says Andrew Robb The Australian ...Trade Minister Andrew Robb is “confident’’ a deal on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership will be signed within weeks after a ministerial meeting to clinch the agreement late this month. Mr Robb also said he was confident that China, which is not party to the TPP negotiations, could eventually be able to join, as a precursor to creating an Asia-Pacific free-trade zone...
Canada and Ukraine announce 'milestone' free trade agreement The Guardian ...Canada formally announced a “milestone” free trade agreement with Ukraine after the two countries’ prime ministers met in Ottawa on Tuesday. The agreement, which has to be ratified by both nations’ parliaments, will be implemented as soon as possible, Stephen Harper said after meeting Arseniy Yatsenyuk. With more than a million people claiming roots in Ukraine, Canada has supported Kiev many times since the 2014 revolution...
The TPP's Bad Medicine Foreign Affairs ...U.S.-drafted TPP terms include patent linkage, which can allow spurious patent filings to delay generic market entry. Further, a proposed investor-state dispute settlement system would allow pharmaceutical corporations to force a government into arbitration over decisions that would reduce the price of medicines. A similar process has served as the platform for corporate challenges to the Canadian government’s invalidation of drug patents, antismoking regulations in Australia and Uruguay, and an environmental court ruling in Ecuador...
Undermining the State Department's trafficking report (opinion) The Hill ...Recent press reports suggest that the State Department will recommend that Secretary John Kerry take a shameless and unprincipled stand in this year's Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP Report) by concluding that the government of Malaysia is making significant efforts to combat human trafficking. The State Department is trying to ensure that, come what may, Malaysia can stay part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)...
TTIP will force all Europeans to take Greece's medicine (opinion) Politics UK ...If the Greek crisis has shown how the institutions of the EU will stop at nothing to force through their own brand of capitalist discipline, TTIP is confirmation that we will all soon be tasting the same medicine. This week sees the 10th round of negotiations towards the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the controversial EU-US trade deal that threatens our jobs, our public services and our democracy itself...
Greek parliament to vote on austerity bill amid growing dissent in governing party US News & World Report ...Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras faced a rising wave of hostility from members of his own party Wednesday ahead of a parliament vote on an austerity bill that condemns the country to years of spending cuts but is required to get a new bailout package. The raft of consumer tax increases and pension reforms has led to growing anger among Greece's governing left-wing Syriza party, while the country's civil servants' union voiced its objections with a 24-hour public sector strike...
Key Driver Of International Austerity Push Now Says Europe Must Forgive Greek Debt Think Progress ...A day after agreeing to discuss a new Greek bailout, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned European Union leaders that their expectations for Greece’s financial future are unsupported by the facts. A realistic accounting of things requires Europe to agree to forgive Greece’s debts or else leave them uncollected for a generation, a leaked report from the group says...
UK unemployment in surprise rise Yahoo News ...Britain's unemployment rate climbed to 5.6 percent in the quarter ending in May, with the number of jobless up for the first time in over two years, data showed Wednesday. Unemployment edged up from 5.5 percent in the quarter ending in February, the Office for National Statistics said in a statement...
Ecuador National Strike: Labor, Social Groups To Protest As Pressure On Correa Grows International Business Times ...Labor unions and social groups in Ecuador are planning a one-day national strike to launch another blow against President Rafael Correa, who is still grappling with mass outrage over a slate of tax proposals. Correa has accused opposition factions of fomenting a “soft coup” against his government. Unions and social and indigenous groups said this week that a “people’s national strike” would take place next month...
Farm Workers’ Global Struggle for Rights on the Job Solidarity Center ...Agriculture employs nearly half of the world’s workforce. Low-paying and seasonal, it also is one of the three most hazardous sectors for workers (along with construction and mining), according to the International Labor Organization. Despite the hardships, agricultural workers—cacao harvesters in the Dominican Republic, vegetable farmers in South Africa and Moroccan vineyard and olive grove laborers in Meknes—are joining with unions and worker associations to improve their workplaces and win rights on the job...
After Greece’s defeat, we need a new European movement against austerity (opinion) The Guardian ...Ater five months of negotiations, Sunday evening brought a moment of painful realisation: democracy has left the EU building. The proposals put forward by the German government and its allies were preposterous – a clear message that any government opposing neoliberalism and austerity should be brought to its knees at all costs...
State & Living Wage Battles
The Past Goes On Trial in North Carolina The Atlantic ...A group of plaintiffs—including the Justice Department, NAACP, and League of Women Voters—are suing the state over new voting laws implemented in 2013, saying that they represent an attempt to suppress the minority vote. The new laws were passed shortly after the Supreme Court struck down a section of the Voting Rights Act that required some jurisdictions to seek approval from the federal government before altering voting laws...
Scott Walker Strips Wisconsin Workers Of 'Living Wage' In New State Budget Huffington Post ...Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) signed the new state budget into law on Sunday with a last-minute change that strips the words "living wage" from state laws and replaces it with "minimum wage." The change means minimum-wage Wisconsin workers will earn nearly $6,000 per year less than what the Massachusetts Institute of Technology calculates is a living wage in the state...
Bangor considers raising minimum wage WCSH ...Bangor City Council has introduced an ordinance that would increase the city's minimum wage. The proposal comes a week after Portland's City Council voted to increase its minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. If the Bangor ordinance passes, the minimum wage would increase 75 cents every year for three years...
State unemployment rate climbs to 5.5 percent Statesman Journal ...Oregon’s unemployment rate was 5.5 percent in June, a slight increase from May’s rate of 5.3 percent. The increase was not a surprise because one characteristic of Oregon’s labor market following the Great Recession has been small increases in the unemployment rate during the summer months...
Oregon governor signs paid sick leave, retirement legislation Yahoo News ...Oregon Governor Kate Brown signed legislation on Monday mandating paid sick leave for nearly all workers and establishing a first-of-its kind state-run retirement program for private sector employees. Brown said the four bills, dubbed the "Fair Shot" agenda, will help working, low-income families...
Scott Walker makes Mitt Romney look like FDR: The Kohl’s shopper is even more callous toward the poor Salon ...Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker thinks his humble background gives him working class appeal. But we know the man who shops at Kohl’s is wholly owned by the Kochs. But if he wasn’t born a plutocrat, he’s a zealous convert to the cause. His first shot out of the gate Monday night, after his relatively successful campaign launch, was to attack the minimum wage on his friend Sean Hannity’s show...
Four Ways ALEC Tried to Ruin Your State This Year Alternet ...In a year with unprecedented rightwing dominance in state legislative chambers, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has continued to wreak havoc in states across the country--despite an ongoing exodus of high-profile corporate members, including BP, Google, and several high-tech firms...
WV Legislature staff finds prevailing wage documents missing from first submission State Journal ...A law passed during the 2015 regular legislative session called for the state’s prevailing wage rate to be recalculated, with the new method in place July 1, 2015. There currently is no prevailing wage rate in place because the wage expired and a new method has not yet been set and a proposal to allow an extension to Sept. 30 in which to set a rate was voted down...
U.S. Labor
USW Local 444 rejects three-year contract proposal Daily Gate City ...The Membership of United Steel Workers Local 444 has voted to reject a three year contract proposal from Henniges Automotive in Keokuk, according to a union news release. The ratification meeting took place Friday at the Grand Theatre in Keokuk after the proposal was reviewed before the membership. The union and the employer have agreed to continue work under the terms of the 2012-2015 bargaining agreement with an extension agreement signed July 10...
Alabama Company Admits Locking Katrina Workers in Squalid Camps, Settles for $20 Million Slate ...An Alabama company has agreed to a $20 million settlement and admitted that workers it brought from India to rebuild oil rigs after Hurricane Katrina were deceptively recruited and then forcibly corralled in squalid, overcrowded camps, the Los Angeles Times reports. The settlement covers several lawsuits brought against marine services company Signal International by 200 guest workers...
Fiat Chrysler, UAW agree on ending two-tier wages CBS ...Fiat Chrysler (FCUA) CEO Sergio Marchionne and United Auto Workers President Dennis Williams agree on at least one thing: getting rid of the two-tier wages for hourly workers in the company's U.S. plants. Marchionne and Williams formally opened bargaining a new four-year contract for Fiat Chrysler's 35,700 workers Tuesday. The current contract expires in September...
Teachers Say No Freaking Way to AFT Endorsement of Hillary Clinton Common Dreams ...On Saturday, July 11th - the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President, Randi Weingarten came under fire after her executive council voted overwhelmingly to endorse Hillary Clinton for the democratic primary for President of the United States. AFT is the parent organization of Washington Teachers' Union, Local 6 and has 1.5 million members...
Union to challenge new prison food contract Detroit Free Press ...A union representing state employees is challenging the State of Michigan's decision to take the prison food contract away from one private company and give the contract to a second company without first calling for bids. Michigan AFSCME Council 25 said today it will challenge as unlawful the $158-million three-year deal with Trinity...
UFW launches a sponsored AdelanTech Leadership Program The Californian ...A dozen Salinas-area residents have been selected for the first AdelanTECH Leadership Program that will empower emerging rural leaders into so-called “STEM” industries. STEM stands for science, technology, engineering and math. In an effort to give opportunities to dedicated but underserved students, the UFW in association with AT&T, CORO and Udacity will launch for the first time their AdelanTECH Leadership Program...
Growth in the ‘Gig Economy’ Fuels Work Force Anxieties New York Times ...When the California Labor Commissioner’s Office ruled last month that an Uber driver was an employee deserving of a variety of workplace protections — and was not, as the company maintained, an independent contractor — it highlighted the divided feelings many Americans have about what is increasingly being called the “gig economy”...
11 jobs where a hard day’s work only results in poverty Salon ...Why should people in the richest country on Earth toil long hours for wages that would make Charles Dickens recoil in horror? A lot of Americans have been wondering the same thing. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that in 2012, 1.57 million Americans earned the minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Millions more were just above that figure, and plenty actually ended up below it...
Miscellaneous
Martin O’Malley lays out broad immigration plan MSNBC ...Democratic presidential candidate Martin O’Malley outlined an extensive immigration plan on Tuesday, vowing that if elected, he would make comprehensive reform a priority on his first day in office. The former Maryland governor said he would expand President Obama’s embattled executive actions on immigration and ultimately press Congress to resurrect a bipartisan deal on comprehensive reform to extend a pathway to citizenship for the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the United States...
Black Children Almost 4 Times More Likely to Grow Up Poor Than Whites Common Dreams ...For the first time since the U.S. Census began, the number of black children living in poverty has surpassed the number of poor white children, despite the significant difference in population size, a new Pew Research study published Tuesday has found. According to the Pew analysis of recent Census data, in 2013, 14.7 million children in the U.S. (roughly 20 percent) lived in a household with an annual income below $23,624 for a family of four. This marks a decline of two percent since 2010...
Millennials Who Are Thriving Financially Have One Thing in Common The Atlantic ...there are those who are doing just great—owning a house, buying a car, and consistently putting money away for retirement. These, however, are not your run-of-the-mill Millennials. Nope. These Millennials have something very special: rich parents. These Millennials have help paying their tuition, meaning they graduate in much better financial shape than their peers...
ExxonMobil gave millions to climate-denying lawmakers despite pledge The Guardian ...ExxonMobil gave more than $2.3m to members of Congress and a corporate lobbying group that deny climate change and block efforts to fight climate change – eight years after pledging to stop its funding of climate denial, the Guardian has learned. Climate denial – from Republicans in Congress and lobby groups operating at the state level – is seen as a major obstacle to US and global efforts to fight climate change...
'Money Isn't Justice': Eric Garner Family Calls for Real Accountability Common Dreams ...The family of Eric Garner held a press conference Tuesday to discuss the $5.9 million settlement it reached with New York City days before the one-year anniversary of his death—and to renew calls to criminally charge the police officer who put Garner in a fatal chokehold last July. Garner, an unarmed 43-year-old black man, died on July 17, 2014 after white New York City police officer Daniel Pantaleo used a chokehold to subdue him...
Teamsters Urge Airgas Investors to Vote Against Directors Teamster.org ...In a letter to Airgas stockholders, Teamsters General Secretary-Treasurer Ken Hall is urging shareholders to withhold support for all three independent directors standing for re-election at the company’s Annual Meeting on August 4, 2015, in Philadelphia. "These long-tenured directors, who each joined the board in 1999, and serve together on the board’s Governance and Compensation Committee, have failed to implement a proposal to declassify the board of directors"...
California bill would protect carriers from misclassification claims — if they settle with drivers CCJ ...California lawmakers are considering a misclassification amnesty program for drayage companies that would relieve port drayage companies from liability for penalties associated with misclassification of drivers as independent contractors if the company enters into a settlement agreement with the state before 2017. The Teamsters-backed bill stipulates the agreement would also require the motor carrier to convert independent contractor truckers to employee drivers...
Growing Labor Movement Shakes Up Silicon Valley KQED ...Silicon Valley companies are reluctant to discuss the issue of wages and their relationships with their service workers. And they refuse to discuss the recent labor agitation and organizing. But they have to be aware of the increased activism. In February, for example, shuttle bus drivers for Yahoo, Apple, Genentech, eBay and Zynga voted to joined the Teamsters union...
Senator Feinstein: Safety first, not bigger trucks (opinion) The Hill ...the Senate Appropriations Committee recently approved an amendment to allow even longer trailer trucks on our highways. This provision stands in stark contrast to highway safety, putting the profits of trucking companies ahead of personal safety. The Teamsters Union opposed this amendment too, arguing that our highways are not designed for the larger configurations...
Global Labor & Trade
Japan minister says TPP deal without some nations possible The Mainichi ...Japan's minister in charge of a 12-country Pacific Rim free trade initiative said Tuesday one possible option is to reach a broad agreement without some members that are unwilling to end negotiations at the next ministerial meeting later this month in Hawaii. Economic and Fiscal Policy Minister Akira Amari did not name the countries he thinks could be excluded from a Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, but Canada and New Zealand are said to be lagging behind...
Trans-Pacific Partnership deal in sight, says Andrew Robb The Australian ...Trade Minister Andrew Robb is “confident’’ a deal on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership will be signed within weeks after a ministerial meeting to clinch the agreement late this month. Mr Robb also said he was confident that China, which is not party to the TPP negotiations, could eventually be able to join, as a precursor to creating an Asia-Pacific free-trade zone...
Canada and Ukraine announce 'milestone' free trade agreement The Guardian ...Canada formally announced a “milestone” free trade agreement with Ukraine after the two countries’ prime ministers met in Ottawa on Tuesday. The agreement, which has to be ratified by both nations’ parliaments, will be implemented as soon as possible, Stephen Harper said after meeting Arseniy Yatsenyuk. With more than a million people claiming roots in Ukraine, Canada has supported Kiev many times since the 2014 revolution...
The TPP's Bad Medicine Foreign Affairs ...U.S.-drafted TPP terms include patent linkage, which can allow spurious patent filings to delay generic market entry. Further, a proposed investor-state dispute settlement system would allow pharmaceutical corporations to force a government into arbitration over decisions that would reduce the price of medicines. A similar process has served as the platform for corporate challenges to the Canadian government’s invalidation of drug patents, antismoking regulations in Australia and Uruguay, and an environmental court ruling in Ecuador...
Undermining the State Department's trafficking report (opinion) The Hill ...Recent press reports suggest that the State Department will recommend that Secretary John Kerry take a shameless and unprincipled stand in this year's Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP Report) by concluding that the government of Malaysia is making significant efforts to combat human trafficking. The State Department is trying to ensure that, come what may, Malaysia can stay part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)...
TTIP will force all Europeans to take Greece's medicine (opinion) Politics UK ...If the Greek crisis has shown how the institutions of the EU will stop at nothing to force through their own brand of capitalist discipline, TTIP is confirmation that we will all soon be tasting the same medicine. This week sees the 10th round of negotiations towards the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the controversial EU-US trade deal that threatens our jobs, our public services and our democracy itself...
Greek parliament to vote on austerity bill amid growing dissent in governing party US News & World Report ...Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras faced a rising wave of hostility from members of his own party Wednesday ahead of a parliament vote on an austerity bill that condemns the country to years of spending cuts but is required to get a new bailout package. The raft of consumer tax increases and pension reforms has led to growing anger among Greece's governing left-wing Syriza party, while the country's civil servants' union voiced its objections with a 24-hour public sector strike...
Key Driver Of International Austerity Push Now Says Europe Must Forgive Greek Debt Think Progress ...A day after agreeing to discuss a new Greek bailout, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned European Union leaders that their expectations for Greece’s financial future are unsupported by the facts. A realistic accounting of things requires Europe to agree to forgive Greece’s debts or else leave them uncollected for a generation, a leaked report from the group says...
UK unemployment in surprise rise Yahoo News ...Britain's unemployment rate climbed to 5.6 percent in the quarter ending in May, with the number of jobless up for the first time in over two years, data showed Wednesday. Unemployment edged up from 5.5 percent in the quarter ending in February, the Office for National Statistics said in a statement...
Ecuador National Strike: Labor, Social Groups To Protest As Pressure On Correa Grows International Business Times ...Labor unions and social groups in Ecuador are planning a one-day national strike to launch another blow against President Rafael Correa, who is still grappling with mass outrage over a slate of tax proposals. Correa has accused opposition factions of fomenting a “soft coup” against his government. Unions and social and indigenous groups said this week that a “people’s national strike” would take place next month...
Farm Workers’ Global Struggle for Rights on the Job Solidarity Center ...Agriculture employs nearly half of the world’s workforce. Low-paying and seasonal, it also is one of the three most hazardous sectors for workers (along with construction and mining), according to the International Labor Organization. Despite the hardships, agricultural workers—cacao harvesters in the Dominican Republic, vegetable farmers in South Africa and Moroccan vineyard and olive grove laborers in Meknes—are joining with unions and worker associations to improve their workplaces and win rights on the job...
After Greece’s defeat, we need a new European movement against austerity (opinion) The Guardian ...Ater five months of negotiations, Sunday evening brought a moment of painful realisation: democracy has left the EU building. The proposals put forward by the German government and its allies were preposterous – a clear message that any government opposing neoliberalism and austerity should be brought to its knees at all costs...
State & Living Wage Battles
The Past Goes On Trial in North Carolina The Atlantic ...A group of plaintiffs—including the Justice Department, NAACP, and League of Women Voters—are suing the state over new voting laws implemented in 2013, saying that they represent an attempt to suppress the minority vote. The new laws were passed shortly after the Supreme Court struck down a section of the Voting Rights Act that required some jurisdictions to seek approval from the federal government before altering voting laws...
Scott Walker Strips Wisconsin Workers Of 'Living Wage' In New State Budget Huffington Post ...Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) signed the new state budget into law on Sunday with a last-minute change that strips the words "living wage" from state laws and replaces it with "minimum wage." The change means minimum-wage Wisconsin workers will earn nearly $6,000 per year less than what the Massachusetts Institute of Technology calculates is a living wage in the state...
Bangor considers raising minimum wage WCSH ...Bangor City Council has introduced an ordinance that would increase the city's minimum wage. The proposal comes a week after Portland's City Council voted to increase its minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. If the Bangor ordinance passes, the minimum wage would increase 75 cents every year for three years...
State unemployment rate climbs to 5.5 percent Statesman Journal ...Oregon’s unemployment rate was 5.5 percent in June, a slight increase from May’s rate of 5.3 percent. The increase was not a surprise because one characteristic of Oregon’s labor market following the Great Recession has been small increases in the unemployment rate during the summer months...
Oregon governor signs paid sick leave, retirement legislation Yahoo News ...Oregon Governor Kate Brown signed legislation on Monday mandating paid sick leave for nearly all workers and establishing a first-of-its kind state-run retirement program for private sector employees. Brown said the four bills, dubbed the "Fair Shot" agenda, will help working, low-income families...
Scott Walker makes Mitt Romney look like FDR: The Kohl’s shopper is even more callous toward the poor Salon ...Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker thinks his humble background gives him working class appeal. But we know the man who shops at Kohl’s is wholly owned by the Kochs. But if he wasn’t born a plutocrat, he’s a zealous convert to the cause. His first shot out of the gate Monday night, after his relatively successful campaign launch, was to attack the minimum wage on his friend Sean Hannity’s show...
Four Ways ALEC Tried to Ruin Your State This Year Alternet ...In a year with unprecedented rightwing dominance in state legislative chambers, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has continued to wreak havoc in states across the country--despite an ongoing exodus of high-profile corporate members, including BP, Google, and several high-tech firms...
WV Legislature staff finds prevailing wage documents missing from first submission State Journal ...A law passed during the 2015 regular legislative session called for the state’s prevailing wage rate to be recalculated, with the new method in place July 1, 2015. There currently is no prevailing wage rate in place because the wage expired and a new method has not yet been set and a proposal to allow an extension to Sept. 30 in which to set a rate was voted down...
U.S. Labor
USW Local 444 rejects three-year contract proposal Daily Gate City ...The Membership of United Steel Workers Local 444 has voted to reject a three year contract proposal from Henniges Automotive in Keokuk, according to a union news release. The ratification meeting took place Friday at the Grand Theatre in Keokuk after the proposal was reviewed before the membership. The union and the employer have agreed to continue work under the terms of the 2012-2015 bargaining agreement with an extension agreement signed July 10...
Alabama Company Admits Locking Katrina Workers in Squalid Camps, Settles for $20 Million Slate ...An Alabama company has agreed to a $20 million settlement and admitted that workers it brought from India to rebuild oil rigs after Hurricane Katrina were deceptively recruited and then forcibly corralled in squalid, overcrowded camps, the Los Angeles Times reports. The settlement covers several lawsuits brought against marine services company Signal International by 200 guest workers...
Fiat Chrysler, UAW agree on ending two-tier wages CBS ...Fiat Chrysler (FCUA) CEO Sergio Marchionne and United Auto Workers President Dennis Williams agree on at least one thing: getting rid of the two-tier wages for hourly workers in the company's U.S. plants. Marchionne and Williams formally opened bargaining a new four-year contract for Fiat Chrysler's 35,700 workers Tuesday. The current contract expires in September...
Teachers Say No Freaking Way to AFT Endorsement of Hillary Clinton Common Dreams ...On Saturday, July 11th - the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President, Randi Weingarten came under fire after her executive council voted overwhelmingly to endorse Hillary Clinton for the democratic primary for President of the United States. AFT is the parent organization of Washington Teachers' Union, Local 6 and has 1.5 million members...
Union to challenge new prison food contract Detroit Free Press ...A union representing state employees is challenging the State of Michigan's decision to take the prison food contract away from one private company and give the contract to a second company without first calling for bids. Michigan AFSCME Council 25 said today it will challenge as unlawful the $158-million three-year deal with Trinity...
UFW launches a sponsored AdelanTech Leadership Program The Californian ...A dozen Salinas-area residents have been selected for the first AdelanTECH Leadership Program that will empower emerging rural leaders into so-called “STEM” industries. STEM stands for science, technology, engineering and math. In an effort to give opportunities to dedicated but underserved students, the UFW in association with AT&T, CORO and Udacity will launch for the first time their AdelanTECH Leadership Program...
Growth in the ‘Gig Economy’ Fuels Work Force Anxieties New York Times ...When the California Labor Commissioner’s Office ruled last month that an Uber driver was an employee deserving of a variety of workplace protections — and was not, as the company maintained, an independent contractor — it highlighted the divided feelings many Americans have about what is increasingly being called the “gig economy”...
11 jobs where a hard day’s work only results in poverty Salon ...Why should people in the richest country on Earth toil long hours for wages that would make Charles Dickens recoil in horror? A lot of Americans have been wondering the same thing. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that in 2012, 1.57 million Americans earned the minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Millions more were just above that figure, and plenty actually ended up below it...
Miscellaneous
Martin O’Malley lays out broad immigration plan MSNBC ...Democratic presidential candidate Martin O’Malley outlined an extensive immigration plan on Tuesday, vowing that if elected, he would make comprehensive reform a priority on his first day in office. The former Maryland governor said he would expand President Obama’s embattled executive actions on immigration and ultimately press Congress to resurrect a bipartisan deal on comprehensive reform to extend a pathway to citizenship for the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the United States...
Black Children Almost 4 Times More Likely to Grow Up Poor Than Whites Common Dreams ...For the first time since the U.S. Census began, the number of black children living in poverty has surpassed the number of poor white children, despite the significant difference in population size, a new Pew Research study published Tuesday has found. According to the Pew analysis of recent Census data, in 2013, 14.7 million children in the U.S. (roughly 20 percent) lived in a household with an annual income below $23,624 for a family of four. This marks a decline of two percent since 2010...
Millennials Who Are Thriving Financially Have One Thing in Common The Atlantic ...there are those who are doing just great—owning a house, buying a car, and consistently putting money away for retirement. These, however, are not your run-of-the-mill Millennials. Nope. These Millennials have something very special: rich parents. These Millennials have help paying their tuition, meaning they graduate in much better financial shape than their peers...
ExxonMobil gave millions to climate-denying lawmakers despite pledge The Guardian ...ExxonMobil gave more than $2.3m to members of Congress and a corporate lobbying group that deny climate change and block efforts to fight climate change – eight years after pledging to stop its funding of climate denial, the Guardian has learned. Climate denial – from Republicans in Congress and lobby groups operating at the state level – is seen as a major obstacle to US and global efforts to fight climate change...
'Money Isn't Justice': Eric Garner Family Calls for Real Accountability Common Dreams ...The family of Eric Garner held a press conference Tuesday to discuss the $5.9 million settlement it reached with New York City days before the one-year anniversary of his death—and to renew calls to criminally charge the police officer who put Garner in a fatal chokehold last July. Garner, an unarmed 43-year-old black man, died on July 17, 2014 after white New York City police officer Daniel Pantaleo used a chokehold to subdue him...
Wednesday, July 8, 2015
Democracy vs. austerity: Greece draws the line against global loan sharks
Last week our brothers and sisters in Greece's trade unions hung a massive banner from the country's Finance Ministry building which read: "No to blackmail and austerity."
A few days later Greek society echoed that defiant sentiment with a resounding "No" vote against the latest round of cuts demanded by European and international creditors on a nation already collapsing under the weight of austerity.
Following Sunday's vote, Greece saw celebrations in the streets while observers wondered if the rejection of concessions to the "troika" institutions -- the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the IMF -- signaled Greece's exit from the Eurozone (or "Grexit").
As Think Progress reported following Sunday's referendum vote,
Following Sunday's vote, Greece saw celebrations in the streets while observers wondered if the rejection of concessions to the "troika" institutions -- the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the IMF -- signaled Greece's exit from the Eurozone (or "Grexit").
As Think Progress reported following Sunday's referendum vote,
Greeks overwhelmingly voted against a European deal to extend financing to the country’s banks that would have required more harsh austerity measures on the part of the government. Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who came to power in large part on a promise to reject more austerity measures, had called the referendum to get more bargaining power in the dealmaking process. Greeks rejoiced at the news of the vote.
The country’s financial fate is far from certain, and the prospects of Greece coming to an agreement with European creditors may now be dimmer after the no vote. In the meantime, Greek banks remain closed, the economy is suffering from the financial chaos, and any new bailout agreement may now come with a higher price tag.
The historic vote against austerity is a vote against more budget cuts, privatization and high taxes on financially-strapped workers -- the same policies that have been strangling Greece's financial system. Now Prime Minister Tsipras, who supported the vote against more austerity, is scrambling to put together another bailout proposal.
Led by Germany (with its own history of failing to repay its debts), the assault on workers and the poor in Greece is both economic and political. When Greeks dared to elect the anti-austerity Syriza party to power -- after years of savage cuts imposed by bank-installed technocrats -- powerful creditors were determined to punish them.
Economist Paul Krugman explains:
But, as has always been the case, austerity didn't break the cycle of debt -- it only accelerated it (something even the IMF admits). This should be no surprise for an institution with a long history of ensnaring impoverished countries of the Global South under mountains for odious debt, a recipe for privatizing their natural resources and selling them off the highest multinational bidder. In Greece, unemployment stands above 25 percent and more than 50 percent of Greek youths are jobless.
The solution, says Dean Baker, is simple -- stop the austerity:
All of this may seem a little distant to working families on this side of the Atlantic. But what happens in the eurozone will reverberate across the global economy. And it wasn't long ago when austerity was on the lips American lawmakers and business leaders as a "solution" to our economic crisis.
For the corporate class, the fallout from the 2008 financial meltdown in the U.S. was an opportunity to gut the public sector and shift the costs of the crisis onto the backs of working Americans. The government took on massive debts accumulated on Wall Street, which provided the perfect conditions of "disaster capitalism" to cut public spending. We are now living with the consequences of budget cuts at state and local levels nationwide -- targeting everything from workers' pensions to basic services (which have been increasingly privatized).
Events in Europe are a lesson on how deep austerity can cut before hitting a nerve of democratic revolt. We all must stand in solidarity with the popular movement against austerity in Greece.
Led by Germany (with its own history of failing to repay its debts), the assault on workers and the poor in Greece is both economic and political. When Greeks dared to elect the anti-austerity Syriza party to power -- after years of savage cuts imposed by bank-installed technocrats -- powerful creditors were determined to punish them.
Economist Paul Krugman explains:
The campaign of bullying -- the attempt to terrify Greeks by cutting off bank financing and threatening general chaos, all with the almost open goal of pushing the current leftist government out of office -- was a shameful moment in a Europe that claims to believe in democratic principles. It would have set a terrible precedent if that campaign had succeeded, even if the creditors were making sense.
What’s more, they weren’t. The truth is that Europe’s self-styled technocrats are like medieval doctors who insisted on bleeding their patients -- and when their treatment made the patients sicker, demanded even more bleeding. A “yes” vote in Greece would have condemned the country to years more of suffering under policies that haven’t worked and in fact, given the arithmetic, can’t work: austerity probably shrinks the economy faster than it reduces debt, so that all the suffering serves no purpose.It's important to remember the economic crisis began in part with shady financial practices by financial giants like Goldman Sachs that allowed Greece to grow and conceal its debt. Over the years, previous governments in Athens have surrendered to international loan sharks, submitting to intense austerity measures that were supposed to pull Greece back from the brink of default and to a place of economic stability.
But, as has always been the case, austerity didn't break the cycle of debt -- it only accelerated it (something even the IMF admits). This should be no surprise for an institution with a long history of ensnaring impoverished countries of the Global South under mountains for odious debt, a recipe for privatizing their natural resources and selling them off the highest multinational bidder. In Greece, unemployment stands above 25 percent and more than 50 percent of Greek youths are jobless.
The solution, says Dean Baker, is simple -- stop the austerity:
The best solution would be a turn by the eurozone leadership away from austerity. Germany and other countries are not lending money to the Greeks to support their profligate lifestyles, they are lending money to Greece to allow the country to get through the austerity that its creditors have imposed on the country. If Greece's economy was allowed to grow, then it would not be facing a budget deficit.As far as what Greece owes, the solution is simpler: forgive the debt. Just as Germany was allowed to write down its postwar debt, relief for Greece could similarly lead to restored economic growth.
All of this may seem a little distant to working families on this side of the Atlantic. But what happens in the eurozone will reverberate across the global economy. And it wasn't long ago when austerity was on the lips American lawmakers and business leaders as a "solution" to our economic crisis.
For the corporate class, the fallout from the 2008 financial meltdown in the U.S. was an opportunity to gut the public sector and shift the costs of the crisis onto the backs of working Americans. The government took on massive debts accumulated on Wall Street, which provided the perfect conditions of "disaster capitalism" to cut public spending. We are now living with the consequences of budget cuts at state and local levels nationwide -- targeting everything from workers' pensions to basic services (which have been increasingly privatized).
Events in Europe are a lesson on how deep austerity can cut before hitting a nerve of democratic revolt. We all must stand in solidarity with the popular movement against austerity in Greece.
Monday, June 8, 2015
Today's Teamster News 06.08.15
Teamsters
Port truckers for Chinese company demand Teamsters recognition Daily Breeze ...Contract drivers for a Chinese-owned trucking company will deliver a letter today to their employer demanding that their right to be represented by the Teamsters be recognized. The drivers for Intermodal Bridge Transport, or IBT, are part of a pair of class action lawsuits and one 16-person lawsuit contending that they are misclassified as independent contractors, and actually do the work of full-time employees...
Disney World's confidentiality warning riles actors' union Associated Press ...Teamsters Local 385 said in the complaint that Disney was committing an unfair labor practice. A grievance was filed last week with the company. The two-week-old written policy prevents actors from publicly revealing in social media or traditional media which characters they play, according to the union...
Global Labor & Trade
Confidential USTR Emails Show Close Industry Involvement In TPP Negotiations IP Watch ...While a full range of stakeholders would be affected by the outcome of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement under secret negotiation by the United States and a dozen trading partners, corporate representatives have had a special seat at the negotiating table, as shown by hundreds of pages of confidential emails from the US Trade Representative’s office obtained by Intellectual Property Watch...
Trade Pacts Face Growing Pushback Wall Street Journal ...The decades-old argument that major trade agreements boost both exports and jobs at home is losing its political punch, even in some of the country’s most export-heavy congressional districts. In the 10 districts with the biggest export growth since 2006, only three of the representatives say they back legislation to help President Barack Obama wrap up a major Pacific trade deal...
Trade supporters bullish as vote nears The Hill ...House GOP leaders are expressing a bold new confidence heading into the final stretch of the divisive fight over granting President Obama broad trade powers. The vote, expected as soon as this week, is likely to be a nail-biter — scores of lawmakers in both parties remain publicly undecided, making the count on both sides difficult to pin down...
Big Pharma seeks special trade deal Politico ...A revolutionary class of drugs with the potential to treat intractable diseases like cancer and other killers — as well as to explode health spending globally — is at the center of the toughest negotiations of the biggest trade deal in history. The pharmaceutical industry has been pressing the Obama administration to insist that the Trans-Pacific Partnership include 12 years of monopoly pricing power for the makers of these complex and costly drugs...
Black Caucus Is Wooed for Trade Pact Votes New York Times ...Until the vote is called, a lot of black Democrats will find themselves in a painful, public squeeze between the president they admire and do not want to see fail and the unions that have sustained them for years. “I’m hoping he doesn’t call,” fretted one veteran black House Democrat, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he counts Mr. Obama as a friend who has stood by him on political matters...
Obama and his GOP allies launch big effort to win trade fight in the House Washington Post ...President Obama opened an intense final round of lobbying to win support for his sweeping Pacific Rim trade accord ahead of a crucial vote in the House as soon as next week, expressing confidence that he will overcome deepening skepticism among fellow Democrats. The push from the president included direct calls to lawmakers, interviews with television stations in key states and plans to bring several Democrats aboard Air Force One with him to a summit in Germany...
Fast-track vote still up in the air Politico ...Supporters of a controversial trade bill are increasingly confident they can secure the votes needed to pass so-called fast-track legislation when it hits the House floor, which could come as early as this week. Only about a dozen members remain undecided, most of them Democrats, and President Barack Obama is expected to make another lobbying push this week to try and win over wavering members of his party...
20,000+ Police March In Force Against G7 Protests in Germany Common Dreams ...Though outnumbered by police by approximately two-to-one, thousands of people took to the streets of the Alpine resort town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany on Saturday to express their opposition to the hegemonic and neoliberal policies of the G7 nations. Speaking out against the destructive policies of the world's leading industrialized nations organized groups and individuals who participated in the protest carried signs and banners decrying inaction on climate change, the pending TransAtlantic Trade in Partnership (TTIP) agreement...
Ukraine Labor Dares Operation Vulture Truthout ...Many workers are simply not getting paid, and what they actually are being paid is often illegally low. Employers are taking whatever money is in their business accounts and squirreling it away – preferably abroad, or at least in foreign currency. For labor leaders, the problem is not only to collect back wages, but to survive with a future living wage. If they refrain from protesting, they simply won’t get paid...
Brinkmanship on Display as Greece Rejects 'Irrational' IMF Proposals Common Dreams ...Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday rejected the financial aid proposal of introduced by foreign creditors overseeing the country's bailout, saying the Syriza government cannot accept "irrational" proposals that call for additional austerity measures while offering nothing in the way of debt relief. In a rarely used move, Tsipras announced Greece would defer a series of payments to the end of the month as negotiations with the troika—the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Central Bank, and the European Commission—continued...
State & Living Wage Battles
Sen. Richard, governor disagree on impact of right-to-work The Joplin Globe ...In vetoing the bill Thursday, Nixon said the measure is designed to undermine labor organizations that produce highly skilled workers for Missouri employers. He called the measure an "attack on working Missourians" which he said would stunt economic growth by reducing work force training opportunities and driving down wages...
Prevailing wage fight blooms on Kane County Board Daily Herald ...Now, having grudgingly supported a watered-down Kane County resolution calling for reform in Springfield in May, Frasz is urging his colleagues to cast at least a symbolic vote rejecting the entire state prevailing wage law. On Friday, he gained at least three supporters during a meeting of the Kane County Forest Preserve Commission's executive committee...
$15 minimum wage proposal faces business backlash STL Today ...The minimum-wage bill would apply to any businesses with more than 15 employees and $500,000 in annual sales. It would raise the wage floor to $10 an hour this summer and $15 on Jan. 1, 2020. Seattle and San Francisco have already passed $15 minimum-wage ordinances, and Los Angeles is considering one. St. Louis, however, isn’t like those West Coast places. It has a lower cost of living and a slow-growing economy, and the city is small relative to its suburbs...
Public comment hearing on proposed voter ID rules set for Tuesday Winston-Salem Journal ...People have an opportunity locally this week to voice their thoughts on the State Board of Elections’ proposed rules for implementing the state’s voter ID law. Winston-Salem was one of nine locations selected by the State Board of Elections to host public comment hearings on the proposed rules, which outline procedures such as how precinct officials are supposed to determine whether the person pictured in the ID matches the individual checking in to vote...
Here Are All the Reasons Walmart’s Business Is Not Sustainable The Nation ...Walmart’s “savings” from cheap labor gets passed through its US supply chain, too: The federal government recently cracked down on a Walmart egg supplier for “discriminatory practices” in intrusive screening of immigrant workers. One major lettuce supplier, Taylor Farms, has been hit by a wage-theft class-action lawsuit along with scandals over alleged union-busting and abuse of migrant workers in California...
U.S. Labor
Pittsburgh Labor Board finds in favor of Duquesne Adjuncts Pittsburgh Courier ...The Pittsburgh regional office of the National Labor Relations Board issued a decision June 5 ordering that Duquesne University recognize the Adjunct Faculty Association of the United Steelworkers as the collective bargaining representative of part-time faculty at Duquesne’s McAnulty College of Liberal Arts. Part-time faculty at the College voted overwhelmingly to organize with the AFA-USW in 2012...
May Saw The Highest Number Of Jobs Created All Year Think Progress ...The economy added 280,000 jobs in May while the unemployment rate was little changed at 5.5 percent, according to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Analysts had expected 225,000 jobs to be added. May was the best month for jobs added since December...
Greenbrier, IBEW finish contract NP Telegraph ...Employees of Greenbrier Rail Services at Hershey joined with their new union brothers Friday afternoon to celebrate the ratification of Greenbrier’s contract with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1920. The contract was ratified on May 27...
Pot Legalization Could Bring A Million Jobs to California Alternet ...An estimated 100,000 people are currently employed in California's marijuana industry, but that number could grow 10-fold within a few years, according to the California Cannabis Industry Association. There is one big "if," though. That's if California actually gets around to legalizing it next year...
Miscellaneous
The link between police tactics and economic conditions cannot be ignored The Guardian ...The failed war on drugs tripled the number of people in prison, even as crime rates in the US fell to the lowest levels in a generation. Nearly 1.5m African American men are in prison and missing from society due, in large part, to a criminal justice system that locks them up and limits their options upon release. Cities, starved of funding by austerity-obsessed leaders, write tickets and charge fees for residents already struggling to avoid hunger and eviction...
Traumatized by 3 Years at Rikers Without Charge, Ex-Teen Prisoner Kalief Browder Commits Suicide Democracy Now ...A young man imprisoned for three years at Rikers Island jail in New York without charge has committed suicide. Kalief Browder was a 16-year-old high school sophomore when he was detained on suspicion of stealing a backpack. Browder never pleaded guilty and was never convicted. After enduring nearly 800 days in solitary confinement and abuses from guards, Browder was only released when the case was dismissed...
Port truckers for Chinese company demand Teamsters recognition Daily Breeze ...Contract drivers for a Chinese-owned trucking company will deliver a letter today to their employer demanding that their right to be represented by the Teamsters be recognized. The drivers for Intermodal Bridge Transport, or IBT, are part of a pair of class action lawsuits and one 16-person lawsuit contending that they are misclassified as independent contractors, and actually do the work of full-time employees...
Disney World's confidentiality warning riles actors' union Associated Press ...Teamsters Local 385 said in the complaint that Disney was committing an unfair labor practice. A grievance was filed last week with the company. The two-week-old written policy prevents actors from publicly revealing in social media or traditional media which characters they play, according to the union...
Global Labor & Trade
Confidential USTR Emails Show Close Industry Involvement In TPP Negotiations IP Watch ...While a full range of stakeholders would be affected by the outcome of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement under secret negotiation by the United States and a dozen trading partners, corporate representatives have had a special seat at the negotiating table, as shown by hundreds of pages of confidential emails from the US Trade Representative’s office obtained by Intellectual Property Watch...
Trade Pacts Face Growing Pushback Wall Street Journal ...The decades-old argument that major trade agreements boost both exports and jobs at home is losing its political punch, even in some of the country’s most export-heavy congressional districts. In the 10 districts with the biggest export growth since 2006, only three of the representatives say they back legislation to help President Barack Obama wrap up a major Pacific trade deal...
Trade supporters bullish as vote nears The Hill ...House GOP leaders are expressing a bold new confidence heading into the final stretch of the divisive fight over granting President Obama broad trade powers. The vote, expected as soon as this week, is likely to be a nail-biter — scores of lawmakers in both parties remain publicly undecided, making the count on both sides difficult to pin down...
Big Pharma seeks special trade deal Politico ...A revolutionary class of drugs with the potential to treat intractable diseases like cancer and other killers — as well as to explode health spending globally — is at the center of the toughest negotiations of the biggest trade deal in history. The pharmaceutical industry has been pressing the Obama administration to insist that the Trans-Pacific Partnership include 12 years of monopoly pricing power for the makers of these complex and costly drugs...
Black Caucus Is Wooed for Trade Pact Votes New York Times ...Until the vote is called, a lot of black Democrats will find themselves in a painful, public squeeze between the president they admire and do not want to see fail and the unions that have sustained them for years. “I’m hoping he doesn’t call,” fretted one veteran black House Democrat, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he counts Mr. Obama as a friend who has stood by him on political matters...
Obama and his GOP allies launch big effort to win trade fight in the House Washington Post ...President Obama opened an intense final round of lobbying to win support for his sweeping Pacific Rim trade accord ahead of a crucial vote in the House as soon as next week, expressing confidence that he will overcome deepening skepticism among fellow Democrats. The push from the president included direct calls to lawmakers, interviews with television stations in key states and plans to bring several Democrats aboard Air Force One with him to a summit in Germany...
Fast-track vote still up in the air Politico ...Supporters of a controversial trade bill are increasingly confident they can secure the votes needed to pass so-called fast-track legislation when it hits the House floor, which could come as early as this week. Only about a dozen members remain undecided, most of them Democrats, and President Barack Obama is expected to make another lobbying push this week to try and win over wavering members of his party...
20,000+ Police March In Force Against G7 Protests in Germany Common Dreams ...Though outnumbered by police by approximately two-to-one, thousands of people took to the streets of the Alpine resort town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany on Saturday to express their opposition to the hegemonic and neoliberal policies of the G7 nations. Speaking out against the destructive policies of the world's leading industrialized nations organized groups and individuals who participated in the protest carried signs and banners decrying inaction on climate change, the pending TransAtlantic Trade in Partnership (TTIP) agreement...
Ukraine Labor Dares Operation Vulture Truthout ...Many workers are simply not getting paid, and what they actually are being paid is often illegally low. Employers are taking whatever money is in their business accounts and squirreling it away – preferably abroad, or at least in foreign currency. For labor leaders, the problem is not only to collect back wages, but to survive with a future living wage. If they refrain from protesting, they simply won’t get paid...
Brinkmanship on Display as Greece Rejects 'Irrational' IMF Proposals Common Dreams ...Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday rejected the financial aid proposal of introduced by foreign creditors overseeing the country's bailout, saying the Syriza government cannot accept "irrational" proposals that call for additional austerity measures while offering nothing in the way of debt relief. In a rarely used move, Tsipras announced Greece would defer a series of payments to the end of the month as negotiations with the troika—the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Central Bank, and the European Commission—continued...
Sen. Richard, governor disagree on impact of right-to-work The Joplin Globe ...In vetoing the bill Thursday, Nixon said the measure is designed to undermine labor organizations that produce highly skilled workers for Missouri employers. He called the measure an "attack on working Missourians" which he said would stunt economic growth by reducing work force training opportunities and driving down wages...
Prevailing wage fight blooms on Kane County Board Daily Herald ...Now, having grudgingly supported a watered-down Kane County resolution calling for reform in Springfield in May, Frasz is urging his colleagues to cast at least a symbolic vote rejecting the entire state prevailing wage law. On Friday, he gained at least three supporters during a meeting of the Kane County Forest Preserve Commission's executive committee...
$15 minimum wage proposal faces business backlash STL Today ...The minimum-wage bill would apply to any businesses with more than 15 employees and $500,000 in annual sales. It would raise the wage floor to $10 an hour this summer and $15 on Jan. 1, 2020. Seattle and San Francisco have already passed $15 minimum-wage ordinances, and Los Angeles is considering one. St. Louis, however, isn’t like those West Coast places. It has a lower cost of living and a slow-growing economy, and the city is small relative to its suburbs...
Public comment hearing on proposed voter ID rules set for Tuesday Winston-Salem Journal ...People have an opportunity locally this week to voice their thoughts on the State Board of Elections’ proposed rules for implementing the state’s voter ID law. Winston-Salem was one of nine locations selected by the State Board of Elections to host public comment hearings on the proposed rules, which outline procedures such as how precinct officials are supposed to determine whether the person pictured in the ID matches the individual checking in to vote...
Here Are All the Reasons Walmart’s Business Is Not Sustainable The Nation ...Walmart’s “savings” from cheap labor gets passed through its US supply chain, too: The federal government recently cracked down on a Walmart egg supplier for “discriminatory practices” in intrusive screening of immigrant workers. One major lettuce supplier, Taylor Farms, has been hit by a wage-theft class-action lawsuit along with scandals over alleged union-busting and abuse of migrant workers in California...
U.S. Labor
Pittsburgh Labor Board finds in favor of Duquesne Adjuncts Pittsburgh Courier ...The Pittsburgh regional office of the National Labor Relations Board issued a decision June 5 ordering that Duquesne University recognize the Adjunct Faculty Association of the United Steelworkers as the collective bargaining representative of part-time faculty at Duquesne’s McAnulty College of Liberal Arts. Part-time faculty at the College voted overwhelmingly to organize with the AFA-USW in 2012...
May Saw The Highest Number Of Jobs Created All Year Think Progress ...The economy added 280,000 jobs in May while the unemployment rate was little changed at 5.5 percent, according to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Analysts had expected 225,000 jobs to be added. May was the best month for jobs added since December...
Greenbrier, IBEW finish contract NP Telegraph ...Employees of Greenbrier Rail Services at Hershey joined with their new union brothers Friday afternoon to celebrate the ratification of Greenbrier’s contract with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1920. The contract was ratified on May 27...
Pot Legalization Could Bring A Million Jobs to California Alternet ...An estimated 100,000 people are currently employed in California's marijuana industry, but that number could grow 10-fold within a few years, according to the California Cannabis Industry Association. There is one big "if," though. That's if California actually gets around to legalizing it next year...
Miscellaneous
The link between police tactics and economic conditions cannot be ignored The Guardian ...The failed war on drugs tripled the number of people in prison, even as crime rates in the US fell to the lowest levels in a generation. Nearly 1.5m African American men are in prison and missing from society due, in large part, to a criminal justice system that locks them up and limits their options upon release. Cities, starved of funding by austerity-obsessed leaders, write tickets and charge fees for residents already struggling to avoid hunger and eviction...
Traumatized by 3 Years at Rikers Without Charge, Ex-Teen Prisoner Kalief Browder Commits Suicide Democracy Now ...A young man imprisoned for three years at Rikers Island jail in New York without charge has committed suicide. Kalief Browder was a 16-year-old high school sophomore when he was detained on suspicion of stealing a backpack. Browder never pleaded guilty and was never convicted. After enduring nearly 800 days in solitary confinement and abuses from guards, Browder was only released when the case was dismissed...
Monday, July 28, 2014
Today's Teamster News 07.28.14
Trade
Report: Germany To Reject EU-Canada Trade Deal Globe and Mail ...Germany is to reject a multi-billion free trade deal between the European Union and Canada which is widely seen as a template for a bigger agreement with the United States, a leading German paper reported on Saturday. Citing diplomats in Brussels, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung said Berlin objects to clauses outlining the legal protection offered to firms investing in the 28-member bloc. Critics say they could allow investors to stop or reverse laws...
Apocalypse Preview: Chinese River Turns Blood-Red zero hedge ...An inner city waterway in the eastern city of Wenzhou was found to have been inundated by an influx of blood-red water this morning...
The Factory in the China Food Scandal Is Foreign-Owned. That Could Have Made It a Target Time ...An undercover investigation by a Chinese TV station, which aired on Sunday, claimed that a factory in Shanghai owned by Illinois-based OSI Group was shipping the fast-food giants expired meat. Later, coffee-shop chain Starbucks in China and McDonald’s outlets in Japan got dragged into the mess, as they, too, had meat from the suspect factory in their products...
State Battles
Ohio Has Lost 25,000 Local Government Jobs Under John Kasich Plunderbund ...Ohio has seen “nearly 25,000 jobs lost in local government” since John Kasich has been governor of Ohio. And “median incomes in Ohio have fallen about $7,000 over the past decade...”
City seeks $2M from unions Racine Journal Times ...Looking for help to close a projected a $4.6 million deficit next year, administration officials at City Hall are seeking $2 million in concessions from police and fire unions...
War on Workers
Steel jobs have plummeted by a third since 2000 NWI Times ...Northwest Indiana's steel industry, which once drew immigrants from the world over and put bread on many tables for generations, has lost a third of its jobs since 2000...
Corporate Artful Dodgers (opinion) New York Times ...The federal government still gets a tenth of its revenue from corporate profits taxation. But it used to get a lot more — a third of revenue came from profits taxes in the early 1950s, a quarter or more well into the 1960s...
World of Resistance Report: IMF, World Bank, Giant Consultants Admit the Storm is Coming truthout ...three issues are prevalent in terms of assessing the fears and threats facing the global elite: 1) growing inequality, 2) decline of public trust in institutions of all kinds, and 3) the resulting social unrest...
Financial Predators Move On From Foreclosure Rescue, Enter Student Debt, Military Lending Spaces naked capitalism ... These scams are basically all the same: empty promises about obtaining a modification in exchange for up-front cash, with all the promises broken down the road. In this case, the offending parties happen to be law firms, who made the impression on the victims that they would provide legal representation in securing a modification...
Mike Mathieu: Big Data is Watching You Next New Deal ...In a darker turn, we begin to see a loss of human freedoms as behavior is increasingly predicted, tracked, and incentivized according to data models...
NSA Helps Crush Dissent at Home and Abroad Washington Blog ...The National Security Agency last year significantly expanded its cooperative relationship with the Saudi Ministry of Interior, one of the world’s most repressive and abusive government agencies. An April 2013 top secret memo provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden details the agency’s plans “to provide direct analytic and technical support” to the Saudis on “internal security” matters...
Auto shop worker killed when car falls on him WIVB ...The accident happened Friday afternoon at Yuya Complete Auto Repair on Skillen Street in Buffalo...
Miscellaneous
Outside money drives a deluge of political ads New York Times ... An explosion of spending on political advertising on television — set to break $2 billion in congressional races, with overall spots up nearly 70 percent since the 2010 midterm election — is accelerating the rise of moneyed interests and wresting control from the candidates’ own efforts to reach voters...
Report: Germany To Reject EU-Canada Trade Deal Globe and Mail ...Germany is to reject a multi-billion free trade deal between the European Union and Canada which is widely seen as a template for a bigger agreement with the United States, a leading German paper reported on Saturday. Citing diplomats in Brussels, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung said Berlin objects to clauses outlining the legal protection offered to firms investing in the 28-member bloc. Critics say they could allow investors to stop or reverse laws...
Apocalypse Preview: Chinese River Turns Blood-Red zero hedge ...An inner city waterway in the eastern city of Wenzhou was found to have been inundated by an influx of blood-red water this morning...
The Factory in the China Food Scandal Is Foreign-Owned. That Could Have Made It a Target Time ...An undercover investigation by a Chinese TV station, which aired on Sunday, claimed that a factory in Shanghai owned by Illinois-based OSI Group was shipping the fast-food giants expired meat. Later, coffee-shop chain Starbucks in China and McDonald’s outlets in Japan got dragged into the mess, as they, too, had meat from the suspect factory in their products...
State Battles
Ohio Has Lost 25,000 Local Government Jobs Under John Kasich Plunderbund ...Ohio has seen “nearly 25,000 jobs lost in local government” since John Kasich has been governor of Ohio. And “median incomes in Ohio have fallen about $7,000 over the past decade...”
City seeks $2M from unions Racine Journal Times ...Looking for help to close a projected a $4.6 million deficit next year, administration officials at City Hall are seeking $2 million in concessions from police and fire unions...
War on Workers
Steel jobs have plummeted by a third since 2000 NWI Times ...Northwest Indiana's steel industry, which once drew immigrants from the world over and put bread on many tables for generations, has lost a third of its jobs since 2000...
Corporate Artful Dodgers (opinion) New York Times ...The federal government still gets a tenth of its revenue from corporate profits taxation. But it used to get a lot more — a third of revenue came from profits taxes in the early 1950s, a quarter or more well into the 1960s...
World of Resistance Report: IMF, World Bank, Giant Consultants Admit the Storm is Coming truthout ...three issues are prevalent in terms of assessing the fears and threats facing the global elite: 1) growing inequality, 2) decline of public trust in institutions of all kinds, and 3) the resulting social unrest...
Financial Predators Move On From Foreclosure Rescue, Enter Student Debt, Military Lending Spaces naked capitalism ... These scams are basically all the same: empty promises about obtaining a modification in exchange for up-front cash, with all the promises broken down the road. In this case, the offending parties happen to be law firms, who made the impression on the victims that they would provide legal representation in securing a modification...
Mike Mathieu: Big Data is Watching You Next New Deal ...In a darker turn, we begin to see a loss of human freedoms as behavior is increasingly predicted, tracked, and incentivized according to data models...
NSA Helps Crush Dissent at Home and Abroad Washington Blog ...The National Security Agency last year significantly expanded its cooperative relationship with the Saudi Ministry of Interior, one of the world’s most repressive and abusive government agencies. An April 2013 top secret memo provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden details the agency’s plans “to provide direct analytic and technical support” to the Saudis on “internal security” matters...
Auto shop worker killed when car falls on him WIVB ...The accident happened Friday afternoon at Yuya Complete Auto Repair on Skillen Street in Buffalo...
Miscellaneous
Outside money drives a deluge of political ads New York Times ... An explosion of spending on political advertising on television — set to break $2 billion in congressional races, with overall spots up nearly 70 percent since the 2010 midterm election — is accelerating the rise of moneyed interests and wresting control from the candidates’ own efforts to reach voters...
Sunday, June 16, 2013
Today's Teamster News 06.16.13
Father of modern 401(k) says it fails many Americans Marketplace ...Today, the typical middle-class household nearing retirement has saved $120,000 -- one-tenth what many say it needs. ..
Why real wages are falling Stumbling and Mumbling ...Real wages are falling at a near-record rate...they were 6% lower in April than they were in April 2008. This is the biggest five-year drop in real wages since 1921-26, and the second-largest fall since records began in 1855...
IMF Article IV on the US: "deficit reduction in 2013 has been excessively rapid and ill-designed" Econbrowser ... the automatic spending cuts (“sequester”) not only exert a heavy toll on growth in the short term, but the indiscriminate reductions in education, science, and infrastructure spending could also reduce medium-term potential growth...
GOP labor bills limit 'micro-unions,' require secret ballots The Hill ...Legislation introduced in the House and Senate on Thursday would cut back on the ability of unions to form among smaller groups of workers and require that workers use a secret ballot when voting to organize...
26 Lawmakers Live Off Food Stamps To Protest Republican Cuts ThinkProgress ...The SNAP challenge means that Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and 25 participating members must try to live off of under $4.50 per day for food and drink...
Spanish Austerity Cuts Put Lives at Risk, Study Finds Reuters ... Austerity cuts in Spain could lead to the effective dismantling of large parts of its healthcare system and significantly damage the health of the population, according to a study...
As neighboring states add jobs, Wisconsin leads nation in losses over past 12 months The Cap Times ...Wisconsin (had)...6,800 fewer total non-farm jobs in April 2013 compared to April 2012...
Rick Perry Vetoes Texas Equal Pay Bill Huffington Post ...Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) has vetoed a bill meant to prevent wage discrimination against women...
Emergency Manager: Detroit won't pay $2.5B it owes Associated Press ...A team led by a state-appointed emergency manager said Friday that Detroit is defaulting on about $2.5 billion in unsecured debt and is asking creditors to take about 10 cents on the dollar of what the city owes them. Kevyn Orr spent two hours with about 180 bond insurers, pension trustees, union representatives and other creditors in a move to avoid what bankruptcy experts have said would be the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history...
LABOR: Teamsters to vote on strike at bottling company Press-Enterprise ...Local 63 of the Teamsters is preparing to take a vote this weekend on whether to authorize a strike against American Bottling Co., which has a distribution center in Riverside...
Why real wages are falling Stumbling and Mumbling ...Real wages are falling at a near-record rate...they were 6% lower in April than they were in April 2008. This is the biggest five-year drop in real wages since 1921-26, and the second-largest fall since records began in 1855...
IMF Article IV on the US: "deficit reduction in 2013 has been excessively rapid and ill-designed" Econbrowser ... the automatic spending cuts (“sequester”) not only exert a heavy toll on growth in the short term, but the indiscriminate reductions in education, science, and infrastructure spending could also reduce medium-term potential growth...
GOP labor bills limit 'micro-unions,' require secret ballots The Hill ...Legislation introduced in the House and Senate on Thursday would cut back on the ability of unions to form among smaller groups of workers and require that workers use a secret ballot when voting to organize...
26 Lawmakers Live Off Food Stamps To Protest Republican Cuts ThinkProgress ...The SNAP challenge means that Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and 25 participating members must try to live off of under $4.50 per day for food and drink...
Spanish Austerity Cuts Put Lives at Risk, Study Finds Reuters ... Austerity cuts in Spain could lead to the effective dismantling of large parts of its healthcare system and significantly damage the health of the population, according to a study...
As neighboring states add jobs, Wisconsin leads nation in losses over past 12 months The Cap Times ...Wisconsin (had)...6,800 fewer total non-farm jobs in April 2013 compared to April 2012...
Rick Perry Vetoes Texas Equal Pay Bill Huffington Post ...Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) has vetoed a bill meant to prevent wage discrimination against women...
Emergency Manager: Detroit won't pay $2.5B it owes Associated Press ...A team led by a state-appointed emergency manager said Friday that Detroit is defaulting on about $2.5 billion in unsecured debt and is asking creditors to take about 10 cents on the dollar of what the city owes them. Kevyn Orr spent two hours with about 180 bond insurers, pension trustees, union representatives and other creditors in a move to avoid what bankruptcy experts have said would be the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history...
LABOR: Teamsters to vote on strike at bottling company Press-Enterprise ...Local 63 of the Teamsters is preparing to take a vote this weekend on whether to authorize a strike against American Bottling Co., which has a distribution center in Riverside...
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Capitalism is failing the middle class, say capitalists
We're painfully aware that the U.S. economy is generating too few good jobs and that people are mad as hell about it. What's surprising is that influential bastions of the Establishment are starting to agree with us.
The latest surprise came from the Council on Foreign Relations, an august group that has as its members high-ranking government officials, world business leaders and prominent media figures. Last month, the CFR published a working paper called "The Evolving Structure of the American Economy and the Employment Challenge" (just the kind of snoozer headline you'd expect from such an august group).
Here's the CFR's take on all that Ayn Rand crap about market outcomes, especially efficient ones, always making everyone better off in the long run:
giant vampire squid Goldman Sachs before he ran the World Bank.
Just as amazing, the International Monetary Fund came out with a paper in February saying workers need more collective bargaining power. That's a big turnaround for the IMF, kind of like Fred Smith inviting the Teamsters to come organize FedEx workers. According to the U.K. Telegraph on Feb. 1,
The latest surprise came from the Council on Foreign Relations, an august group that has as its members high-ranking government officials, world business leaders and prominent media figures. Last month, the CFR published a working paper called "The Evolving Structure of the American Economy and the Employment Challenge" (just the kind of snoozer headline you'd expect from such an august group).
Here's the CFR's take on all that Ayn Rand crap about market outcomes, especially efficient ones, always making everyone better off in the long run:
That seems clearly incorrect and is supported by neither theory nor experience. It is true, as in the United States, that many goods and services are less expensive than they would be if the economy were walled off from the global economy, and that the benefits of lower prices are widespread. But these cost savings do not necessarily compensate for diminished employment opportunities, and it would be presumptuous in the extreme for policymakers to tell voters what their values and preferences should be. People might trade cheaper goods for assurances that a wide range of productive and rewarding employment options would be available, now and in the future, for themselves and their children and grandchildren, even if the cost of goods they consumer were to rise.Reuters economics editor Chrystia Freeland agrees with us that it's pretty damn interesting who this is coming from (a winner of the Nobel Prize for Economics is a co-author). She characterizes their conclusions this way:
Globalization and the technology revolution are increasing productivity and prosperity. But those rewards are unevenly shared – they are going to the people at the top in the United States, and enriching emerging economies over all. But the American middle class is losing out.And, she says, this is unsurprising to most people. BUT,
...the analysis and its impeccable provenance matter, because this basic truth about how the world economy is working today is being ignored by most of the politicians in the United States and denied by many of its leading business people.The Council on Foreign Relations isn't the only influential bastion of the Establishment that's growing alarmed about what capitalism is doing to people. Just last week, the World Bank put out a report saying that unemployment "was overwhelmingly the most important factor cited for recruitment into gangs and rebel movements." World Bank President Robert Zoellick said,
If we are to break the cycles of violence and lessen the stresses that drive them, countries must develop more legitimate, accountable and capable national institutions that provide for citizen security, justice and jobs.Think about it: this guy was George W. Bush's U.S. Trade Representative and a managing director at
Just as amazing, the International Monetary Fund came out with a paper in February saying workers need more collective bargaining power. That's a big turnaround for the IMF, kind of like Fred Smith inviting the Teamsters to come organize FedEx workers. According to the U.K. Telegraph on Feb. 1,
The IMF has published a paper entitled Inequality, Leverage and Crisis arguing that the extreme gap between rich and poor – with echoes of the US in the late 1920s – was an underlying cause of the Great Recession from 2008-2009.
The paper, by the Fund's modelling unit, warned of "disastrous consequences" for the world economy unless workers regain their "bargaining power" against rentiers. It suggests radical changes to the tax system and debt relief for workers.If only they'd listened to us all along.
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