Teamster News
Roma Food Drivers In California Vote Overwhelmingly To Join Teamsters teamster.org ... Food distribution drivers at Roma of Southern California, a Performance Food company, have voted overwhelmingly, 68-15, in favor of joining Teamsters Local 630 in Los Angeles. Of the 84 drivers in the bargaining unit, 83 participated in the Nov. 20 election...
Teamsters Lead Buffalo Snow Storm Relief Efforts teamster.org ...“Our members went above and beyond. They worked around the clock plowing roads; selecting and delivering bread, milk and other essential food products to local stores and supermarkets; delivering gas and diesel to service stations; and staffing the correctional facilities,” said Brian Dickman, President of Teamsters Local 264 in Cheektowaga, N.Y...
Walmart Needs To Show More Thanks For Its Workers Huffington Post ...Thanksgiving Day is a holiday where family and friends gather together and express gratitude for everything in their lives. But those who work at Walmart have little to be thankful for, at least when it comes to their employment...
Commissioners approve memorandum of understanding with union Presque Isle Advance ...The Onaway City Commission approved a memorandum of understanding with the Teamsters union Nov. 17 that will keep the current Department of Public Works (DPW) foreman Clayton Dunn at his current level of pay...
Trade
What ‘Free Trade’ Has Done to Central America The Nation ... the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement, or DR-CAFTA ... the pact has had a devastating effect on poverty, dislocation and environmental contamination in the region. And perhaps even worse, it’s diminished the ability of Central American countries to protect their citizens from corporate abuse......
U.S.-NAFTA Freight Jumps 8.2% From Year Earlier Truckinginfo ...The amount freight moved between the U.S. and its neighbors of Canada and Mexico totaled $102.2 billion in September, an 8.2% gain from a year ago, as all five major transportation carried more cargo, according to new U.S. Transportation Department figures...
War on Workers
$1 Billion: That’s How Much Walmart Avoids Paying in Taxes Each Year Through Loopholes The Nation ...Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) found that the company “avoids $1 billion a year in taxes” through federal loopholes, and various political shenanigans drive this always-low tax rate: the big-box giant is absorbing government subsidies both directly and indirectly, through its retail operations as well as its ingenious accounting methods...
Walmart Still Avoiding Paying $7000 Fine For Worker Killed By Black Friday Shoppers In 2008 Consumerist ...In 2008, a Walmart employee was killed when a mob of deal-desperate Black Friday shoppers tore the store’s doors from their hinges and stormed inside, trampling him to death. The chain was eventually fined $7000 for their role in the employee’s death — but six years and $2 million later, the world’s largest retailer has yet to pay up...
One Worker Killed, Another Injured When Jamaica Plain Porch Collapses boston.com ...One worker was killed and another critically injured when the decking they were installing on a third-story porch at 89 Forest Hills Street in Jamaica Plain suddenly gave way just before 11 a.m. Tuesday...
The Tech Worker Shortage Doesn't Really Exist Bloomberg ...The real issue, say Salzman and others, is the industry’s desire for lower-wage,more-exploitable guest workers, not a lack of available American staff. “It seems pretty clear that the industry just wants lower-cost labor,” Dean Baker, the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, wrote...
Doggy Day Care Chain Makes Pet Sitters Sign Noncompetes To Protect 'Trade Secrets' Huffington Post ...According to a Camp Bow Wow “employee confidentiality and non-compete agreement” obtained by HuffPost, by signing the contract employees agree not to work for a competing business within 25 miles of their Camp Bow Wow location's "franchise territory" for a period of two years following the contract's termination...
Private Prisons Seek Broader Markets The Austin Chronicle ...A new report finds that prison corporations, stymied by prison reform, are seeking new markets for human product lines – if you can't jail ’em, find another way to make ’em pay...
Oil Trains Use 105-Year-Old Tunnel Below Seattle KOMO ...A train carrying up to three million gallons of highly flammable Bakken crude oil runs right under downtown Seattle through a century-old tunnel that does not meet modern safety standards, according to BNSF Railway and Seattle fire officials...
US Electricity Generated By Coal Would Likely Drop To 22% In 2020 Platts ...The percent of US electricity generated by coal in 2020 would likely drop to 22%, with a decline in coal prices to follow as a result, according to a study of the cumulative impact of the US Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan and its other environmental programs...
Atlantic City's Taj Mahal Offers To Restore Workers' Health Care NorthJersey.com ...Trump Entertainment Resorts said Saturday it has offered to restore health insurance to its 3,000 workers for at least two years if the union will drop its appeal of a court order that canceled the health insurance and pension plan for casino workers. It made the offer in a letter to Bob McDevitt, president of Local 54 of the Unite-HERE casino workers union...
Miscellaneous
Railroads Sound Alarm Ahead of Chicago Gridlock Redux: Freight Bloomberg ...With last week’s 7 feet of snow in upstate New York heralding an early winter, railroads crisscrossing Chicago are rushing to open 24-hour command centers, install heaters to keep switches from freezing, and plotting ways to reroute traffic...
Showing posts with label coal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label coal. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 26, 2014
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
Today's Teamster News 11.18.14
Teamster News
L.A.-Area Port Truckers Expand Strike To Three New Companies Los Angeles Times ...Drivers from QTS Inc., LACA Express and WinWin Logistics Inc. joined an ongoing strike Monday morning, said Barb Maynard, a spokeswoman for the Teamsters Union, which is backing the drivers...
Port Truckers Drive Home Difference Between Contractors And Employees Los Angeles Times ...Decades ago, such drivers were full-time employees, but many companies began treating them as independent contractors to bump profits and cut labor costs. And when environmental safeguards made expensive clean-energy trucks mandatory, drivers essentially became indentured servants, with truck leasing costs, insurance and other expenses deducted from their paychecks, often knocking them below minimum wage but still requiring them to pay for gas and repairs....
Fired Disney performers seeking jobs, back pay Bay News 9 ...The Teamsters Union representing the three men has already been through the grievance process and will now go forward to present their case to a federal arbitrator, unless Disney meets their demands...
Trade
French Government Will Not Sign TTIP Agreement In 2015 EurActiv ...Matthias Fekl, France's Secretary of State for Foreign Trade, has made it clear that France will not support the inclusion of the Investor State Dispute Settlement mechanism (ISDS) in a potential TTIP agreement...
State Battles
Government employees produce nothing, says ignorant Kansas House Speaker Ray Merrick of Johnson County (opinion) Kansas City Star ...News flash for Ray Merrick: Those employees doing “nothing” are the schoolteachers, firefighters and police officers employed by governments across the state. These are the hardworking employees who make it possible to educate Kansas children and protect Kansas families...
An Embattled ALEC, Buoyed by Election Results, Lays Blueprint for 2015 Center for Media and Democracy ...ALEC has been bleeding corporate members, but with Republicans now in control of 68 out of 98 state legislative bodies, there are fewer impediments to the enactment of the corporate-friendly legislation that ALEC peddles -- and in early December, ALEC and the corporations that still fund it will likely lay out the legislative blueprint for 2015 at the ALEC States & Nation Policy Summit in Washington, DC...
California Tells Court It Can’t Release Inmates Early Because It Would Lose Cheap Prison Labor ThinkProgress ...Out of California’s years-long litigation over reducing the population of prisons deemed unconstitutionally overcrowded by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2010, another obstacle to addressing the U.S. epidemic of mass incarceration has emerged: The utility of cheap prison labor...
War on Workers
Number Of Homeless Children In America Surges To All-Time High: Report Huffington Post ...The number of homeless children in the U.S. has surged in recent years to an all-time high, amounting to one child in every 30, according to a comprehensive state-by-state report that blames the nation's high poverty rate, the lack of affordable housing and the impacts of pervasive domestic violence...
We Are the Most Unequal Society in the Developed World...And We Don't Know It (opinion) Huffington Post ...Americans grossly underestimated this gap. Instead of 354 to 1, the Americans in representative survey think it is only 30 to 1. When asked what the ideal pay gap should be, Americans say that a fair gap would be about 7 to 1...
Agencies Look For Cause Of Fatal Gas Leak In Texas New York Times ...Randall Clements, the plant manager, said DuPont was working with the authorities and conducting its own “top-to-bottom review” of the accident. Asked how the leak had begun and whether the problem had been a result of equipment failure or human error, a company spokesman, Gregg M. Schmidt, said answering those questions was part of the investigation...
Worker dies in fall at Mosinee paper mill Associated Press ...A 55-year-old worker was killed when he fell from a hydraulic bucket while installing insulation at a Mosinee paper mill...
Trump Taj Mahal Casino In Atlantic City Will Shutter New York Daily News ...The owner of the struggling Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort filed court papers on Friday saying it will close next month, making it the fifth of the city’s 12 casinos to shut down this year...
Miscellaneous
Keystone at Senate tipping point The Hill ...Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and other supporters of the Keystone XL oil pipeline are stuck at 59 votes — one vote shy of the supermajority they need to move their bill forward on Tuesday...
L.A.-Area Port Truckers Expand Strike To Three New Companies Los Angeles Times ...Drivers from QTS Inc., LACA Express and WinWin Logistics Inc. joined an ongoing strike Monday morning, said Barb Maynard, a spokeswoman for the Teamsters Union, which is backing the drivers...
Port Truckers Drive Home Difference Between Contractors And Employees Los Angeles Times ...Decades ago, such drivers were full-time employees, but many companies began treating them as independent contractors to bump profits and cut labor costs. And when environmental safeguards made expensive clean-energy trucks mandatory, drivers essentially became indentured servants, with truck leasing costs, insurance and other expenses deducted from their paychecks, often knocking them below minimum wage but still requiring them to pay for gas and repairs....
Fired Disney performers seeking jobs, back pay Bay News 9 ...The Teamsters Union representing the three men has already been through the grievance process and will now go forward to present their case to a federal arbitrator, unless Disney meets their demands...
Trade
French Government Will Not Sign TTIP Agreement In 2015 EurActiv ...Matthias Fekl, France's Secretary of State for Foreign Trade, has made it clear that France will not support the inclusion of the Investor State Dispute Settlement mechanism (ISDS) in a potential TTIP agreement...
State Battles
Government employees produce nothing, says ignorant Kansas House Speaker Ray Merrick of Johnson County (opinion) Kansas City Star ...News flash for Ray Merrick: Those employees doing “nothing” are the schoolteachers, firefighters and police officers employed by governments across the state. These are the hardworking employees who make it possible to educate Kansas children and protect Kansas families...
An Embattled ALEC, Buoyed by Election Results, Lays Blueprint for 2015 Center for Media and Democracy ...ALEC has been bleeding corporate members, but with Republicans now in control of 68 out of 98 state legislative bodies, there are fewer impediments to the enactment of the corporate-friendly legislation that ALEC peddles -- and in early December, ALEC and the corporations that still fund it will likely lay out the legislative blueprint for 2015 at the ALEC States & Nation Policy Summit in Washington, DC...
California Tells Court It Can’t Release Inmates Early Because It Would Lose Cheap Prison Labor ThinkProgress ...Out of California’s years-long litigation over reducing the population of prisons deemed unconstitutionally overcrowded by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2010, another obstacle to addressing the U.S. epidemic of mass incarceration has emerged: The utility of cheap prison labor...
War on Workers
Number Of Homeless Children In America Surges To All-Time High: Report Huffington Post ...The number of homeless children in the U.S. has surged in recent years to an all-time high, amounting to one child in every 30, according to a comprehensive state-by-state report that blames the nation's high poverty rate, the lack of affordable housing and the impacts of pervasive domestic violence...
We Are the Most Unequal Society in the Developed World...And We Don't Know It (opinion) Huffington Post ...Americans grossly underestimated this gap. Instead of 354 to 1, the Americans in representative survey think it is only 30 to 1. When asked what the ideal pay gap should be, Americans say that a fair gap would be about 7 to 1...
Agencies Look For Cause Of Fatal Gas Leak In Texas New York Times ...Randall Clements, the plant manager, said DuPont was working with the authorities and conducting its own “top-to-bottom review” of the accident. Asked how the leak had begun and whether the problem had been a result of equipment failure or human error, a company spokesman, Gregg M. Schmidt, said answering those questions was part of the investigation...
Worker dies in fall at Mosinee paper mill Associated Press ...A 55-year-old worker was killed when he fell from a hydraulic bucket while installing insulation at a Mosinee paper mill...
Trump Taj Mahal Casino In Atlantic City Will Shutter New York Daily News ...The owner of the struggling Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort filed court papers on Friday saying it will close next month, making it the fifth of the city’s 12 casinos to shut down this year...
Miscellaneous
Keystone at Senate tipping point The Hill ...Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and other supporters of the Keystone XL oil pipeline are stuck at 59 votes — one vote shy of the supermajority they need to move their bill forward on Tuesday...
Thursday, October 9, 2014
Today's Teamster News 10.09.14
Teamster News
The Teamsters launch a television ad campaign on rail safety Teamsters Canada ..."We want to send a clear message to the federal government: we need more inspectors on the track," explains Robert Bouvier, president of Teamsters Canada...
Drivers Say Two-Tier System Will Give Uber, Others Unfair Advantage teamster.org ...Thousands of D.C. cab drivers affiliated with the Teamsters Union participated in a second “Fairness NOW!” caravan today throughout the city to demand equal regulatory treatment with private sedan services by the D.C. City Council...
A Clear Choice In November (opinion) Detroit News ...When you don't fight to close loopholes that encourage companies to ship their jobs overseas, you're not doing what's best for Michigan...
The Antique Car That Might Replace Horse-Drawn Carriages In NYC Yahoo News ...The eCarriage is the proposed replacement for all that animal-powered transportation capacity for tourists...
Trade
A New U.S. Tobacco Proposal in TPP? Politico ...U.S. trade officials have denied they plan to offer a new tobacco proposal in the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks in Australia later this month. The pushback comes amid growing industry concerns that the United States is discussing the idea of prohibiting tobacco companies from bringing lawsuits against TPP governments under an investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) clause...
Union Boss Len McCluskey Slams Vince Cable Over TTIP Threat To NHS The Independent ...unions and a plethora of NGOs are concerned about an element in the agreement which they say could pave the way for US multinationals to sue future British governments if they try to reverse the recent privatization of large parts of the NHS...
State Battles
Fla. Gov. Scott sued over finances by AG candidate Associated Press ..."The people of Florida don't really care whether Gov. Scott is worth $3 million or $300 million," said Sheldon. "What they care about is being able to determine whether he has a personal financial stake in the decisions he makes as a public official..."
AFL-CIO leaders decry Johnson's opposition to minimum wage increase Minneapolis Star Tribune ...AFL-CIO leaders on Tuesday decried what they say is Republican gubernatorial candidate Jeff Johnson’s opposition to increasing Minnesota’s minimum wage...
Philadelphia’s school reform debacle: Despised governor crosses the line Salon ...Parents, teachers and students have resisted full privatization, New Orleans-style, and have found themselves punished for resistance as Gov. Tom Corbett, who controls the schools after a 2001 takeover by the state, slashes school budgets, wipes out thousands of jobs, and shutters dozens of schools. The latest move by Corbett and the Philadelphia School Reform Commission (SRC), which replaced an elected school board after the 2001 takeover, is to unilaterally cancel the city’s contract with the 15,000 members of the Philadelphia Federation of teachers...
L.A. Lawmakers Lay Out Path To $15.25 Minimum Wage By 2019 Los Angeles Times ...Six members of the Los Angeles City Council launched an effort Tuesday to take the city's minimum wage to $15.25 by 2019, a move that would be more aggressive than the pay strategy backed by Mayor Eric Garcetti several weeks ago...
Mailers Sent By Koch Group Appear Designed To Misdirect Voters In Key U.S. Senate Race The American Prospect ...The North Carolina State Board of Elections announced this week that it is investigating a controversial mailer the conservative advocacy group Americans for Prosperity Foundation (AFPF) sent to thousands of state residents that contained inaccurate information about voter registration...
Court Decisions On Voting Rules Sow Confusion In State Races New York Times ...Just weeks before elections that will decide control of the Senate and crucial governors’ races, a cascade of court rulings about voting rules, issued by judges with an increasingly partisan edge, are sowing confusion and changing voting procedures with the potential to affect outcomes in some states...
Anti-ALEC Activists Pressure eBay to Drop Conservative Group National Journal ...More than 80 organizations are asking the e-commerce company to follow the lead of Google and other tech giants and divorce itself from the American Legislative Exchange Council...
Rightwing Groups Try to Stamp Out Local Union Contracts The Progressive ...A rightwing legal group is suing the school district, school board, and teacher’s union in Madison, Wisconsin, for honoring a labor contract negotiated before the state supreme court upheld Governor Scott Walker’s divisive Act 10 law, ending most collective bargaining rights for most public employees...
War on Workers
Union blocks traffic to protest casino givebacks Associated Press ...Casino workers blocked traffic on a highway Wednesday night to protest demands for contract givebacks being made to keep the Trump Taj Mahal casino open...24 protesters who sat down in the intersection and refused to move when ordered by officers were arrested and charged with obstructing a highway and failure to move...
Republicans Are Trying to Make Sure Minorities and Young People Don't Vote This November Mother Jones ...In 15 states, this year's midterms will mark the first federal election with a host of these new voting restrictions in action...
There Were Two Unemployed Persons Per Job Opening in August 2014 Economic Populist ...If one takes the U-6 broader measure of unemployment that includes people who are forced into part-time work and the marginally attached, the ratio is 3.9 people needing a job to each actual job opening....
Union Miners Rally At EPA To Protest New Emissions Standards Huffington Post ...Organizers said about 700 people made it to Washington for the protest, and another 50 or so were on a bus that arrived late. They carried signs that read "EPA Rules Destroy Good Jobs" and "EPA Rules Put Seniors At Risk," and some wore shirts that said "Stop The War On Coal."...
Burdened With Record Amount Of Debt, Graduates Delay Marriage NBC News ...Student loans have hit a record high of $1.2 trillion, putting a crimp in The American Dream of owning a home and starting a family. And it’s affecting the broader economy too...
Uber Skimps On Driver Training, Then Charges Drivers $65 For Basic Driver Skills Course Forbes ...Uber puts some drivers out on the road with no vehicle inspections and barely any training — and Uber makes them pay out of pocket if they want basic driver training, drivers say...
Worker killed at West Point Kia plant turnto10.com ...The worker who died during an industrial accident at the Kia production plant in West Point has been identified as 57-year-old John Edd Dunnivant, of Lanett, the West Point Police Department has announced...
Highway worker dies in Tilden, NE accident Associated Press ...55-year-old man has been killed while working on a highway project in northeast Nebraska...
The Teamsters launch a television ad campaign on rail safety Teamsters Canada ..."We want to send a clear message to the federal government: we need more inspectors on the track," explains Robert Bouvier, president of Teamsters Canada...
Drivers Say Two-Tier System Will Give Uber, Others Unfair Advantage teamster.org ...Thousands of D.C. cab drivers affiliated with the Teamsters Union participated in a second “Fairness NOW!” caravan today throughout the city to demand equal regulatory treatment with private sedan services by the D.C. City Council...
A Clear Choice In November (opinion) Detroit News ...When you don't fight to close loopholes that encourage companies to ship their jobs overseas, you're not doing what's best for Michigan...
The Antique Car That Might Replace Horse-Drawn Carriages In NYC Yahoo News ...The eCarriage is the proposed replacement for all that animal-powered transportation capacity for tourists...
Trade
A New U.S. Tobacco Proposal in TPP? Politico ...U.S. trade officials have denied they plan to offer a new tobacco proposal in the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks in Australia later this month. The pushback comes amid growing industry concerns that the United States is discussing the idea of prohibiting tobacco companies from bringing lawsuits against TPP governments under an investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) clause...
Union Boss Len McCluskey Slams Vince Cable Over TTIP Threat To NHS The Independent ...unions and a plethora of NGOs are concerned about an element in the agreement which they say could pave the way for US multinationals to sue future British governments if they try to reverse the recent privatization of large parts of the NHS...
State Battles
Fla. Gov. Scott sued over finances by AG candidate Associated Press ..."The people of Florida don't really care whether Gov. Scott is worth $3 million or $300 million," said Sheldon. "What they care about is being able to determine whether he has a personal financial stake in the decisions he makes as a public official..."
AFL-CIO leaders decry Johnson's opposition to minimum wage increase Minneapolis Star Tribune ...AFL-CIO leaders on Tuesday decried what they say is Republican gubernatorial candidate Jeff Johnson’s opposition to increasing Minnesota’s minimum wage...
Philadelphia’s school reform debacle: Despised governor crosses the line Salon ...Parents, teachers and students have resisted full privatization, New Orleans-style, and have found themselves punished for resistance as Gov. Tom Corbett, who controls the schools after a 2001 takeover by the state, slashes school budgets, wipes out thousands of jobs, and shutters dozens of schools. The latest move by Corbett and the Philadelphia School Reform Commission (SRC), which replaced an elected school board after the 2001 takeover, is to unilaterally cancel the city’s contract with the 15,000 members of the Philadelphia Federation of teachers...
L.A. Lawmakers Lay Out Path To $15.25 Minimum Wage By 2019 Los Angeles Times ...Six members of the Los Angeles City Council launched an effort Tuesday to take the city's minimum wage to $15.25 by 2019, a move that would be more aggressive than the pay strategy backed by Mayor Eric Garcetti several weeks ago...
Mailers Sent By Koch Group Appear Designed To Misdirect Voters In Key U.S. Senate Race The American Prospect ...The North Carolina State Board of Elections announced this week that it is investigating a controversial mailer the conservative advocacy group Americans for Prosperity Foundation (AFPF) sent to thousands of state residents that contained inaccurate information about voter registration...
Court Decisions On Voting Rules Sow Confusion In State Races New York Times ...Just weeks before elections that will decide control of the Senate and crucial governors’ races, a cascade of court rulings about voting rules, issued by judges with an increasingly partisan edge, are sowing confusion and changing voting procedures with the potential to affect outcomes in some states...
Anti-ALEC Activists Pressure eBay to Drop Conservative Group National Journal ...More than 80 organizations are asking the e-commerce company to follow the lead of Google and other tech giants and divorce itself from the American Legislative Exchange Council...
Rightwing Groups Try to Stamp Out Local Union Contracts The Progressive ...A rightwing legal group is suing the school district, school board, and teacher’s union in Madison, Wisconsin, for honoring a labor contract negotiated before the state supreme court upheld Governor Scott Walker’s divisive Act 10 law, ending most collective bargaining rights for most public employees...
War on Workers
Union blocks traffic to protest casino givebacks Associated Press ...Casino workers blocked traffic on a highway Wednesday night to protest demands for contract givebacks being made to keep the Trump Taj Mahal casino open...24 protesters who sat down in the intersection and refused to move when ordered by officers were arrested and charged with obstructing a highway and failure to move...
Republicans Are Trying to Make Sure Minorities and Young People Don't Vote This November Mother Jones ...In 15 states, this year's midterms will mark the first federal election with a host of these new voting restrictions in action...
There Were Two Unemployed Persons Per Job Opening in August 2014 Economic Populist ...If one takes the U-6 broader measure of unemployment that includes people who are forced into part-time work and the marginally attached, the ratio is 3.9 people needing a job to each actual job opening....
Union Miners Rally At EPA To Protest New Emissions Standards Huffington Post ...Organizers said about 700 people made it to Washington for the protest, and another 50 or so were on a bus that arrived late. They carried signs that read "EPA Rules Destroy Good Jobs" and "EPA Rules Put Seniors At Risk," and some wore shirts that said "Stop The War On Coal."...
Burdened With Record Amount Of Debt, Graduates Delay Marriage NBC News ...Student loans have hit a record high of $1.2 trillion, putting a crimp in The American Dream of owning a home and starting a family. And it’s affecting the broader economy too...
Uber Skimps On Driver Training, Then Charges Drivers $65 For Basic Driver Skills Course Forbes ...Uber puts some drivers out on the road with no vehicle inspections and barely any training — and Uber makes them pay out of pocket if they want basic driver training, drivers say...
Worker killed at West Point Kia plant turnto10.com ...The worker who died during an industrial accident at the Kia production plant in West Point has been identified as 57-year-old John Edd Dunnivant, of Lanett, the West Point Police Department has announced...
Highway worker dies in Tilden, NE accident Associated Press ...55-year-old man has been killed while working on a highway project in northeast Nebraska...
Tuesday, August 19, 2014
Today's Teamster News 08.19.14
Teamster News
Michigan Teamsters Joint Council 43 President Nowak, Executive Board Re-Elected Without Opposition IBT ...Michigan Teamster local union officers who gathered at the Shanty Creek Resort in Bellaire, Mich. for Joint Council 43’s 2014 Fall Delegates Meeting voted unanimously to re-elect Joint Council 43 President Greg Nowak, Secretary-Treasurer Jim “Cinci” Cianciolo and the entire Executive Board to a new three-year term...
Trade
Awash In Coal, U.S. Imports Even More Wall Street Journal ...Coal imports surged 44% to 5.4 million metric tons during the first six months of 2014, compared with a year ago, according to Global Trade Information Services...
State Battles
Nebraska: Minimum Wage Increase to Be on Ballot New York Times ...A proposal to increase Nebraska’s minimum wage has qualified for the November ballot. The secretary of state’s office said Friday it had verified enough signatures. If approved by voters, the measure would increase the state’s minimum wage to $9 an hour by 2016 from $7.25 an hour, the same as the federal minimum...
California teachers union fears right-to-work law inevitable Washington Examiner ... the change might be inevitable based on various lawsuits that could reach the Supreme Court...
With close ties to sugar, Florida’s next House speaker admits taking King Ranch trip Miami Herald ...Crisafulli, who will become the most powerful man in the Florida House of Representatives this fall, has been a major beneficiary of the state’s sugar industry. During the past two election cycles, agricultural interests have contributed at least $200,000 to Rep. Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island, and his political action committees...
How Much Of Wal-Mart Is Really Made In America? Bloomberg Businessweek ...At least one company, Kent Bicycles, has said it located a new factory in South Carolina because of the state’s right-to-work law. The chief executive noted that Wal-Mart had introduced him to South Carolina’s Republican governor, Nikki Haley...
Democracy A Casualty Of Voter-Suppression Politics (opinion) Billings Gazette ...When same-day voter registration and voting is being cut back, as pushed in Montana by the Republican Legislature, and evidence shows that the majority of late registrants do not vote the Republican way, no wonder many Montanans think someone is trying to stop them from voting because of where they stand philosophically...
6,000 Lack Proper Voter ID Locally The Robesonian ...More than 6,000 Robeson County (North Carolina) residents will have to get a voter ID if they they want to vote in the 2016 General Election...
War On Workers
Blame Employers, Not Workers, for Any Skills Gap, Economist Says Wall Street Journal ...The “obvious solution” to “virtually all the skill problems reported by employers is to increase training and produce the skilled workers they want themselves.” Much of the evidence in support of a skills gap could be explained by employers who are no longer willing to train their employees or raise salaries, and instead want to be able to hire people with exactly the right skills–and on the cheap...
Average cost of raising a child hits $245,000 CNN ...To raise a child born in 2013 to the age of 18, it will cost a middle-income couple just over $245,000, according to newly released estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. That's up $4,260, or almost 2%, from the year before...
Feds: Red light camera firm paid for Chicago official’s car, condo ars technica ...The former chief executive officer of Redflex, a major red light camera (RLC) vendor, has been indicted on federal corruption charges stemming from a contract with the City of Chicago...
Worker Killed In North Side Industrial Accident KSAT ...A man in his 60s was killed Monday when a 3,500 pound sack of fracking sand fell on him...
Efforts Advance To Stabilize The Schedules Of Part-Time Workers Kansas City Star ...The movement to support “schedules that work” for employees includes a bill by that name, introduced this summer in the U.S. House and Senate, that would let employees request changes to their work schedules “without fear of retaliation,” among other things...
Money in Politics: Rising in Intensity as a 2014 Election Issue Huffington Post ...candidates all over the country, in red states as well as purple and blue, are taking up the fight against money in politics, to take the country back from the Koch brothers, Wall Street, and the big business interests that run things right now...
Miscellaneous
Community Health says data stolen in cyber attack from China Reuters ...Community Health Systems Inc (CYH.N), one of the biggest U.S. hospital groups, said on Monday it was the victim of a cyber attack from China, resulting in the theft of Social Security numbers and other personal data belonging to 4.5 million patients...
Michigan Teamsters Joint Council 43 President Nowak, Executive Board Re-Elected Without Opposition IBT ...Michigan Teamster local union officers who gathered at the Shanty Creek Resort in Bellaire, Mich. for Joint Council 43’s 2014 Fall Delegates Meeting voted unanimously to re-elect Joint Council 43 President Greg Nowak, Secretary-Treasurer Jim “Cinci” Cianciolo and the entire Executive Board to a new three-year term...
Trade
Awash In Coal, U.S. Imports Even More Wall Street Journal ...Coal imports surged 44% to 5.4 million metric tons during the first six months of 2014, compared with a year ago, according to Global Trade Information Services...
State Battles
Nebraska: Minimum Wage Increase to Be on Ballot New York Times ...A proposal to increase Nebraska’s minimum wage has qualified for the November ballot. The secretary of state’s office said Friday it had verified enough signatures. If approved by voters, the measure would increase the state’s minimum wage to $9 an hour by 2016 from $7.25 an hour, the same as the federal minimum...
California teachers union fears right-to-work law inevitable Washington Examiner ... the change might be inevitable based on various lawsuits that could reach the Supreme Court...
With close ties to sugar, Florida’s next House speaker admits taking King Ranch trip Miami Herald ...Crisafulli, who will become the most powerful man in the Florida House of Representatives this fall, has been a major beneficiary of the state’s sugar industry. During the past two election cycles, agricultural interests have contributed at least $200,000 to Rep. Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island, and his political action committees...
How Much Of Wal-Mart Is Really Made In America? Bloomberg Businessweek ...At least one company, Kent Bicycles, has said it located a new factory in South Carolina because of the state’s right-to-work law. The chief executive noted that Wal-Mart had introduced him to South Carolina’s Republican governor, Nikki Haley...
Democracy A Casualty Of Voter-Suppression Politics (opinion) Billings Gazette ...When same-day voter registration and voting is being cut back, as pushed in Montana by the Republican Legislature, and evidence shows that the majority of late registrants do not vote the Republican way, no wonder many Montanans think someone is trying to stop them from voting because of where they stand philosophically...
6,000 Lack Proper Voter ID Locally The Robesonian ...More than 6,000 Robeson County (North Carolina) residents will have to get a voter ID if they they want to vote in the 2016 General Election...
War On Workers
Blame Employers, Not Workers, for Any Skills Gap, Economist Says Wall Street Journal ...The “obvious solution” to “virtually all the skill problems reported by employers is to increase training and produce the skilled workers they want themselves.” Much of the evidence in support of a skills gap could be explained by employers who are no longer willing to train their employees or raise salaries, and instead want to be able to hire people with exactly the right skills–and on the cheap...
Average cost of raising a child hits $245,000 CNN ...To raise a child born in 2013 to the age of 18, it will cost a middle-income couple just over $245,000, according to newly released estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. That's up $4,260, or almost 2%, from the year before...
Feds: Red light camera firm paid for Chicago official’s car, condo ars technica ...The former chief executive officer of Redflex, a major red light camera (RLC) vendor, has been indicted on federal corruption charges stemming from a contract with the City of Chicago...
Worker Killed In North Side Industrial Accident KSAT ...A man in his 60s was killed Monday when a 3,500 pound sack of fracking sand fell on him...
Efforts Advance To Stabilize The Schedules Of Part-Time Workers Kansas City Star ...The movement to support “schedules that work” for employees includes a bill by that name, introduced this summer in the U.S. House and Senate, that would let employees request changes to their work schedules “without fear of retaliation,” among other things...
Money in Politics: Rising in Intensity as a 2014 Election Issue Huffington Post ...candidates all over the country, in red states as well as purple and blue, are taking up the fight against money in politics, to take the country back from the Koch brothers, Wall Street, and the big business interests that run things right now...
Miscellaneous
Community Health says data stolen in cyber attack from China Reuters ...Community Health Systems Inc (CYH.N), one of the biggest U.S. hospital groups, said on Monday it was the victim of a cyber attack from China, resulting in the theft of Social Security numbers and other personal data belonging to 4.5 million patients...
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
Today's Teamster News 06.24.14
Teamster News
Teamsters, Taylor Farms clash The Packer ...The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which hopes to represent Taylor Farms employees at two Tracy, Calif., facilities, claims many were denied benefits as a result of prolonged stays in temporary worker status...
With help from Teamsters, LA Uber drivers try to organize Southern California Public Radio ...Organizers are expecting up to 500 Uber drivers – supported by Teamsters Local 986 – to hold a demonstration Tuesday morning in front of the Uber offices in Santa Monica...
D.C. Taxicab Drivers Organize Against Ridesharing Services WAMU ...local labor groups are focusing on pressuring the D.C. Council to help cabbies stave off competition from the unregulated, on-demand “ridesharing” services UberX, Lyft, and Sidecar. The Teamsters Local 922 is planning to hold a cab driver rally Wednesday at Freedom Plaza in downtown Washington to call on District legislators to level a playing field where the city’s regulated taxi fleet currently feels at a disadvantage to the innovative newcomers...
Arbitration Ruling Renews CN, Teamsters Canada Rail Conference Agreement Progressive Railroading ...CN on Friday announced it will immediately begin to implement an arbitrator's decision that set the terms and conditions of a new three-year agreement with the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference-Conductors, Trainpersons and Yardpersons (TCRC-CTY)...
Trade
Thanks to Wikileaks, public can debate alarming new trade deal Trade Reform ...The draft agreement Wikileaks released on June 19 is fresh, written in May. It is a model of secret law, blatant in its disregard for transparency, democratic process and history. Its opening page says the terms are to remain secret for five years after negotiations formally end or the proposed new rules take effect. Talks to refine that agreement were to resume Monday in Geneva...
LIVEBLOG: Minnesota State Reps Demand Washington Act On Unfair Steel Trade manufacture this ...Jason Metsa, Tom Anzelc and several others followed Governor Mark Dayton’s powerful demand for federal action on unfair trade in steel ... especially tubular products being produced in South Korea and dumped at below-market prices in the U.S. market...
State Battles
We have a proven formula for success’ (opinion) FortWayne.com ...I recently vetoed an ordinance passed by City Council that would end collective bargaining for non-public safety union employees...
Labor Law Repeal To Hit Assembly, Again, On Tuesday Anchorage Daily News ...The latest effort to defeat a controversial city labor law will hit the Anchorage Assembly on Tuesday night as members consider a complicated array of options from repealing the measure outright to replacing it with a watered-down version to leaving it as a referendum question on the state ballot in November's election...
The Supreme Court Ruled In Favor Of An Alabama Whistle Blower. What Does That Mean For Others Who Expose Corruption? Birmingham News ...Edward Lane was the director of a statewide program for Alabama's at-risk youth when he saw State Rep. Sue Schmitz was drawing pay, but doing no work, for the program. Lane fired Schmitz in 2006 and later testified at her public corruption trials regarding the "no-show" job....
Mayors Put Focus On How To Raise Wages For Lowest-Paid Workers In Cities New York Times ...Here at the annual meeting of the United States Conference of Mayors, which convened over the weekend, the subject of income inequality seemed to be on almost everyone’s lips, and mayors wondered aloud how best to use their powers to help the lowest-paid workers...
War On Workers
Starbucks baristudents should beware the green mermaid bearing gifts (opinion) Guardian ...For the first two years of their education, Starbucks students will qualify for a small scholarship from ASU, but the balance of their tuition payments will have to come from loans and students' own financial resources (aka their take-home pay as baristas)...
The CEO Aristocracy: Big Bucks For The Big Boss Washington Post ...Any CEO of a major company is virtually guaranteed to become a multimillionaire. In the Equilar survey, the median holding of company stock was $83 million. CEO compensation has vastly outstripped average wage gains...
Miscellaneous
Justices Uphold Emission Limits on Big Industry New York Times ...In a big win for environmentalists, the Supreme Court on Monday effectively endorsed the Obama administration’s efforts to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from sources like power plants, even as it criticized what it called the administration’s overreaching...
Teamsters, Taylor Farms clash The Packer ...The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which hopes to represent Taylor Farms employees at two Tracy, Calif., facilities, claims many were denied benefits as a result of prolonged stays in temporary worker status...
With help from Teamsters, LA Uber drivers try to organize Southern California Public Radio ...Organizers are expecting up to 500 Uber drivers – supported by Teamsters Local 986 – to hold a demonstration Tuesday morning in front of the Uber offices in Santa Monica...
D.C. Taxicab Drivers Organize Against Ridesharing Services WAMU ...local labor groups are focusing on pressuring the D.C. Council to help cabbies stave off competition from the unregulated, on-demand “ridesharing” services UberX, Lyft, and Sidecar. The Teamsters Local 922 is planning to hold a cab driver rally Wednesday at Freedom Plaza in downtown Washington to call on District legislators to level a playing field where the city’s regulated taxi fleet currently feels at a disadvantage to the innovative newcomers...
Arbitration Ruling Renews CN, Teamsters Canada Rail Conference Agreement Progressive Railroading ...CN on Friday announced it will immediately begin to implement an arbitrator's decision that set the terms and conditions of a new three-year agreement with the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference-Conductors, Trainpersons and Yardpersons (TCRC-CTY)...
Trade
Thanks to Wikileaks, public can debate alarming new trade deal Trade Reform ...The draft agreement Wikileaks released on June 19 is fresh, written in May. It is a model of secret law, blatant in its disregard for transparency, democratic process and history. Its opening page says the terms are to remain secret for five years after negotiations formally end or the proposed new rules take effect. Talks to refine that agreement were to resume Monday in Geneva...
LIVEBLOG: Minnesota State Reps Demand Washington Act On Unfair Steel Trade manufacture this ...Jason Metsa, Tom Anzelc and several others followed Governor Mark Dayton’s powerful demand for federal action on unfair trade in steel ... especially tubular products being produced in South Korea and dumped at below-market prices in the U.S. market...
State Battles
We have a proven formula for success’ (opinion) FortWayne.com ...I recently vetoed an ordinance passed by City Council that would end collective bargaining for non-public safety union employees...
Labor Law Repeal To Hit Assembly, Again, On Tuesday Anchorage Daily News ...The latest effort to defeat a controversial city labor law will hit the Anchorage Assembly on Tuesday night as members consider a complicated array of options from repealing the measure outright to replacing it with a watered-down version to leaving it as a referendum question on the state ballot in November's election...
The Supreme Court Ruled In Favor Of An Alabama Whistle Blower. What Does That Mean For Others Who Expose Corruption? Birmingham News ...Edward Lane was the director of a statewide program for Alabama's at-risk youth when he saw State Rep. Sue Schmitz was drawing pay, but doing no work, for the program. Lane fired Schmitz in 2006 and later testified at her public corruption trials regarding the "no-show" job....
Mayors Put Focus On How To Raise Wages For Lowest-Paid Workers In Cities New York Times ...Here at the annual meeting of the United States Conference of Mayors, which convened over the weekend, the subject of income inequality seemed to be on almost everyone’s lips, and mayors wondered aloud how best to use their powers to help the lowest-paid workers...
War On Workers
Starbucks baristudents should beware the green mermaid bearing gifts (opinion) Guardian ...For the first two years of their education, Starbucks students will qualify for a small scholarship from ASU, but the balance of their tuition payments will have to come from loans and students' own financial resources (aka their take-home pay as baristas)...
The CEO Aristocracy: Big Bucks For The Big Boss Washington Post ...Any CEO of a major company is virtually guaranteed to become a multimillionaire. In the Equilar survey, the median holding of company stock was $83 million. CEO compensation has vastly outstripped average wage gains...
Miscellaneous
Justices Uphold Emission Limits on Big Industry New York Times ...In a big win for environmentalists, the Supreme Court on Monday effectively endorsed the Obama administration’s efforts to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from sources like power plants, even as it criticized what it called the administration’s overreaching...
Friday, June 6, 2014
Today's Teamster News 06.06.14
Teamster News
Teamsters Caution FTC Sysco-US Foods Merger Could Harm Competition, Consumers, Workers IBT ...On Wednesday, the Teamsters cautioned the Federal Trade Commission staff and state attorneys general investigating Sysco's proposed acquisition of US Foods for anti-trust issues that a merger of the top two U.S. food service providers could limit competition...
Trade
Chicken from China? Your Seafood is Already Being Processed There Trade Reform ...fish processors in the Northwest, including Seattle-based Trident Seafoods, are sending part of their catch of Alaskan salmon or Dungeness crab to China to be filleted or de-shelled before returning to U.S. tables...
OMB Bureaucratic Fraud: Foreign Goods to Be Classified as U.S. Produced! Trade Reform ...…Apple iPhones built by Foxconn in China and sold in Japan will be counted a U.S. export!...
State Battles
R.I. Senate Committee Oks Bill Raising Minimum Wage Providence Journal ...Rhode Island's minimum wage moved one step closer to a one-dollar hike Wednesday. By a unanimous vote, the Senate Labor Committee passed a bill that raises the minimum wage from $8 an hour to $9 an hour, effective Jan. 1, 2015...
Ohio Proposal Aimed At Barring College Athletes From Unionizing Heads To Gov In Budget Bill U.S. News ...Ohio lawmakers have passed a bill that says college athletes are not public employees under state law. The idea cleared the state legislature Wednesday as part of a broader bill now headed to the governor's desk...
Study finds strong evidence for discriminatory intent behind voter ID laws Washington Post ...State legislators who support voter ID laws are motivated in no small part by racial bias, according to a new study from the University of Southern California...
Some states already lashing at climate rule Politico Pro ...Kentucky has gone even further, enacting a law this spring that could block the state from complying with EPA’s rule. West Virginia and Kansas have new laws taking aim at the regulation one way or another, and states like Ohio, Louisiana and Missouri are considering similar measures...
War On Workers
Who Is Behind the National Right to Work Committee and Its Anti-Union Crusade? Truthout ...If the court follows National Right to Work's lead, every state in the country would essentially turn into an anti-union "right to work" state, which would be a significant blow to public sector unions' collective bargaining efforts and also complicate thousands of existing contracts between organized workers and municipalities, cities, counties, and states across the country...
Well-Paid Workers Strengthen Local Economies New York Times ...Orthodox economists and trickle-down dogmatists are sputtering in disbelief over Seattle's new $15 minimum wage, convinced it will destroy our economy. As House Speaker John Boehner is fond of saying, "If you raise the price of employment, guess what happens? You get less of it." They are wrong...
Three New Ways The Koch Brothers Are Screwing America Rolling Stone ...The fourth-richest men in America target low-wage workers, minority voters and unions...
Walmart Workers Strike Today, As Report Says Women Hardest Hit By Retail's Low Wages Cleveland Plain-Dealer ...Women are disproportionately impacted by the low wages and often erratic work schedules in the retail industry, says a new report...
Walmart's Executive Tax Bonuses Have Cost Taxpayers $104 Million Since 2009 Think Progress ...Since 2009, Walmart has ducked $104 million in taxes by exploiting a tax loophole around bonus payments to just eight top executives, according to a report from the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS)...
McDonald's CEO: 'We Will Support' A Minimum Wage Hike Huffington Post ...McDonald's CEO Don Thompson recently suggested his company would support a bill, proposed by President Barack Obama, raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour from $7.25...
Miscellaneous
Unions Set High Goal: Collective Bargaining For All Workers Wall Street Journal ...Organized labor has embarked on a project to develop legislation that would expand collective bargaining rights of private sector workers, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said...
UAW Elects Dennis Williams President In A Landslide: 'I Feel The Energy' Detroit Free Press ...The UAW elected Dennis Williams its 11th president Wednesday in a landslide, putting him in charge of a union struggling to regain bargaining leverage, rebuild its finances and restore political clout...
The Snowden Effect: 8 Things That Happened Only Because Of The NSA Leaks Huffington Post ...Brazil gave a massive fighter jet contract to Saab instead of the American company Boeing...
Teamsters Caution FTC Sysco-US Foods Merger Could Harm Competition, Consumers, Workers IBT ...On Wednesday, the Teamsters cautioned the Federal Trade Commission staff and state attorneys general investigating Sysco's proposed acquisition of US Foods for anti-trust issues that a merger of the top two U.S. food service providers could limit competition...
Trade
Chicken from China? Your Seafood is Already Being Processed There Trade Reform ...fish processors in the Northwest, including Seattle-based Trident Seafoods, are sending part of their catch of Alaskan salmon or Dungeness crab to China to be filleted or de-shelled before returning to U.S. tables...
OMB Bureaucratic Fraud: Foreign Goods to Be Classified as U.S. Produced! Trade Reform ...…Apple iPhones built by Foxconn in China and sold in Japan will be counted a U.S. export!...
State Battles
R.I. Senate Committee Oks Bill Raising Minimum Wage Providence Journal ...Rhode Island's minimum wage moved one step closer to a one-dollar hike Wednesday. By a unanimous vote, the Senate Labor Committee passed a bill that raises the minimum wage from $8 an hour to $9 an hour, effective Jan. 1, 2015...
Ohio Proposal Aimed At Barring College Athletes From Unionizing Heads To Gov In Budget Bill U.S. News ...Ohio lawmakers have passed a bill that says college athletes are not public employees under state law. The idea cleared the state legislature Wednesday as part of a broader bill now headed to the governor's desk...
Study finds strong evidence for discriminatory intent behind voter ID laws Washington Post ...State legislators who support voter ID laws are motivated in no small part by racial bias, according to a new study from the University of Southern California...
Some states already lashing at climate rule Politico Pro ...Kentucky has gone even further, enacting a law this spring that could block the state from complying with EPA’s rule. West Virginia and Kansas have new laws taking aim at the regulation one way or another, and states like Ohio, Louisiana and Missouri are considering similar measures...
War On Workers
Who Is Behind the National Right to Work Committee and Its Anti-Union Crusade? Truthout ...If the court follows National Right to Work's lead, every state in the country would essentially turn into an anti-union "right to work" state, which would be a significant blow to public sector unions' collective bargaining efforts and also complicate thousands of existing contracts between organized workers and municipalities, cities, counties, and states across the country...
Well-Paid Workers Strengthen Local Economies New York Times ...Orthodox economists and trickle-down dogmatists are sputtering in disbelief over Seattle's new $15 minimum wage, convinced it will destroy our economy. As House Speaker John Boehner is fond of saying, "If you raise the price of employment, guess what happens? You get less of it." They are wrong...
Three New Ways The Koch Brothers Are Screwing America Rolling Stone ...The fourth-richest men in America target low-wage workers, minority voters and unions...
Walmart Workers Strike Today, As Report Says Women Hardest Hit By Retail's Low Wages Cleveland Plain-Dealer ...Women are disproportionately impacted by the low wages and often erratic work schedules in the retail industry, says a new report...
Walmart's Executive Tax Bonuses Have Cost Taxpayers $104 Million Since 2009 Think Progress ...Since 2009, Walmart has ducked $104 million in taxes by exploiting a tax loophole around bonus payments to just eight top executives, according to a report from the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS)...
McDonald's CEO: 'We Will Support' A Minimum Wage Hike Huffington Post ...McDonald's CEO Don Thompson recently suggested his company would support a bill, proposed by President Barack Obama, raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour from $7.25...
Miscellaneous
Unions Set High Goal: Collective Bargaining For All Workers Wall Street Journal ...Organized labor has embarked on a project to develop legislation that would expand collective bargaining rights of private sector workers, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said...
UAW Elects Dennis Williams President In A Landslide: 'I Feel The Energy' Detroit Free Press ...The UAW elected Dennis Williams its 11th president Wednesday in a landslide, putting him in charge of a union struggling to regain bargaining leverage, rebuild its finances and restore political clout...
The Snowden Effect: 8 Things That Happened Only Because Of The NSA Leaks Huffington Post ...Brazil gave a massive fighter jet contract to Saab instead of the American company Boeing...
Thursday, June 5, 2014
Teamsters Rail Conference says EPA plan would cost railroad jobs
The EPA earlier this week proposed new regulations on electrical generation plants that could cost a staggering number of railroad jobs because it will reduce the use of coal.
That's according to the Teamsters Rail Conference, which represents more than 70,000 locomotive engineers and trainmen and maintenance of way employees. They're concerned that good, blue-collar jobs will be replaced with low-wage service jobs -- or few jobs at all.
Here's the whole statement:
On June 2, the Environmental Protection Agency proposed to regulate electrical generation plants to reduce greenhouse gases, issuing a rule that could cost a staggering number of good railroad industry jobs.
The rule, if it becomes final in its current form, would significantly reduce the amount of coal used to generate electricity. Nearly one in five railroad jobs is directly linked to coal haulage.
If these jobs are lost, it is unlikely that new business generated on our nation’s railroads will ever make up for the loss of coal. This rule has the potential to devastate communities reliant on the coal industry. We have a responsibility to those individuals and families, and they cannot be treated merely as collateral damage in our country’s efforts to curb climate change.
The railroad jobs that could disappear under this regulation are among the most highly skilled blue-collar jobs in America. We support efforts to invest in renewable energy and corresponding jobs in the so-called “green economy,” but the nation’s economy, as a whole, will suffer if those jobs are not as well-paying and secure, which is likely.
We understand that the United States must play a leadership role in reducing emissions globally, but other countries like China and India are in no position to switch from coal anytime soon.
Without a binding agreement on global greenhouse gas emissions, this proposal threatens to put U.S. manufacturing at a cost disadvantage and even more jobs will go overseas. This is why deploying cost-effective carbon capture and sequestration technology is essential and should be a priority for this Administration and the Congress.
The Teamsters Rail Conference will continue to work for a balanced energy policy that stresses affordability and reliability — a policy that includes coal in an “all of the above” plan for America’s energy future. There is a place for renewebles in this plan, but the rising cost of energy in Spain and other European countries should act as a cautionary tale against moving too quickly and aggressively, and failing to diversify our energy portfolio.
Recognizing that this is only the beginning of what will be a lengthy policy-making process, we will continue to work with the Administration and the broader labor community to ensure that any final rule prioritizes the economic health of working people as highly as it does the health of our planet. There is a place where both priorities may coexist, but with this proposal we are most definitely not there yet.The Teamsters Rail Conference represents the more than 35,000 locomotive engineers and trainmen of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen and 35,000 maintenance of way workers of the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division on freight, passenger and commuter rail lines across the United States.
Tuesday, June 3, 2014
Today's Teamster News 06.03.14
Teamsters
Teamsters Mourn Passing Of Troy Stapleton teamster.org ...The Teamsters Union lost a true friend and brother in the labor movement with the passing of retired Local 100 president Troy Stapleton on May 29 after succumbing to injuries suffered in an automobile accident...
Accelerated-Vesting Bans Win Shareholder Votes Agenda ...In landmark votes, shareholders of Valero Energy and Gannett separately approved shareholder proposals that would ban accelerated vesting of performance-based executive equity awards if the companies change hands… The Gannett measure was sponsored by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters General Fund...
Teamsters in Windsor: A look at the 1910 federal census The Coloradan ...In 1904, the teamsters conducted a sympathy strike in support of 18,000 Chicago meat cutters. In 1905, they supported tailors in the well-known Montgomery Ward strike of the same city...
Trade
Whoa! U.S. House passes bill banning 'Buy American' waivers for TPP, TTIP TeamsterNation ...The U.S. House of Representatives voted last week to block talks for trade agreements that void Buy American rules...
53 Democratic lawmakers push U.S. to toughen up Trans-Pacific Partnership rules Reuters ...U.S. trade negotiators must insist on tough standards on human and workers’ rights in a Pacific trade deal spanning 12 countries, more than 150 Democratic lawmakers said in a letter to the Obama administration on Thursday...
5 takeaways from #SOSJobs Lone Star Rally manufacture this ...the Alliance for American Manufacturing 9AAM) joined citizens, workers, and state and federal legislators in Texas to rally in support of steel jobs at U.S. Steel’s Lone Star Tubular Operations facility. The products produced there –- called oil country tubular goods (OCTG) –- are used for energy exploration...But America’s domestic producers of OCTG are in danger of being swamped by illegal competition...
State Battles
Seattle OKs $15 minimum wage Associated Press ...The Seattle City Council unanimously passed an ordinance Monday that gradually increases the minimum wage in the city to $15, which would make it the highest in the nation...
War on Workers
'Walmart Moms' Target Annual Shareholder Meeting Women's eNews ...When Walmart, holds its annual shareholder meeting on June 6, many of its female workers are planning to crash the event at the mega retailer's Bentonville, Ark., headquarters...
Quelle Surprise, Labor Productivity is Up while Labor Wages are Still Down! Angry Bear ...Labor worked the exact same number of hours in 1998 as they did in 2013 or ~194 billion hours. While there was no growth in the number of hours worked, the Non-Institutional Civilian Population grew by 40 million people, and new businesses were created by the thousands which should have needed more Labor...
Study: Privacy is gone, but that’s OK because we get stuff for free Pando ...A new study out from Accenture debuting at the end of last week, surveying 2,012 adults between the ages of 20 and 40 from across the United States and the United Kingdom, found that in today’s digital world 80 percent of us don’t believe that total privacy exists anymore. Worse, however, is that we seem to be accepting of with this new reality...
Miscellaneous
Latest EPA rules signal a bleaker future for coal Arizona Republic ...The Environmental Protection Agency proposed new restrictions on power plants Monday to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, a move that is likely to accelerate a shift away from coal...
Teamsters Mourn Passing Of Troy Stapleton teamster.org ...The Teamsters Union lost a true friend and brother in the labor movement with the passing of retired Local 100 president Troy Stapleton on May 29 after succumbing to injuries suffered in an automobile accident...
Accelerated-Vesting Bans Win Shareholder Votes Agenda ...In landmark votes, shareholders of Valero Energy and Gannett separately approved shareholder proposals that would ban accelerated vesting of performance-based executive equity awards if the companies change hands… The Gannett measure was sponsored by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters General Fund...
Teamsters in Windsor: A look at the 1910 federal census The Coloradan ...In 1904, the teamsters conducted a sympathy strike in support of 18,000 Chicago meat cutters. In 1905, they supported tailors in the well-known Montgomery Ward strike of the same city...
Trade
Whoa! U.S. House passes bill banning 'Buy American' waivers for TPP, TTIP TeamsterNation ...The U.S. House of Representatives voted last week to block talks for trade agreements that void Buy American rules...
53 Democratic lawmakers push U.S. to toughen up Trans-Pacific Partnership rules Reuters ...U.S. trade negotiators must insist on tough standards on human and workers’ rights in a Pacific trade deal spanning 12 countries, more than 150 Democratic lawmakers said in a letter to the Obama administration on Thursday...
5 takeaways from #SOSJobs Lone Star Rally manufacture this ...the Alliance for American Manufacturing 9AAM) joined citizens, workers, and state and federal legislators in Texas to rally in support of steel jobs at U.S. Steel’s Lone Star Tubular Operations facility. The products produced there –- called oil country tubular goods (OCTG) –- are used for energy exploration...But America’s domestic producers of OCTG are in danger of being swamped by illegal competition...
State Battles
Seattle OKs $15 minimum wage Associated Press ...The Seattle City Council unanimously passed an ordinance Monday that gradually increases the minimum wage in the city to $15, which would make it the highest in the nation...
War on Workers
'Walmart Moms' Target Annual Shareholder Meeting Women's eNews ...When Walmart, holds its annual shareholder meeting on June 6, many of its female workers are planning to crash the event at the mega retailer's Bentonville, Ark., headquarters...
Quelle Surprise, Labor Productivity is Up while Labor Wages are Still Down! Angry Bear ...Labor worked the exact same number of hours in 1998 as they did in 2013 or ~194 billion hours. While there was no growth in the number of hours worked, the Non-Institutional Civilian Population grew by 40 million people, and new businesses were created by the thousands which should have needed more Labor...
Study: Privacy is gone, but that’s OK because we get stuff for free Pando ...A new study out from Accenture debuting at the end of last week, surveying 2,012 adults between the ages of 20 and 40 from across the United States and the United Kingdom, found that in today’s digital world 80 percent of us don’t believe that total privacy exists anymore. Worse, however, is that we seem to be accepting of with this new reality...
Miscellaneous
Latest EPA rules signal a bleaker future for coal Arizona Republic ...The Environmental Protection Agency proposed new restrictions on power plants Monday to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, a move that is likely to accelerate a shift away from coal...
Monday, June 2, 2014
Today's Teamster News 06.02.14
Trade
US food safety association flags up potential negatives of TTIP Global Meat News ...Food safety in the meat industry could be negatively affected by the result of the current Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) talks between the US and the European Union, according to the Center for Food Safety (CFS) in the US...
EU-US clash over financial services in TTIP EurActiv ... The US Ambassador to the EU told the European Commissioner for Trade today (15 May) that there is hardly any chance that financial services will be included in a future Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)...
State Battles
How Local Governments Are Using Their Purchasing Power to End Sweatshop Labor The Nation ...Last month, to commemorate the anniversary of the deadly Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh, the city of Madison, Wisconsin, launched a contracting policy that commits the city’s vendors to promote fair labor standards...
A New Teacher Union Movement is Rising Portside ...A revitalized teacher union movement is bubbling up in the midst of relentless attacks on public schools and the teaching profession...
The War on Workers
QE, Bailouts, And Families Struggling To Buy Food Testosterone Pit ...In 2013, as the S&P 500 index, including dividends, shot up 32.4% – after an already blistering 16% in 2012 – and as the Fed’s trillions inflated just about every asset class, from modernist paintings to farmland, well just then, 23% of the families with kids and 19% of the families without kids in America reported difficulties buying food...
Walmart Associates From All Over The World Arrive In Northwest Arkansas Sunday 5News ...The Walmart shareholders and associates stay at the University of Arkansas in the dorms. All of the events and meals take place on campus, with the biggest event being the 7 a.m. Friday shareholders meeting at Bud Walton Arena...
A New Rallying Cry for Retail Workers: $25,000 a Year Bloomberg ...Walmart Moms head to the headquarters of Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) for the retailer’s annual shareholder meeting on June 6. The union-supported group is asking for $25,000 a year for full-time work...
N.S.A. Collecting Millions of Faces From Web Images New York Times ...The National Security Agency is harvesting huge numbers of images of people from communications that it intercepts through its global surveillance operations for use in sophisticated facial recognition programs, according to top-secret documents...
Miscellaneous
U.S. to unveil sweeping rules to cut power plant pollution Reuters ...The U.S. power sector will need to emit 30 percent less carbon dioxide by 2030 than it did in 2005, according to new federal regulations - the centerpiece of the Obama administration's climate change strategy - to be unveiled on Monday...
Study Examines Efficacy of Taxes on Sugary Drinks New York Times ...A new study of how taxes might be used to curb consumption of sugary drinks suggests that applying a tax based on the amount of calories contained in a serving rather than its size would be more effective...
US food safety association flags up potential negatives of TTIP Global Meat News ...Food safety in the meat industry could be negatively affected by the result of the current Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) talks between the US and the European Union, according to the Center for Food Safety (CFS) in the US...
EU-US clash over financial services in TTIP EurActiv ... The US Ambassador to the EU told the European Commissioner for Trade today (15 May) that there is hardly any chance that financial services will be included in a future Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)...
State Battles
How Local Governments Are Using Their Purchasing Power to End Sweatshop Labor The Nation ...Last month, to commemorate the anniversary of the deadly Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh, the city of Madison, Wisconsin, launched a contracting policy that commits the city’s vendors to promote fair labor standards...
A New Teacher Union Movement is Rising Portside ...A revitalized teacher union movement is bubbling up in the midst of relentless attacks on public schools and the teaching profession...
The War on Workers
QE, Bailouts, And Families Struggling To Buy Food Testosterone Pit ...In 2013, as the S&P 500 index, including dividends, shot up 32.4% – after an already blistering 16% in 2012 – and as the Fed’s trillions inflated just about every asset class, from modernist paintings to farmland, well just then, 23% of the families with kids and 19% of the families without kids in America reported difficulties buying food...
Walmart Associates From All Over The World Arrive In Northwest Arkansas Sunday 5News ...The Walmart shareholders and associates stay at the University of Arkansas in the dorms. All of the events and meals take place on campus, with the biggest event being the 7 a.m. Friday shareholders meeting at Bud Walton Arena...
A New Rallying Cry for Retail Workers: $25,000 a Year Bloomberg ...Walmart Moms head to the headquarters of Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) for the retailer’s annual shareholder meeting on June 6. The union-supported group is asking for $25,000 a year for full-time work...
N.S.A. Collecting Millions of Faces From Web Images New York Times ...The National Security Agency is harvesting huge numbers of images of people from communications that it intercepts through its global surveillance operations for use in sophisticated facial recognition programs, according to top-secret documents...
Miscellaneous
U.S. to unveil sweeping rules to cut power plant pollution Reuters ...The U.S. power sector will need to emit 30 percent less carbon dioxide by 2030 than it did in 2005, according to new federal regulations - the centerpiece of the Obama administration's climate change strategy - to be unveiled on Monday...
Study Examines Efficacy of Taxes on Sugary Drinks New York Times ...A new study of how taxes might be used to curb consumption of sugary drinks suggests that applying a tax based on the amount of calories contained in a serving rather than its size would be more effective...
Sunday, June 1, 2014
Today's Teamster News 06.01.14
Trade
Ford moves jobs, production from Mexico to America PowerNation ...Ford Motor Co. plans to announce details of a manufacturing shift of medium-duty trucks from Mexico to the United States. Its F-650s and F-750s will be moved to the Ohio Assembly Plant, and the switch is planned to take place in early 2015…
Success Of Fringe Parties In European Parliament Raises New Obstacle To TAFTA/TTIP's Progress TechDirt ...following last week's elections for the European Parliament, a new obstacle to concluding the agreement has been added: an increased number of European politicians (MEPs) that are skeptical about pan-European projects in general, and TAFTA/TTIP...
State Battles
Wall Street Journal hits Scott Walker again on Doe deal-making Milwauke Journal Sentinel ...The Wall Street Journal editorial page has once again spanked Gov. Scott Walker for allegedly contemplating a settlement deal with John Doe prosecutors...
The War on Workers
How the NSA Can Get Onto Your Computer PBS Frontline ...there is a suite of programs, codenamed QUANTUM, which allows the NSA access to a much wider variety of computers...
New Law ‘Facilitates Privatization’ of US Water Systems Mint Press News ...Much of America’s drinking water and wastewater infrastructure needs attention, but critics worry that a new funding bill could be a pipeline to government-subsidized privatization...
Fast Food Workers' Movement: Union 2.0? Real News Network ...With the support of America's second largest union SEIU, the fast food workers' $15 wage movement has grown, but is this unorganized workforce of the past shaping up to be the future face of the American organized labor force?...
The problems isn't the VA or Eric Shinseki (opinion) GQ ...thus ends the honorable career of a soldier who was correct about the lies behind the greatest policy disaster of our times, about the essential criminality of the people who launched the invasion of Iraq, but whose primary failures as an administrator were his inability to oversee the people in his department who were directly trying to cope with the flood of casualties that resulted from all of those soldiers that most of official Washington told Eric Shinseki they would never need to create a democratic paradise in Iraq...
SEC Chair Mary Jo White Earns the Wrath of the Media for Refusing to Acknowledge High Frequency Trading Perks as a Crime Wall Street on Parade ...there has been a slow, but steady, realization that the woman President Obama sold to the American people as the white knight who would rein in abuses on Wall Street has failed miserably in that role...
Miscellaneous
It's simple. If we can't change our economic system, our number's up (opinion) Guardian ...It was neither capitalism nor communism that made possible the progress and pathologies (total war, the unprecedented concentration of global wealth, planetary destruction) of the modern age. It was coal, followed by oil and gas...
Not Walking the Walk on Board Diversity New York Times ...is there a penalty if a company reneges on its promise of change? The answer, if you are Skechers USA, the footwear manufacturer, is apparently not…
Ford moves jobs, production from Mexico to America PowerNation ...Ford Motor Co. plans to announce details of a manufacturing shift of medium-duty trucks from Mexico to the United States. Its F-650s and F-750s will be moved to the Ohio Assembly Plant, and the switch is planned to take place in early 2015…
Success Of Fringe Parties In European Parliament Raises New Obstacle To TAFTA/TTIP's Progress TechDirt ...following last week's elections for the European Parliament, a new obstacle to concluding the agreement has been added: an increased number of European politicians (MEPs) that are skeptical about pan-European projects in general, and TAFTA/TTIP...
State Battles
Wall Street Journal hits Scott Walker again on Doe deal-making Milwauke Journal Sentinel ...The Wall Street Journal editorial page has once again spanked Gov. Scott Walker for allegedly contemplating a settlement deal with John Doe prosecutors...
The War on Workers
How the NSA Can Get Onto Your Computer PBS Frontline ...there is a suite of programs, codenamed QUANTUM, which allows the NSA access to a much wider variety of computers...
New Law ‘Facilitates Privatization’ of US Water Systems Mint Press News ...Much of America’s drinking water and wastewater infrastructure needs attention, but critics worry that a new funding bill could be a pipeline to government-subsidized privatization...
Fast Food Workers' Movement: Union 2.0? Real News Network ...With the support of America's second largest union SEIU, the fast food workers' $15 wage movement has grown, but is this unorganized workforce of the past shaping up to be the future face of the American organized labor force?...
The problems isn't the VA or Eric Shinseki (opinion) GQ ...thus ends the honorable career of a soldier who was correct about the lies behind the greatest policy disaster of our times, about the essential criminality of the people who launched the invasion of Iraq, but whose primary failures as an administrator were his inability to oversee the people in his department who were directly trying to cope with the flood of casualties that resulted from all of those soldiers that most of official Washington told Eric Shinseki they would never need to create a democratic paradise in Iraq...
SEC Chair Mary Jo White Earns the Wrath of the Media for Refusing to Acknowledge High Frequency Trading Perks as a Crime Wall Street on Parade ...there has been a slow, but steady, realization that the woman President Obama sold to the American people as the white knight who would rein in abuses on Wall Street has failed miserably in that role...
Miscellaneous
It's simple. If we can't change our economic system, our number's up (opinion) Guardian ...It was neither capitalism nor communism that made possible the progress and pathologies (total war, the unprecedented concentration of global wealth, planetary destruction) of the modern age. It was coal, followed by oil and gas...
Not Walking the Walk on Board Diversity New York Times ...is there a penalty if a company reneges on its promise of change? The answer, if you are Skechers USA, the footwear manufacturer, is apparently not…
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Today's Teamster News 12.10.13
Teamsters Call On Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan To Stop Worker Abuse Teamsters Canada ...The demonstrators will publicly call on Teachers' to stop worker and human rights abuses at EXAL Corp., an aluminum bottle manufacturer in Youngstown, Ohio. EXAL is owned and actively managed by the Canadian pension plan...
Use of Phones on Planes Would Be More Than Just Annoying teamster.org ...President James P. Hoffa wrote to the head of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) last week asking the agency not to move forward with proposed changes that would allow passengers to speak on cell phones while in flight...
Sysco to buy rival US Foods Inc and become largest American distributor The Guardian ...Shareholders of US Foods, owned by affiliates of private equity firms Clayton, Dubilier & Rice and KKR & Co, will own about 13% of Sysco after the closing of the deal, which will create a company with revenue of $65bn...
Get a clue, McDonald’s: Chain tells workers how much to tip their pool cleaners, dog walkers, and masseuses Salon ...“In total, the tips add up to hundreds, if not more than a thousand dollars of gift suggestions for McDonald’s workers, many of whom earn just above minimum wage...”
A Record Number of Americans Can’t Afford Their Rent ThinkProgress ... low-income renters who make $15,000 or less would have to find housing that costs less than $375 a month, yet the median monthly cost for housing that was built in the last four years is more than $1,000...
More Than Three-Quarters of Workers Missing from the Labor Force Are Under Age 55 Economic Policy Institute ...even if all of the missing workers age 55 and over are early retirees who will never reenter the labor force no matter how strong job opportunities are (a very strong assumption), that still leaves 4.3 million missing workers under the age of 55 who are likely to re-enter the labor force when job opportunities strengthen...
TPP Trade Pact Misses Deadline as More Talks Planned for January Bloomberg ...The TPP, which would link an area with about $28 trillion in annual economic output, has been bogged down by differences over issues from agricultural tariffs to intellectual property. Leaders from the U.S. to Malaysia and Japan face opposition to the deal from lawmakers at home, an obstacle that will have to be overcome once the agreement itself is finalized...
NAFTA’s Impact on U.S. Workers Economic Policy Institute ...NAFTA was the template for rules of the emerging global economy, in which the benefits would flow to capital and the costs to labor...
Eight bodies, some dismembered, found on Mexican highway Reuters ...Mexican authorities found the bodies of eight kidnap victims, some dismembered, on a highway in the troubled southern state of Guerrero where government troops have been deployed to stem violence, officials said on Monday...
Meet the 20 Percent: Wealthy Social Liberals Standing Against Efforts to Fight Income Inequality Alternet ...The "20 percent" don’t want their taxes raised in an effort to reduce inequality...
Let's get this straight: AIG execs got bailout bonuses, but pensioners get cuts (opinion) The Guardian ...No one has accused city workers in Chicago or Detroit of bringing down the economy, but they could face pension cuts...
Unionization Yields Significant Gains in Pay and Benefits for Women Workers Center for Economic Policy Research ...Unionized women workers on average make 12.9 percent more than their non-union counterparts, are 36.8 percent more likely to have employer-provided health insurance and 53.4 percent more likely to have participated in an employer-sponsored retirement plan...
“They’re getting away with murder”: East Coast takes Midwest to task over air pollution Salon ...The governors of eight Northeastern states petitioned the EPA to crack down on coal burning in the Midwest...
Detroit Bankruptcy Bankrupts Democracy The Nation ...The voters of Michigan sent a clear signal last fall. They rejected emergency-manager authoritarianism. Unfortunately, a federal bankruptcy judge has sided with a governor who could not win an election in Detroit and an approach that Detroit voters rejected...
Bad deals with Wall Street are costing the city as much as $1 billion a year: report New York Daily News ..."New York City could be saving $1 billion annually just by changing the way it does business with Wall Street," one of the report's authors, Connie Razza, director of strategic research initiatives at the Center for Popular Democracy, told the Daily News...
Use of Phones on Planes Would Be More Than Just Annoying teamster.org ...President James P. Hoffa wrote to the head of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) last week asking the agency not to move forward with proposed changes that would allow passengers to speak on cell phones while in flight...
Sysco to buy rival US Foods Inc and become largest American distributor The Guardian ...Shareholders of US Foods, owned by affiliates of private equity firms Clayton, Dubilier & Rice and KKR & Co, will own about 13% of Sysco after the closing of the deal, which will create a company with revenue of $65bn...
Get a clue, McDonald’s: Chain tells workers how much to tip their pool cleaners, dog walkers, and masseuses Salon ...“In total, the tips add up to hundreds, if not more than a thousand dollars of gift suggestions for McDonald’s workers, many of whom earn just above minimum wage...”
A Record Number of Americans Can’t Afford Their Rent ThinkProgress ... low-income renters who make $15,000 or less would have to find housing that costs less than $375 a month, yet the median monthly cost for housing that was built in the last four years is more than $1,000...
More Than Three-Quarters of Workers Missing from the Labor Force Are Under Age 55 Economic Policy Institute ...even if all of the missing workers age 55 and over are early retirees who will never reenter the labor force no matter how strong job opportunities are (a very strong assumption), that still leaves 4.3 million missing workers under the age of 55 who are likely to re-enter the labor force when job opportunities strengthen...
TPP Trade Pact Misses Deadline as More Talks Planned for January Bloomberg ...The TPP, which would link an area with about $28 trillion in annual economic output, has been bogged down by differences over issues from agricultural tariffs to intellectual property. Leaders from the U.S. to Malaysia and Japan face opposition to the deal from lawmakers at home, an obstacle that will have to be overcome once the agreement itself is finalized...
NAFTA’s Impact on U.S. Workers Economic Policy Institute ...NAFTA was the template for rules of the emerging global economy, in which the benefits would flow to capital and the costs to labor...
Eight bodies, some dismembered, found on Mexican highway Reuters ...Mexican authorities found the bodies of eight kidnap victims, some dismembered, on a highway in the troubled southern state of Guerrero where government troops have been deployed to stem violence, officials said on Monday...
Meet the 20 Percent: Wealthy Social Liberals Standing Against Efforts to Fight Income Inequality Alternet ...The "20 percent" don’t want their taxes raised in an effort to reduce inequality...
Let's get this straight: AIG execs got bailout bonuses, but pensioners get cuts (opinion) The Guardian ...No one has accused city workers in Chicago or Detroit of bringing down the economy, but they could face pension cuts...
Unionization Yields Significant Gains in Pay and Benefits for Women Workers Center for Economic Policy Research ...Unionized women workers on average make 12.9 percent more than their non-union counterparts, are 36.8 percent more likely to have employer-provided health insurance and 53.4 percent more likely to have participated in an employer-sponsored retirement plan...
“They’re getting away with murder”: East Coast takes Midwest to task over air pollution Salon ...The governors of eight Northeastern states petitioned the EPA to crack down on coal burning in the Midwest...
Detroit Bankruptcy Bankrupts Democracy The Nation ...The voters of Michigan sent a clear signal last fall. They rejected emergency-manager authoritarianism. Unfortunately, a federal bankruptcy judge has sided with a governor who could not win an election in Detroit and an approach that Detroit voters rejected...
Bad deals with Wall Street are costing the city as much as $1 billion a year: report New York Daily News ..."New York City could be saving $1 billion annually just by changing the way it does business with Wall Street," one of the report's authors, Connie Razza, director of strategic research initiatives at the Center for Popular Democracy, told the Daily News...
Saturday, October 19, 2013
Today's Teamster News 10.19.13
Teamsters Stop FMCSA Attack on Truck Drivers teamster.org ...The Teamsters Union helped score a victory for truck drivers this week when H.R. 3095 was signed into law compelling the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) to follow the formal rulemaking process to set strict guidelines for when they can require screening, testing and treatment for sleep apnea...
Star-Ledger unions ratify new 4-year contracts, agree to buyouts Star-Ledger ...After months of negotiations under the cloud of a threatened shutdown of the state’s largest newspaper, the Star-Ledger’s production unions, including the Teamsters Union, have ratified new four-year contracts, agreeing to buyout packages for at least 55 workers...
Since End of U.S. Recession, More Seniors in Workforce Gallup ... There has been a three-point increase since 2010 in the percentage of Americans aged 65 and older who are in the workforce -- employed full time through an employer, self-employed, working part time, or unemployed but actively searching for work. At the same time, there has been a two-point decrease in the percentage of Americans aged 18 to 29 who are in the workforce...
Millennials still lag in forming their own households Pew Research ... most Millennials (adults ages 18 to 32) are still not setting out on their own. As of March 2013, only about one-in-three Millennials (34%) headed up their own household...
Is The Debt Still Worth The Degree? zero hedge ...The price of a college education has increased 1,000% or more over the past 3 decades...
You Thought the Government Shutdown Was Over. You Were Wrong. New Republic ...It was an awful time. Federal employees had to take unpaid furlough days. Beneficiaries were thrown off of federal programs. Courthouses had to be sold. Federal agencies like the FBI, the Food and Drug Administration, and the National Institutes of Health strained to meet commitments, leading to more crime, more outbreaks of disease and less basic research, among other horrors. This may sound like a description of the recent government shutdown, which ended October 16. But this describes the fallout from sequestration...
Pro-Coal Kids' Pages Pulled from Government Site as Public Pressure Increases Alternet ...The Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity has removed coal-related educational sections from its website, less than two weeks after the launch of a grassroots campaign demanding that the pages be taken down...
Food Stamp Outage Highlights Problems With Privatization of Public Services Truthout ...Affiliated Computer Services (ACS), a subsidiary of Xerox since 2000 that specializes in privatizing government administrative services for the most economically vulnerable Americans, has taken heat in the past for siphoning excessive fees from welfare recipients, mismanaging Medicaid payment systems, and failing to complete multimillion dollar contracts for public agencies...
"Fix the Debt's" "Fix the Debt Q&A" needs to be fixed (hilarious) Storify ..."Fix the Debt" decided to have a Twitter Q&A about fixing the debt. I'm not sure it went the way they wanted...
How Mexico is upending the U.S. auto industry Washington Post ...More U.S. automakers have been shifting their plants south of the border, attracted by Mexico's lower wages and dense industrial clusters…
States Clamping Down on Workers Mislabeled as Contractors Bloomberg News ...When construction slowed during the recession, some companies hired workers and wrongly designated them as independent contractors to avoid paying insurance, taxes, fair wages and overtime...
Scott Walker Steers State Funds to Union Busters PolicyMic ...Scott Walker (R-Wisc.) made headlines in 2011 with his plans to bust public sector unions and strip unions of their collective bargaining powers, which led to mass protests in the Madison Capitol building. Now he is back with his latest contribution to increasing jobs in Wisconsin: making them up and steering them to his supporters...
Moral Monday Leader Comes To Boone Oct. 28 High Country Press ...Moral Monday leader Rev. William Barber II will address “The Necessity of a Moral Movement in North Carolina and the Nation” on Monday, Oct. 28...
BART strike: About 400,000 S.F.-area commuters to be affected Los Angeles Times ...Bay Area residents were without commuter rail service and facing a morning of frustration Friday as BART workers went on strike after a week of marathon negotiation collapsed overnight...
Michigan Walmart worker says he was fired for helping assaulted woman Associated Press ...A Michigan man says he was fired from his job at Walmart after he tried to help a woman being assaulted in the parking lot of one of the retail giant's stores and ended up fighting with her attacker...
Wal-Mart workers on strike, defying firings The Salon ...In protest of paltry hours and defiance of firings, over 80 Wal-Mart workers in Hialeah, Florida walk off the job...
The U.S. Blows Everyone Else Out Of The Water In 1 Key Way Huffington Post ...That one way? We're really, really good at creating really, really rich people -- like, $50 million-plus rich. Just ignore the fact that our 400 wealthiest people are worth more than the entire bottom half of the country combined. Look at the chart…
Krugman on GOP’s “top-down class warfare” The Salon ...The New York Times columnist explains how the GOP policies have stalled a true economic recovery...
McDonald's Has Their Hands in All of Our Pockets AlterNet ...Do you want to pay for billion dollar companies to make more money? Of course not, but in recent studies, we learned that we are, in fact, playing billions of dollar to support low-wage fast food workers for America's top seven restaurant chains...
Euro Capitals Tighten Fiscal Leash as EU Polices Cuts Bloomberg News ...Even with the 17-nation euro area projecting economic expansion next year, policy makers are keeping a fiscal leash on growth by maintaining austerity policies to save the euro...
Star-Ledger unions ratify new 4-year contracts, agree to buyouts Star-Ledger ...After months of negotiations under the cloud of a threatened shutdown of the state’s largest newspaper, the Star-Ledger’s production unions, including the Teamsters Union, have ratified new four-year contracts, agreeing to buyout packages for at least 55 workers...
Since End of U.S. Recession, More Seniors in Workforce Gallup ... There has been a three-point increase since 2010 in the percentage of Americans aged 65 and older who are in the workforce -- employed full time through an employer, self-employed, working part time, or unemployed but actively searching for work. At the same time, there has been a two-point decrease in the percentage of Americans aged 18 to 29 who are in the workforce...
Millennials still lag in forming their own households Pew Research ... most Millennials (adults ages 18 to 32) are still not setting out on their own. As of March 2013, only about one-in-three Millennials (34%) headed up their own household...
Is The Debt Still Worth The Degree? zero hedge ...The price of a college education has increased 1,000% or more over the past 3 decades...
You Thought the Government Shutdown Was Over. You Were Wrong. New Republic ...It was an awful time. Federal employees had to take unpaid furlough days. Beneficiaries were thrown off of federal programs. Courthouses had to be sold. Federal agencies like the FBI, the Food and Drug Administration, and the National Institutes of Health strained to meet commitments, leading to more crime, more outbreaks of disease and less basic research, among other horrors. This may sound like a description of the recent government shutdown, which ended October 16. But this describes the fallout from sequestration...
Pro-Coal Kids' Pages Pulled from Government Site as Public Pressure Increases Alternet ...The Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity has removed coal-related educational sections from its website, less than two weeks after the launch of a grassroots campaign demanding that the pages be taken down...
Food Stamp Outage Highlights Problems With Privatization of Public Services Truthout ...Affiliated Computer Services (ACS), a subsidiary of Xerox since 2000 that specializes in privatizing government administrative services for the most economically vulnerable Americans, has taken heat in the past for siphoning excessive fees from welfare recipients, mismanaging Medicaid payment systems, and failing to complete multimillion dollar contracts for public agencies...
"Fix the Debt's" "Fix the Debt Q&A" needs to be fixed (hilarious) Storify ..."Fix the Debt" decided to have a Twitter Q&A about fixing the debt. I'm not sure it went the way they wanted...
How Mexico is upending the U.S. auto industry Washington Post ...More U.S. automakers have been shifting their plants south of the border, attracted by Mexico's lower wages and dense industrial clusters…
States Clamping Down on Workers Mislabeled as Contractors Bloomberg News ...When construction slowed during the recession, some companies hired workers and wrongly designated them as independent contractors to avoid paying insurance, taxes, fair wages and overtime...
Scott Walker Steers State Funds to Union Busters PolicyMic ...Scott Walker (R-Wisc.) made headlines in 2011 with his plans to bust public sector unions and strip unions of their collective bargaining powers, which led to mass protests in the Madison Capitol building. Now he is back with his latest contribution to increasing jobs in Wisconsin: making them up and steering them to his supporters...
Moral Monday Leader Comes To Boone Oct. 28 High Country Press ...Moral Monday leader Rev. William Barber II will address “The Necessity of a Moral Movement in North Carolina and the Nation” on Monday, Oct. 28...
BART strike: About 400,000 S.F.-area commuters to be affected Los Angeles Times ...Bay Area residents were without commuter rail service and facing a morning of frustration Friday as BART workers went on strike after a week of marathon negotiation collapsed overnight...
Michigan Walmart worker says he was fired for helping assaulted woman Associated Press ...A Michigan man says he was fired from his job at Walmart after he tried to help a woman being assaulted in the parking lot of one of the retail giant's stores and ended up fighting with her attacker...
Wal-Mart workers on strike, defying firings The Salon ...In protest of paltry hours and defiance of firings, over 80 Wal-Mart workers in Hialeah, Florida walk off the job...
The U.S. Blows Everyone Else Out Of The Water In 1 Key Way Huffington Post ...That one way? We're really, really good at creating really, really rich people -- like, $50 million-plus rich. Just ignore the fact that our 400 wealthiest people are worth more than the entire bottom half of the country combined. Look at the chart…
Krugman on GOP’s “top-down class warfare” The Salon ...The New York Times columnist explains how the GOP policies have stalled a true economic recovery...
McDonald's Has Their Hands in All of Our Pockets AlterNet ...Do you want to pay for billion dollar companies to make more money? Of course not, but in recent studies, we learned that we are, in fact, playing billions of dollar to support low-wage fast food workers for America's top seven restaurant chains...
Euro Capitals Tighten Fiscal Leash as EU Polices Cuts Bloomberg News ...Even with the 17-nation euro area projecting economic expansion next year, policy makers are keeping a fiscal leash on growth by maintaining austerity policies to save the euro...
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Today's Teamster News 04.10.13
JOLTS Shows 3.1 Unemployed per Job Opening in February 2013 Economic Populist ...If one takes the official broader definition of unemployment, or U-6, the ratio becomes 5.8* unemployed people per each job opening...
How to stomp on promising developments in the economy: Austerity Economic Policy Institute ...Frustrated about the slow pace of recovery? Blame those in Congress insisting on damaging cuts...
The Trouble Lurking on Walmart’s Empty Shelves Time ...Walmart has cut employee hours so deeply that it doesn’t have enough associates on hand to get stuff from back-of-the-store staging areas to the shelves...
Plans For One Coal Export Terminal In Oregon Dropped, Four Others Still Under Consideration ThinkProgress ... As of two weeks ago, five terminals to export U.S. taxpayer-owned coal to Asia were proposed for Oregon and Washington. But in the face of fluctuating international energy demand and environmental opposition, one of those terminals—Coos Bay, in Oregon—has been shelved after its last financial backer dropped out early last week...
Bailed-out banks haven’t met goals of small-business lending program, report says Washington Post ...Banks used billions from a small-business lending program to repay government bailout funds, rather than on its intended purpose — making more loans to mom-and-pop operations...
Seniors Mobilize for April 10th Congressional Call-in Day National Committee to Preserve Social Security & Medicare ...The National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare is mobilizing advocates across the nation in a Congressional Call-In day on Wednesday, April 10th, the day that President Obama releases his budget including cuts to Social Security...
Labor Unions: America's Last Hope (opinion) Huffington Post ...It's almost impossible to overstate the importance of old-fashioned "resistance." Indeed, without resistance (e.g., pushing back, taking an aggressive stand, demonstrating that you're willing to fight, etc.), things can get out of hand very quickly, whether we're talking about international relations, social intercourse, basic economics, children or adults...
First Student Drivers in Massachusetts Ratify Contract Drive Up Standards ...School bus drivers in Wayland, Mass., have voted unanimously to ratify a four-year contract with First Student. The drivers, who voted to join Teamsters Local 170 in Worcester, Mass., in October, made a number of gains in their first contract, including wage increases, enhanced benefits and safety and job protections...
Teamsters At Republic Services Extend Picket Lines To Anaheim, California IBT ...Sanitation workers employed at Republic Services/Allied Waste’s [NYSE: RSG] Carbon Limestone landfill in Youngstown, Ohio raised a picket line extension at Republic’s Anaheim, Calif. facilities early this morning...
Teamsters Applaud Obama Announcement of NLRB Nominees IBT ...Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa praised President Obama’s efforts fill the remaining vacancies on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) by naming three nominees today...
How to stomp on promising developments in the economy: Austerity Economic Policy Institute ...Frustrated about the slow pace of recovery? Blame those in Congress insisting on damaging cuts...
The Trouble Lurking on Walmart’s Empty Shelves Time ...Walmart has cut employee hours so deeply that it doesn’t have enough associates on hand to get stuff from back-of-the-store staging areas to the shelves...
Plans For One Coal Export Terminal In Oregon Dropped, Four Others Still Under Consideration ThinkProgress ... As of two weeks ago, five terminals to export U.S. taxpayer-owned coal to Asia were proposed for Oregon and Washington. But in the face of fluctuating international energy demand and environmental opposition, one of those terminals—Coos Bay, in Oregon—has been shelved after its last financial backer dropped out early last week...
Bailed-out banks haven’t met goals of small-business lending program, report says Washington Post ...Banks used billions from a small-business lending program to repay government bailout funds, rather than on its intended purpose — making more loans to mom-and-pop operations...
Seniors Mobilize for April 10th Congressional Call-in Day National Committee to Preserve Social Security & Medicare ...The National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare is mobilizing advocates across the nation in a Congressional Call-In day on Wednesday, April 10th, the day that President Obama releases his budget including cuts to Social Security...
Labor Unions: America's Last Hope (opinion) Huffington Post ...It's almost impossible to overstate the importance of old-fashioned "resistance." Indeed, without resistance (e.g., pushing back, taking an aggressive stand, demonstrating that you're willing to fight, etc.), things can get out of hand very quickly, whether we're talking about international relations, social intercourse, basic economics, children or adults...
First Student Drivers in Massachusetts Ratify Contract Drive Up Standards ...School bus drivers in Wayland, Mass., have voted unanimously to ratify a four-year contract with First Student. The drivers, who voted to join Teamsters Local 170 in Worcester, Mass., in October, made a number of gains in their first contract, including wage increases, enhanced benefits and safety and job protections...
Teamsters At Republic Services Extend Picket Lines To Anaheim, California IBT ...Sanitation workers employed at Republic Services/Allied Waste’s [NYSE: RSG] Carbon Limestone landfill in Youngstown, Ohio raised a picket line extension at Republic’s Anaheim, Calif. facilities early this morning...
Teamsters Applaud Obama Announcement of NLRB Nominees IBT ...Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa praised President Obama’s efforts fill the remaining vacancies on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) by naming three nominees today...
Monday, February 25, 2013
Today's Teamsters News 02.25.13
Gas prices jump, but not as high, survey finds CNN ...Over the past two weeks, prices at the pump have jumped 20 cents, adding to a total rise of nearly 54 cents over the past nine weeks, according to the Lundberg Survey. A gallon of self-serve regular costs $3.80 on average nationwide, the survey found. But the speed of the spike has slowed substantially. And now, prices may even start to drop...
Trade protectionism looms next as central banks exhaust QE The Telegraph ...The four years of QE have given us a contained depression and prevented the global strategic order from unravelling. That is not a bad outcome, but the time gained has largely been wasted because few wish to face the awful truth that globalisation itself -- in its current deformed structure -- is the root cause of the whole disaster...
Major Banks Aid in Payday Loans Banned by States New York Times ...With 15 states banning payday loans, a growing number of the lenders have set up online operations in more hospitable states or far-flung locales like Belize, Malta and the West Indies to more easily evade statewide caps on interest rates...
Kasich cribbed his tax hike from an unpopular ALEC-endorsed initiative Plunderbund ...Kasich’s tax hike–in coordination with similar schemes in Nebraska, Kansas, Louisiana, North Carolina, Virginia, and basically every GOP-controlled state–is clearly part of a national plug-and-play strategy led by ALEC, based on a failed Missouri idea...
Bloomberg's ban prohibits 2-liter soda with your pizza and some nightclub mixers New York Post ...Nanny Bloomberg unleashes his ban on large sodas on March 12 — and there are some nasty surprises lurking for hardworking families. Say goodbye to that 2-liter bottle of Coke with your pizza delivery, pitchers of soft drinks at your kid’s birthday party and some bottle-service mixers at your favorite nightclub...
Ken Hall: Where are 'Friends of Coal Miners'? Charleston Gazette ...Where are these so-called friends when it comes to the 22,500 active miners, retirees and their families who depend on Patriot Coal for their health care and pension benefits?...
Trade protectionism looms next as central banks exhaust QE The Telegraph ...The four years of QE have given us a contained depression and prevented the global strategic order from unravelling. That is not a bad outcome, but the time gained has largely been wasted because few wish to face the awful truth that globalisation itself -- in its current deformed structure -- is the root cause of the whole disaster...
Major Banks Aid in Payday Loans Banned by States New York Times ...With 15 states banning payday loans, a growing number of the lenders have set up online operations in more hospitable states or far-flung locales like Belize, Malta and the West Indies to more easily evade statewide caps on interest rates...
Kasich cribbed his tax hike from an unpopular ALEC-endorsed initiative Plunderbund ...Kasich’s tax hike–in coordination with similar schemes in Nebraska, Kansas, Louisiana, North Carolina, Virginia, and basically every GOP-controlled state–is clearly part of a national plug-and-play strategy led by ALEC, based on a failed Missouri idea...
Bloomberg's ban prohibits 2-liter soda with your pizza and some nightclub mixers New York Post ...Nanny Bloomberg unleashes his ban on large sodas on March 12 — and there are some nasty surprises lurking for hardworking families. Say goodbye to that 2-liter bottle of Coke with your pizza delivery, pitchers of soft drinks at your kid’s birthday party and some bottle-service mixers at your favorite nightclub...
Ken Hall: Where are 'Friends of Coal Miners'? Charleston Gazette ...Where are these so-called friends when it comes to the 22,500 active miners, retirees and their families who depend on Patriot Coal for their health care and pension benefits?...
Monday, February 11, 2013
Today's Teamster News 02.11.13
Trains Restart as U.S. Northeast Fights Back From Storm Bloomberg ...Transit officials across Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York and Rhode Island were forecasting a return to almost full service after crews dug out tracks and bus routes blanketed by as much as three feet of snow that began falling Feb. 8...
China Eclipses U.S. as Biggest Trading Nation Measured in Goods Bloomberg ...U.S. exports and imports of goods last year totaled $3.82 trillion, the U.S. Commerce Department said last week. China’s customs administration reported last month that the country’s trade in goods in 2012 amounted to $3.87 trillion...
US Air, AMR near $11 billion merger, deal seen within week : sources Reuters ...US Airways Group Inc (LCC.N) and AMR Corp (AAMRQ.PK) are nearing an $11 billion merger that would create the world's largest airline and could announce a deal within a week, after resolving key differences on valuation and management structure, people familiar with the matter said...
Have coal companies been ripping Americans off even more than we already knew? Grist ...companies pay 25 cents a ton for coal from public lands and then can turn around and sell it for $35 a ton....
Complex Investments Prove Risky as Savers Chase Bigger Payoff New York Times ...Regulators across the country are confronting a wave of investor fraud that is saddling retirement savers with steep losses on complex products that until a few years ago were pitched only to the most sophisticated investors...
Ethanol Plants Idled Since Drought Began Associated Press ...Many U.S. ethanol plants have halted production over the past year, mostly because the drought has made it difficult to get locally produced corn...
Dude, where's my cheap gas? Econbrowser ...a 5.3% increase in petroleum production over the last two years would have been necessary to keep the price of oil from rising. Ongoing conservation, for example, in the form of continued improvement in fuel economy, has been a key factor keeping the oil price from rising more in the face of world income growing much faster than world oil production...
China Eclipses U.S. as Biggest Trading Nation Measured in Goods Bloomberg ...U.S. exports and imports of goods last year totaled $3.82 trillion, the U.S. Commerce Department said last week. China’s customs administration reported last month that the country’s trade in goods in 2012 amounted to $3.87 trillion...
US Air, AMR near $11 billion merger, deal seen within week : sources Reuters ...US Airways Group Inc (LCC.N) and AMR Corp (AAMRQ.PK) are nearing an $11 billion merger that would create the world's largest airline and could announce a deal within a week, after resolving key differences on valuation and management structure, people familiar with the matter said...
Have coal companies been ripping Americans off even more than we already knew? Grist ...companies pay 25 cents a ton for coal from public lands and then can turn around and sell it for $35 a ton....
Complex Investments Prove Risky as Savers Chase Bigger Payoff New York Times ...Regulators across the country are confronting a wave of investor fraud that is saddling retirement savers with steep losses on complex products that until a few years ago were pitched only to the most sophisticated investors...
Ethanol Plants Idled Since Drought Began Associated Press ...Many U.S. ethanol plants have halted production over the past year, mostly because the drought has made it difficult to get locally produced corn...
Dude, where's my cheap gas? Econbrowser ...a 5.3% increase in petroleum production over the last two years would have been necessary to keep the price of oil from rising. Ongoing conservation, for example, in the form of continued improvement in fuel economy, has been a key factor keeping the oil price from rising more in the face of world income growing much faster than world oil production...
Saturday, February 9, 2013
Today's Teamster News 02.09.13
Oil Exports Trim U.S. Deficit as Fuel Gap Shrinks: Economy Bloomberg ...Record petroleum exports helped shrink the U.S. trade deficit in December to the smallest in almost three years as America moved closer to energy self- sufficiency, a goal the nation has been pursuing since the 1973 Arab oil embargo...
USW Statement on Record U.S. Trade Deficit with China United Steelworkers ...The U.S. trade deficit in goods with the world was $735.7 billion last year, a minor decrease of less than 1/100th of a percent, but our trade deficit with China reached an historic high of $315 billion. “What we need are fundamental changes in trade policy to alter the destructive path we’re on...
U.K. Lesson: Austerity Leads to More Debt (Opinion) The New Yorker ...U.S. fiscal policy is heading in the wrong direction, toward the economics of austerity. If you want to know where this path can lead, look across the Atlantic to poor old Blighty...
EU leaders agree to push for U.S. trade deal Reuters ...European leaders agreed on Friday to push for a free-trade pact with the United States, putting the onus on the White House to decide whether to try for a deal that would encompass half the world's economic output...
Storm hits US north-east The Guardian ...A blizzard that forecasters predicted would dump up to two feet of snow onto the north-east United States prompted five governors to declare states of emergency on Friday. Airlines cancelled flights, public transit systems were shut down and people were urged to stay indoors...
Workers strike at Colombia's top coal exporter Reuters ...Workers at Colombia's largest coal exporting company Cerrejon began a strike on Thursday, the first in more than two decades, after the two sides failed to reach an agreement during last-minute talks on wages and benefits...
Proposal to change Florida state pensions to 401(k) plan moves forward Tampa Bay Times ...A bill placing all new state employees in a 401(k)-style retirement plan passed a House subcommittee on a party-line vote Thursday, setting up a major showdown between legislative Republicans and public workers' unions...
Snyder: Not interested in repealing prevailing wage Associated Press ...The Republican governor told reporters Wednesday that trying to repeal prevailing wages is a "very divisive" issue...
Minnesota Senate approves raise for state employees Pioneer Press ...More than 35,000 Minnesota state employees are a step closer to receiving a 2 percent across-the-board pay raise retroactive to Jan. 2...
Born in the U.S.A: Right-to-work wrong for workers (Opinion) Murray State News ...Right-to-work isn’t about giving anyone a job. These laws simply mean that a citizen of a right-to-work state is entitled to all of the benefits of being in a union without having to pay any union dues...
Ohio Governor’s Tax Plan Would Cut Taxes For Wealthy, Raise Them On The Poor Think Progress ...Kasich’s plan would raise taxes on the poorest 60 percent of the state’s residents by as much as $77. The top 1 percent, though, would see an average tax cut of $10,369...
Kasich plans to privatize food service at prisons The Columbus Dispatch ...A request for proposals will go out today for a privatized joint food-service contract for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction and the Department of Youth Services...Up to 456 state jobs could be lost...
Bill to eliminate 'Prevailing Wage Law' dies in committee KATV.com ...The 'Prevailing Wage Law' in Arkansas sets the rate construction workers will be paid for public projects. Neighboring states like Louisiana and Mississippi have done away with comparable laws, and some argued Arkansas should do the same to save local government money...
US Airways Pilots Approve Merger Contract in Win for Union President Forbes ...US Airways pilots have overwhelmingly backed a memorandum of understanding that stipulates temporary contract provisions if an expected merger with bankrupt American Airlines takes place...
YRC trucking operations profitable in 2012, a first in six years Kansas City Star ...The recovery remains incomplete as YRC’s trucking operating income couldn’t cover all the interest payments on the company’s debts. YRC on Friday reported a net loss for the year. But management hailed the milestone in its hauling business while promising further improvements ahead...
Ports face labor discord Los Angeles Times ...Members of a small clerks union have voted down a proposed contract, which raises the prospect of restarting the strike that paralyzed the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach for eight days late last year...
USW Statement on Record U.S. Trade Deficit with China United Steelworkers ...The U.S. trade deficit in goods with the world was $735.7 billion last year, a minor decrease of less than 1/100th of a percent, but our trade deficit with China reached an historic high of $315 billion. “What we need are fundamental changes in trade policy to alter the destructive path we’re on...
U.K. Lesson: Austerity Leads to More Debt (Opinion) The New Yorker ...U.S. fiscal policy is heading in the wrong direction, toward the economics of austerity. If you want to know where this path can lead, look across the Atlantic to poor old Blighty...
EU leaders agree to push for U.S. trade deal Reuters ...European leaders agreed on Friday to push for a free-trade pact with the United States, putting the onus on the White House to decide whether to try for a deal that would encompass half the world's economic output...
Storm hits US north-east The Guardian ...A blizzard that forecasters predicted would dump up to two feet of snow onto the north-east United States prompted five governors to declare states of emergency on Friday. Airlines cancelled flights, public transit systems were shut down and people were urged to stay indoors...
Workers strike at Colombia's top coal exporter Reuters ...Workers at Colombia's largest coal exporting company Cerrejon began a strike on Thursday, the first in more than two decades, after the two sides failed to reach an agreement during last-minute talks on wages and benefits...
Proposal to change Florida state pensions to 401(k) plan moves forward Tampa Bay Times ...A bill placing all new state employees in a 401(k)-style retirement plan passed a House subcommittee on a party-line vote Thursday, setting up a major showdown between legislative Republicans and public workers' unions...
Snyder: Not interested in repealing prevailing wage Associated Press ...The Republican governor told reporters Wednesday that trying to repeal prevailing wages is a "very divisive" issue...
Minnesota Senate approves raise for state employees Pioneer Press ...More than 35,000 Minnesota state employees are a step closer to receiving a 2 percent across-the-board pay raise retroactive to Jan. 2...
Born in the U.S.A: Right-to-work wrong for workers (Opinion) Murray State News ...Right-to-work isn’t about giving anyone a job. These laws simply mean that a citizen of a right-to-work state is entitled to all of the benefits of being in a union without having to pay any union dues...
Ohio Governor’s Tax Plan Would Cut Taxes For Wealthy, Raise Them On The Poor Think Progress ...Kasich’s plan would raise taxes on the poorest 60 percent of the state’s residents by as much as $77. The top 1 percent, though, would see an average tax cut of $10,369...
Kasich plans to privatize food service at prisons The Columbus Dispatch ...A request for proposals will go out today for a privatized joint food-service contract for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction and the Department of Youth Services...Up to 456 state jobs could be lost...
Bill to eliminate 'Prevailing Wage Law' dies in committee KATV.com ...The 'Prevailing Wage Law' in Arkansas sets the rate construction workers will be paid for public projects. Neighboring states like Louisiana and Mississippi have done away with comparable laws, and some argued Arkansas should do the same to save local government money...
US Airways Pilots Approve Merger Contract in Win for Union President Forbes ...US Airways pilots have overwhelmingly backed a memorandum of understanding that stipulates temporary contract provisions if an expected merger with bankrupt American Airlines takes place...
YRC trucking operations profitable in 2012, a first in six years Kansas City Star ...The recovery remains incomplete as YRC’s trucking operating income couldn’t cover all the interest payments on the company’s debts. YRC on Friday reported a net loss for the year. But management hailed the milestone in its hauling business while promising further improvements ahead...
Ports face labor discord Los Angeles Times ...Members of a small clerks union have voted down a proposed contract, which raises the prospect of restarting the strike that paralyzed the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach for eight days late last year...
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