Victory for Good Jobs Nation! Federal contract workers to get a raise

A Good Jobs Nation strike last year in Washington, D.C.

Federal contract workers who staged a series of sudden one-day strikes in Washington, D.C., can claim victory as the Labor Department yesterday announced a hike in the minimum wage.

The strikes, part of the Good Jobs Nation campaign, began last year with demands for a raise and the right to join a union. Striking workers served food or cleaned Union Station, Smithsonian Museums and the Ronald Reagan Building -- all owned by the federal government. The federal government indirectly employs more low-wage workers than Walmart and McDonald's combined. 

The strikers were supported by the Change to Win labor federation, of which the Teamsters are a member. 

Yesterday, Labor Secretary Tom Perez announced a new rule to give about 200,000 federal contract employees a raise to $10.10 from $7.25 on Jan. 1. The Labor Department has also started to investigate allegations of wage theft.

Meanwhile, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio on Tuesday ordered the minimum wage raised for employees of businesses in buildings subsidized by the city. According to the city's website,

Effective immediately, commercial tenants at projects that receive more than $1 million in City subsidy will be covered by Living Wage provisions, and the Living Wage itself will be raised to from $11.90 to $13.13 per hour—likely reaching $15.22 per hour by 2019.

In a statement yesterday, Perez said,

The underlying principle couldn’t be simpler: no one who works full-time in America should have to raise their family in poverty. And if you serve meals to our troops for a living, for example, then you shouldn’t have to go on food stamps in order to serve a meal to your family at home. By raising the minimum wage for these workers, we’re not just upholding the president’s promise, but the fundamental American promise that hard work should be rewarded with a fair wage.

Our action today will make a big difference for workers like Jackeline Osorio. She’s a 21-year-old mother from Annandale, Virginia, who serves food to military personnel and Defense Department officials in the Pentagon food court. “I don’t make enough money, and I have to pay some of my bills late,” she says. “$10.10 an hour would help me pay my bills on time.”

California Rep. George Miller wants Congress to raise the federal minimum wage for all workers to $10.10 an hour. Miller said in a statement,

Our outdated minimum wage leaves too many families in this country struggling to make ends meet. Until Congress acts, they will continue to suffer. Unfortunately, Republicans refuse to allow an up or down vote on H.R. 1010 and remain out of step with public opinion. 

Nationwide, support for increasing the minimum wage is unequivocal. Americans know that it is good for the economy, good for businesses’ bottom line, and good for individual workers. Congress must get on board with the rest of the country and raise the minimum wage.

Rep. Miller is the senior Democrat on the House Education and the Workforce Committee and the House author of the Fair Minimum Wage Act (H.R. 1010), which was introduced in the Senate by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa). The Miller-Harkin bill would raise the federal minimum wage to $10.10 in three annual stages and index it to inflation thereafter, while also raising the minimum wage for tipped workers for the first time in more than 20 years.

The biggest creator of poverty jobs will surprise you

No one keeps more women in poverty than the federal government. Seven in 10 of the low-wage jobs created by the federal government through contracts, loans and leases are filled by women.

That's according to a new study by Demos, which concluded President Obama could put 21 million American workers and their families on a path to the middle class, if he issued an executive order that:

• Respects workers' right to bargain collectively;
• Offers living wages, decent benefits and fair work schedules;
• Limits executive compensation to 50 times the median workers' salary. 

Our friends at Good Jobs Nation tell us working women who serve meals and clean inside federal buildings said the President’s executive order raising their pay to $10.10 isn’t enough.

They said they need a voice on the job so they don’t need to keep striking to be heard.

“We need a living wage and benefits,”says Yesenia Vega, a worker at a McDonald’s restaurant located at the Pentagon. She and other workers are also seeking decent health insurance, vacation benefits and paid sick days. “We need a union to get these things,” she says. 

The women fighting for a Good Jobs Nation sent a letter to President Obama and Labor Secretary Tom Perez calling for collective bargaining rights – and in just a few days, over 30,000 Americans signed a petition calling on the Administration to act. 

They'd like you to sign the petition urging President Obama to act. Click here to sign.

Nancy Duff Campbell, co-president of the National Women's Law Center, points out that women worked in factories and shipyards for defense contractors during World War II. They were abused and discriminated against, so they joined unions in record numbers and walked off the job:

Unions made a difference in the lives of women industrial workers back then, and they still matter for the women who dominate the low-wage service sector today, including low-wage federal contract workers.

Help empower the new Rosie the Riveter and sign the petition!

Let's make the pay hike real for government contract workers

When you fight, you can win

A series of one-day strikes by low-wage workers in Washington, D.C., resulted in a huge victory -- on paper, at least. They got a pay hike -- on paper, at least. 

The workers are all employed by businesses that have contracts with the federal government. President Obama made good on his promise to use his executive powers to help workers. Obama by boosted the pay of low-wage contractors, expanded overtime protections, and ensured equal pay.

The question is, will the contractors comply with the new rules? 

Our friends at Good Jobs Nation tell us maybe not. 

In the past few months, low-wage federal contract workers at Union Station and Ronald Reagan Building filed formal wage theft complaints with the US Labor Department to reclaim $4 million in back pay and damages because current minimum wage and overtime laws are routinely flouted on federal property.

That's why “the leaders of the Congressional Progressive Caucus sent a letter to Labor Secretary Thomas Perez urging the Labor Department to step up its enforcement actions against wage theft,” reported The Washington Post... 

The New York Times editorial board also urged the US Labor Department to aggressively use its enforcement powers to police federal contractors, noting that “swift investigations and, if warranted, serious consequences, including back pay, damages and penalties, would ensure justice and future compliance.” 

Wage theft is rampant among companies that receive tax dollars. A National Employment Law Project survey showed nearly 40 percent of federal contract workers reported wage theft. A U.S. Senate report found 32 percent of the largest fines for labor law violations were assessed against federal contractors.

Federal contractors pay low wages, break labor and employment laws

Funny, we were just pointing out that McKesson, which has a $32 billion Veterans Administration contract despite ripping off Medicaid, also broke labor law when it suspended a worker for four days without pay for mimicking the CEO. John Hammergren is the McKesson CEO with the $159 million pension. He doesn't seem overly concerned that his workers don't earn enough to pay for health insurance.

And now look what crossed our radar screen: Good Jobs Nation points to a new report that shows in addition to paying miserly wages, federal contractors are also among the worst violators of labor and employment laws.

That’s what a new U.S. Senate report concluded. According to Steve Greenhouse at the New York Times, 49 federal contractors were cited 1,776 times for significant legal violations and paid $196 million in penalties from 2007 to 2012. Federal contractors often punish the whistleblowers who report illegal activity (in addition to workers who mimic overpaid CEOs).

The New York Times said the President should take executive action to prevent labor law violations and to boost pay for federal contract workers:

An executive order “requiring contracting officials to consider the quality of jobs that a prospective contractor will offer … would challenge the damaging notion that the best contractor is the one with the lowest labor costs.”

The Washington Post noted the White House was close to a Congressional deal to reduce the pay reimbursements of top contracting executives from nearly $1 million to $500,000 – but also urged the President to help contract workers at the bottom of the pay scale:

If the White House really wanted to make a statement about the value of work, it could do so much more substantively by boosting the floor of what it requires contractors to pay their burgeoning workforce.

Federal contract workers strike in DC for 5th time

Marching down Pennsylvania Ave. today.

Cleaning and concession workers went on strike today in Washington, D.C., demanding an end to wage theft and retaliation for trying to form a union. Organizers said it was the biggest one-day strike yet.

The striking workers serve food or clean Union Station, Smithsonian Museums and the Ronald Reagan Building and Old Post Office -- all owned by the federal government. This is the fifth one-day walkout since May by employees of federal government contractors.  Their actions already spurred a Department of Labor investigation into their allegations of wage theft, and outspoken support from 17 progressive members of Congress.

Today they rallied at Freedom Plaza, then marched to the White House where six workers delivered petitions signed by 250,000 people. The petitions asked for an executive order requiring federal contractors be given preference for providing decent pay and benefits.

Paying workers more money wouldn't cost taxpayers a dime more, according to a Demos report released today. The think tank figures that capping contractor executive salaries at $230,700 a year -- Vice President Joe Biden's salary -- that would save as much as $7.65 billion annually.

In the past month, port truck drivers hoping to join the Teamsters walked off the job; so did fast-food workers in 60 cities, and 68 people were arrested across the country in nonviolent protests of Walmart's retaliation against workers. Josh Eidelson at Salon reports on the growing support for one-day strikes.

Their effort exemplifies twin trends in the modern, embattled labor movement. First, the rise of one-day, non-union strikes by minorities of the workforce, designed to embarrass bosses and engage co-workers and the public. And second, new campaigns that sidestep workers’ legal employer — whether a fast food franchisee, a warehouse company hired by Wal-Mart, or a federal contractor — and instead attempt to squeeze the “real boss”: the fast food corporation, the retail giant or the president of the United States...

President Obama has signed an executive order that bans federal contractors from billing the government for union busters.

Find out more at the Good Jobs Nation Facebook page. 

Today's Teamster News 07.28.13

Funeral homes win ruling to hold striking Teamsters at bay  Chicago Tribune   ...A judge has granted a temporary restraining order to prevent Teamsters Local 727 from picketing funeral homes and halting alleged harassment of grieving families in its dispute with SCI Illinois Services Inc....
‘Made in Vietnam’ a concern for Teamsters   Cumberland Times-News   ...Teamsters union President James P. Hoffa, along with human rights leaders, say there’s a bleak reality behind imported clothing: Forced labor, child labor and gender discrimination, among other issues...
Will U.S. Face Trade Sanctions for Anti-Smoking Law?  Public Citizen   ...As the World Trade Organization (WTO) deadline passes today for the United States to comply with a WTO ruling against a U.S. ban on sweet-flavored cigarettes targeting youth, the spotlight shifts back to the WTO, which could now authorize trade sanctions if requested by Indonesia, the country that won the WTO challenge...
Prison Labor Booms As Unemployment Remains High; Companies Reap Benefits  Huffington Post   ..."nearly a million prisoners are now making office furniture, working in call centers, fabricating body armor, taking hotel reservations, working in slaughterhouses, or manufacturing textiles, shoes, and clothing, while getting paid somewhere between 93 cents and $4.73 per day..."
SPLC secures release of Alabama man jailed after failing to pay $88 trash bill  Southern Poverty Law Center   ...Though debtors’ prison is supposed to be a thing of the past, a 60-year-old man in Baldwin County, Ala., spent two weeks in jail after failing to pay an $88 trash bill...
You Want a Living Wage With That? Fast Food Workers of N.Y.C. Prep for Another Strike  Village Voice   ...The strike will be their third since November, when fast food workers from Domino's, McDonald's, Wendy's, Taco Bell and other chains organized a massive walkout...
Fast Food, Low Pay (opinion)  New York Times   ... Workers with nothing to lose are demanding a living wage of $15 an hour, and gaining strength and confidence...
Evidence Mounts Agent Provocateurs Used by Brazilian Police  Common Dreams   ...Police sent infiltrators and agent provocateurs into crowds of protesters in Rio de Janeiro Monday—the first day of the Pope's visit to Brazil— as extensive video footage and witness testimony strongly suggests...
Where's the Beef?: The First Thing Obama Can Do By Himself to Create Good Jobs (opinion) Next New Deal   ...He can start with an executive order to boost job quality for at least 2 million workers whose pay is financed by the federal government...
Minimum Wage Hike Would Boost Kids and Workers Out of Poverty  AFL-CIO Now   ...26% of kids younger than 3 are poor and the rate for African American children is 39%. Yet two-thirds of children living in poverty have at least one parent with a full-time, year-round job and many of those are minimum wage jobs...
What parents really think about school reform  Washington Post   ...most parents want strong neighborhood schools — not choices of schools for their children to attend. They don’t want public money diverted to private-school vouchers, or low-performing schools to be closed, or resources being taken away from traditional public schools to be used for public charter schools...
Student Loans Tied to Rise in Market Rates While Wall Street Banks Have Received a Fixed 6% Return from the Government for the Past Century  Wall Street on Parade   ... Loans taken out after July 1 of this year will rise to 3.9 percent for undergraduates; to 5.4 percent for graduate students; and to 6.4 percent for parents taking out the student loans...
The tax break that corporate America wants kept secret CNN Money   ...Oracle, Google, and Amazon are just a few of the hundreds of large companies that have cut confidential deals with the IRS to help lower their tax bills, and critics want the agency to disclose the details of these complex pacts...
Apple’s record cash haul could repay Detroit’s debt eight times over  Quartz   ...Apple now has $146.6 billion in cash and marketable securities on its balance sheet, with some $106 billion kept offshore, the company said during today’s earnings call. That’s a record for the poster-child of tech companies maintaining mountains of overseas green. It’s enough to pay off bankrupt Detroit’s $18.5 billion in debt about eight times over...
New $444 million hockey arena is still a go in Detroit  CNN Money   ...Detroit's financial crisis hasn't derailed the city's plans to spend more than $400 million in Michigan taxpayer funds on a new hockey arena for the Red Wings...
Armed, Masked and Dangerous: the Militias of Privatization vs. the Public Good  TruthOut   ...Wisconsin, the battleground state where Governor Scott Walker has wielded his power with the grace of an elephant in a Crate and Barrel outlet store, has become the scene of armed, mask wearing, camouflaged security outfits patrolling the backwoods on the lookout for eco-terrorist types at the behest of a mining company more than willing to defile the environment for profits...
A voting rights showdown in North Carolina?  CBS News   ...North Carolina, a battleground state that's sure to be one again, is putting in place a new package of measures for voter ID requirements and - importantly - changing its early voting periods, among other measures, steps that many believe have it headed for a voting rights lawsuit...

Workers strike, storm DC rail station, demand living wage from federal contractors

Scores of Washington, D.C., federal contract workers walked off the job and stormed the city's main rail station today to voice their anger over their poverty wages. The rally at Union Station is the third one-day strike in three weeks by workers demanding the government require its contractors to pay employees fairly.


Workers call out federal contractors for low wages.

Demonstrators brought attention to their plight by walking through the station where many of them are employed. They were seen by hundreds of commuters toward the end of the morning rush hour before being asked to leave. They later took their fight to the U.S. Department of Transportation, where they "pied" a protester dressed as Uncle Sam.

The Twitter feed of @GoodJobsNation gave a full running commentary of the morning's events, which showed workers trying to feed their families on $8.25 an hour aren't going to take it anymore. Among the chants heard at the rally:

American flag UP! Corporate flag DOWN! Workers' wages UP! Corporate wages DOWN!

Members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus attended the rally and urged President Obama to sign an executive order to ensure federal contract workers are paid a living wage. Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison tweeted:

We're going to demand that the Prez sign an executive order to make sure you're paid a #livingwage

Ellison speaks to strikers

The protest comes at the same time as the release of a new report by the National Employment Law Project (NELP). The report details how the federal government is promoting poverty through its contracting practices. The paper notes that Americans are funding millions of low-wage jobs through federal contracts that keep places like the Smithsonian Institution running and haul loads of cargo out of the Port of Charleston:

We interviewed a total of 567 workers in federally contracted jobs: 104 workers who
manufacture military uniforms in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Puerto Rico; 429 workers in Washington, D.C., who provide food service, retail services, or janitorial services in various buildings occupied or controlled by the federal government; and 34 port truckers who haul loads under federal contracts out of the port of Charleston, South Carolina.

NELP calls for administrative action so that so many workers won't fall through the cracks. A poll done as part of the report shows that 74 percent of those employed under federal contract jobs earn less than $10 an hour. Only 26 percent receive sick days, and only 11 percent receive employer-provided health insurance. One in five depends on Medicaid for health care:

The federal government needs to lead by example as it once did and ensure that federally linked activity does not inadvertently subsidize low-road employment and fuel poverty, but instead supports the type of quality jobs that communities and our economy need to grow and thrive once more.

DCist just published a report on the strike, noting:

They also chanted, "We can't survive on 8.25," which is the minimum wage in the District of Columbia. As DCist previously noted, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's urban planning department's "living wage calculator" places the living wage for one adult in D.C. at $13.68 per hour.

Stay tuned.