Today's Teamster News 01.02.14

Little Holiday Cheer for IKEA Workers  truthout   ...IKEA's inconsistent labor relations violate international union standards, leaving hundreds of employees without work in Canada and other countries across the globe...
Chief Justice Warns Sequestration Cuts Already Threatening Public Safety  ThinkProgress   ...Chief Justice of the United States John Roberts, in his annual Year-End Report on the State of the Federal Judiciary, blasted the 2011 Budget Control Act’s automatic “sequestration” federal spending cuts and warned that the cuts to the federal court system’s budget “pose a genuine threat to public safety.”...
50 Is the New 65: Older Americans Are Getting Booted from Their Jobs -- and Denied New Opportunities  Alternet   ...Workers as young as 50 are shocked to find themselves suddenly tossed onto the employment rubbish heap, just when they felt on top of their game. They’re feeling stressed, angry and betrayed by a society which has benefited greatly from their contributions...
Pomp and Exceptional Circumstance: How Students Are Forced to Prop Up the Education Bubble  Boston Review   ...The challenge of student debt, like climate change and other urgent needs, threatens to exceed the capacity of our current political and economic systems...
Apple’s Top Crimes of 2013  Counterpunch   ...From tax dodging to toxic sweatshops...
Overthrow the Speculators (opinion)  OpEdNews   ...Speculators at megabanks or investment firms such as Goldman Sachs are not, in a strict sense, capitalists. They do not make money from the means of production. Rather, they ignore or rewrite the law -- ostensibly put in place to protect the vulnerable from the powerful -- to steal from everyone, including their shareholders. They are parasites...
The Life of a Fast-Food Worker  New Yorker   ...According to estimates from union groups, paying workers a living wage would raise the price of a burger or a bucket of chicken by  a couple of cents per meal...
The Top 25 Most Censored Stories of 2013  Project Censored   ...The news that didn't make the news...

Today's Teamster News 11.17.13

Young and Educated in Europe, but Desperate for Jobs  New York Times   ...Five years after the economic crisis struck the Continent, youth unemployment has climbed to staggering levels in many countries: in September, 56 percent in Spain for those 24 and younger, 57 percent in Greece, 40 percent in Italy, 37 percent in Portugal and 28 percent in Ireland. For people 25 to 30, the rates are half to two-thirds as high and rising...
America’s Student Debt Balance Is Growing And Less Of It Is Getting Paid Back  Buzzfeed   ...Now it’s over $1 trillion, bigger than credit card debt...
Security Expert: “Buy American Doesn’t Sell Well Anymore Because It Means Give A Copy To The NSA”  zero hedge   ...We’ve previously noted that mass surveillance is killing American tech companies. And Cisco just blamed its earnings slump on China’s disdain for NSA spying...
Harsher cuts are on their way  MSNBC   ...Unless Congress reverses the cuts, defense discretionary spending will be cut by an estimated $19 billion in 2014 and non-defense spending will be cut $12 billion more...
Chase's Twitter Gambit Devolves into All-Time PR Fiasco  Rolling Stone   ...I almost couldn't believe it when I heard that JP Morgan Chase was going to do a live Twitter Q&A with the public – you know, all those people around the world they've been bending over and robbing for, oh, the last decade or so...
Feds expand hunt for offshore tax evaders  CNBC   ...Federal judges approved special summonses aimed at getting account data and identifying information of American banking clients of Switzerland's Zurcher Kantonalbank and Bermuda-based N.T. Butterfield & Son, prosecutors said Tuesday...
Bankers' lawsuit jeopardizes U.S. tax dodger crackdown: lawyers  Reuters   ...A court challenge by Texas and Florida bankers threatens to undermine a broad U.S. government crackdown on offshore tax avoidance and jeopardize a web of carefully crafted international agreements, tax lawyers said...
Elizabeth Warren: quiet revolutionary who could challenge Hillary Clinton in Democrats' 2016 race  The Guardian   ...Senator's tough stance against Wall Street is attracting voters on the left who are disenchanted with the party establishment...
Volkswagen Isn’t Fighting Unionization—But Leaked Docs Show Right-Wing Groups Are  In These Times   ...Mike Elk reports that while the company promised not to oppose the United Auto Workers attempts to organize their Chattanooga, TN plant, outside groups disagree with that decision. They're pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars into anti-union campaigns...
Boeing, Recipient of the Largest State Tax Subsidy in History, Paid Nothing in State Corporate Income Taxes Over the Past Decade  Citizens for Tax Justice   ...Over the past decade, Boeing has managed to avoid paying even a dime of state income taxes nationwide on $35 billion in pretax U.S. profits...
The Sports Business Can’t Take Any More Money From Its Fans  Buzzfeed   ...The industry’s growth now mostly involves extracting billions from television networks and advertising. Ticket sales and merchandising growth are slowing...
Wisconsin Political Speech Raid  Wall Street Journal   ...In recent weeks, special prosecutor Francis Schmitz has hit dozens of conservative groups with subpoenas demanding documents related to the 2011 and 2012 campaigns to recall Governor Walker and state legislative leaders...
Something stinks in Ohio  Center for Media and Democracy   ...The Buckeye Institute is largely funded by right-wing out-of-state foundations, and does not disclose its donors to the public despite its influence in shaping public policy in Ohio...
Seattle elects Socialist candidate to city council  Associated Press   ...She backed efforts to raise the minimum wage to $15; called for rent control in the city where rental prices keep climbing; and supports a tax on millionaires to help fund a public transit system and other services...

Austerity: The real winner of the government shutdown

A popular thing to say on Capitol Hill is that there were no winners in the government shutdown and debt ceiling crisis that ended last night.

But once again, savage cuts to social spending have won the day. Sure, the conflict may have been a terrible embarrassment for the GOP, but the Wall Street-backed tea party agenda of austerity came out unscathed.

The Los Angeles Times observed:

As the shadow of the shutdown passes, it's proper to be reminded again that this fight involved spending levels that are materially suppressing economic growth and hampering the recovery.

Specifically, the deal soon to be voted on leaves the sequester in place, at least until Jan. 15….The sequester is merely one manifestation of Congress's love for austerity in the post-recession era. From the inception, recovery programs have never been as large or robust as they needed to be, despite evidence that even harsher austerity regimes kept much of Europe mired in slumps.

But the deal that was negotiated yesterday to reopen the government and suspend the debt ceiling didn’t just leave the austerity assault in place. It may end up escalating the assault on workers even more. Richard Eskow at the Campaign for America’s Future writes:

This deal will bend the next few months’ deliberations along the same misguided lines that have guided our political discourse for years now. House and Senate members will be encouraged to come up with a “deficit reduction plan” -- in other words, to impose another round of cuts just like those which have already wounded the economy and shredded millions of jobs.

Specifically, Congress’s latest deal opens the door to further cuts that will target working Americans by establishing a bipartisan committee to deal with budget issues.

Yeah, another one of those! And you can be sure that this committee will try to hash out a “Grand Bargain,” which is basically Washington-speak for harsher cuts and “entitlement reform” -- “entitlement reform,” by the way, is Washington-speak for gutting Social Security and Medicare.

But austerity was the winner even before that part of the deal was conceived. That’s because the goalposts in Congress’s spending debates have already been moved to austerity’s side of the field.
Think Progress reports:

It may seem like ancient history, but sequestration was originally designed to be so unpalatable to both parties that the threat of its automatic budget cuts to both defense and non-defense programs alike would be enough to force lawmakers to come to a grand bargain budget agreement. As it first went into effect in March, Republicans tried to pin the blame for any negative consequences on President Obama. But they gradually came out in favor of sequestration’s devastating cuts and have now made it the baseline in the fight over funding the government.

According to the Center for American Progress, Obama’s original budget for 2014 was $1.203 trillion. In 2010, Republicans took control of the House and deficit hawk Paul Ryan proposed a 2014 budget of $1.095 trillion -- that's 10 percent more than what Congress just passed to end the shutdown.

Outrageously, the justification for all these spending reductions is baseless. The country’s supposedly out-of-control debt has been falling significantly over the last two years.

But for tea party extremists, austerity was never about getting the deficit under control. It’s about shrinking government in a way that punishes workers and the poor. Even during the shutdown, what was deemed “essential” and “non-essential” gives you an idea of what parts of government right-wing elites think is important. So Congress’s gym – complete with heated pools and a sauna – was essential. Food assistance to low-income mothers and children? Non-essential.

Now, the latest agreement sets the stage for another budget and debt limit battle just in time for another round of sequester cuts. As we wrote at Teamster.org:

...our government will be funded at a significantly reduced level than it should be... because of sequester cuts that went into effect last year.

For now, we’ve avoided default, reopened the government and hundreds of thousands of locked-out government workers are back to work. That’s definitely a good thing. But now anti-worker zealots in Washington are hoping that sharper austerity measures won't seem so bad compared to the pain caused by the shutdown.

Don’t be fooled.

How many Americans does it take to shut down the government?

Extremist Republicans claim shutting down the government over their opposition to a law passed three years ago is what the American people want.

That's an interesting theory considering less than 5 percent of the population actually voted for these hostage-takers.

Business Insider reports:

Let's look at the element of the House GOP that supports tying the continuing resolution to fund the government to an un-passable defunding of the Affordable Care Act. Judging by the number of people who signed  freshman Rep. Mark Meadow's (R-N.C.) letter,  81 members of the 233 GOP caucus support this hardcore strategy.

Adding them up, we see that only 13.8 million Americans actually voted for the suicide caucus. That's only 11.7% of the people who voted in a congressional election in 2012, and an absolutely pathetic 4.3% of the U.S. population.

How can such a small percentage of people stack Congress with enough sociopaths to shut down the government? The answer is gerrymandering -- self-serving congressional redistricting that allowed Republicans to get 33 more seats than Democrats in the last election despite getting fewer votes.

And Think Progress reports that Republican gerrymandering makes a quick resolution to the shutdown even more unlikely:

Obama garnered 48.8 percent of the vote or more in just 13 of the 218 other Congressional Districts currently represented by a Republican -- and even if the general public wants the government reopened, there is little political pressure in heavily GOP districts for Republican members to side with President Obama and the Democrats.

With a gerrymandered majority consisting of districts that do not represent the majority of Americans’ viewpoints, House Republicans can keep the government in a shutdown highly insulated from the anger and blame they are receiving.

So when you hear the fanatics in Washington say they're carrying out the will of the American people, remember they're more likely carrying out the will of their heavily gerrymandered districts. They aren't satisfied with the anti-worker sequester cuts they got this year. To them, it's great to tear at the social safety net. But it's better to rip it to pieces and even better to make it look like your opponents are to blame for the crisis.

When that doesn't work the extremists are busy downplaying the crisis altogether. But the shutdown is much more than a few shuttered parks. It's an attack on federal workers, veterans' benefits, vaccine programs, food safety inspections, food assistance for women and children, disability benefits, Head Start programs, financing for small businesses, and tourism.

And it's all thanks to the shrill minority spawned from gerrymandered voting districts -- democracy (and the economy) be damned.

Today's Teamster News 07.29.13

Teamsters On Strike Against Gold Cross Ambulance  Local 542   ..."It is the hope of Teamsters Local 542 that the company realizes the danger that their actions and position has put the residents of the Imperial County in and that they come back to the table with an offer for their employees that will end this strike as soon as possible..."
Exclusive: Signs of declining economic security  Associated Press   ...Four out of 5 U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near-poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives, a sign of deteriorating economic security and an elusive American dream...
U.S. Multinationals Were Hiring Like Mad in 2011...Abroad   Economic Populist   ...we have a 0.1% increase in hiring for jobs in the United States while MNCs (multinational corporations) increased their hiring abroad by 4.4%...
REPORT: Canceling Sequestration Could Add Up To 1.6 Million Jobs  ThinkPtogress   ...Fully canceling sequestration at the beginning of August would likely add 900,000 jobs to the economy but could add up to as many as 1.6 million, according to a new analysis from the Congressional Budget Office...
The Bogus High-Tech Worker Shortage: How Guest Workers Lower US Wages  PBS Newshour   ...When Bill Clinton was president, wages for American IT workers were climbing and American students were clamoring to become computer scientists. Fifteen years later, average real IT wages are no higher. It is no coincidence that high-tech industries are now using guest workers to fill two-thirds of new IT jobs...
It’s Been A Busy Week Of Protests In America: Teachers, Pensions, Minimum Wage…  Mint Press News   ...Detroit is bankrupt, Chicago just layed off 2,100 teachers, and California Wal-Mart workers are on strike. Across the U.S., a growing number of Americans are fed up with low pay and spending cuts that are touted as a panacea for budget deficit and years of overspending by American cities...
Activists protest outside Wells Fargo executive's San Marino home  Los Angeles Times   ...About 70 anti-foreclosure activists gathered Saturday afternoon outside the San Marino home of Wells Fargo Chief Financial Officer Tim Sloan, testing a city law against political protest in residential areas that was enacted after a previous demonstration at the bank executive’s house...
Fighting Back Against Wretched Wages  New York Times   ...More walkouts are expected at fast-food restaurants in seven cities on Monday...
Unlike American Parents, Prince William Gets Paid Paternity Leave After The Royal Baby Is Born  ThinkProgress   ...the U.K. guarantees a weekly sum of £136.78 (equivalent to $209.78) or 90 percent of a father’s average weekly earnings – whichever is lower – for the duration of leave...
Governor Admits He ‘Does Not Know Enough’ About The Voter Suppression Bill He’s About To Sign  ThinkProgress   ...North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) said Friday he would sign a bill passed by the North Carolina legislature that would become the most suppressive voting law in the nation...
Solidarity Sing Along crowd grows as arrests continue at Wisconsin Capitol  The Cap Times   ...Arrests of protesters continued for the third straight day Friday at the state Capitol, suggesting a renewed effort by Gov. Scott Walker’s administration to silence the ad-hoc “Solidarity Sing Along” group is doing little to stop the daily event...
Let Me Show You Why People Support Scott Walker  Daily Kos   ...Propaganda disguised as news...
Lew: No federal bailout for Detroit  The Hill   ...Treasury Secretary Jack Lew on Sunday defended the administration’s decision not to help bail out Detroit, saying that the city would need to negotiate its own resolution with creditors...
California Hunger Strikers Enter Third Week, Face Retaliation  Truth-out   ...The strike encompassed people in two-thirds of California's state prisons and four out-of-state private prisons contracted by California...

Today's Teamster News 06.30.13

Mandatory Federal Cuts Hurt Private Sector, Too  New York Times   ...Many in the facilities support field, a business category that includes janitorial, maintenance, trash disposal, guard and security, mail routing, reception and laundry services, say they are frustrated by the lack of public awareness about how defense budget cuts affect workers who are not performing stereotypical military functions...
Time is running out before student loan rates double  MSNBC   ... even if a deal does pass, it’s still highly likely that future students will pay more in interest to the federal government as legislators continue to insist on budget austerity...
The Supreme Court: Corporate America's Employees of the Month  Bloomberg   ...the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts has narrowed the avenues available to employees and consumers seeking to take their grievances before a judge...
Supreme Court to hear case on Obama’s NLRB appointments  Washington Post   ...The Supreme Court will decide next term whether President Obama exceeded his constitutional authority by making three appointments to the National Labor Relations Board while the Senate was on break last year...
The Supervisor From Hell Gets a Pass From SCOTUS  In These Times   ...The decision could sharply limit employer liability for supervisor harassment in many cases...
The Social Security and Medicare Cutters are Very Unhappy  Center for Economic and Policy Research   ...No, things have not gone well for those wishing to ax Social Security and Medicare, but they are not about to give up. And with the money and access to the media they enjoy, why should they?...
Number of the Week: U.S. Oil Boom Affecting Global Prices  Wall Street Journal   ...The U.S. oil boom is finally affecting global energy prices — but don’t expect cheap prices at the pump as a result...
U.S. bugged EU offices, computer networks: German magazine  Reuters   ...The United States has bugged European Union offices and gained access to EU internal computer networks, according to secret documents cited in a German magazine on Saturday, the latest in a series of exposures of alleged U.S. spy programs...
Snowden fallout comes at bad time for private equity  Reuters   ...The industry is under growing pressure because of a series of apparent security problems that allowed Snowden to leak details of secret U.S. surveillance programs and, according to government officials, badly compromise U.S. national security...
Ed Fast and US trade rep commit to concluding TPP in 2013  iPolitics   ...Trade Minister Ed Fast and his recently-confirmed American counterpart, Michael Froman, came out of their first tête-à-tête in Washington on Tuesday with an ambitious objective to conclude the Trans-Pacific Partnership before the end of the year...
Rousseff's popularity plummets in wake of Brazil protests  Reuters   ...President Dilma Rousseff's approval rating sank by 27 percentage points in the last three weeks, a poll showed on Saturday in the strongest evidence yet that the recent wave of street protests sweeping Brazil poses a serious threat to her likely re-election bid next year...
Not Just BART, But Pretty Much the Whole Damn City of Oakland Is Going on Strike  SFWeekly   ...Oakland city workers this morning announced the big news that they, along with BART employees, will walk off the job on Monday at 7 a.m., in protest of stalled labor negotiations...
ALEC’s Latest Scam Is Sending Public School Dollars to Corporate Owned Private Schools  PoliticusUSA   ...According to the data, contrary to what Republicans, ALEC, and corporate-education advocates contend, America’s public education system has made consistent and equitable progress over the past four decades...
Teamsters, funeral directors at odds  Southtown Star   ...Teamsters Local 727, which represents 59 funeral directors and drivers at 16 Chicago-area funeral homes owned by Service Corporation International, has lodged unfair labor practice charges against the company...
Indefinite extension reached on National Master Agreement between Teamsters, UPS  WHAS11   ...The contract was set to expire at the end of July. It will now be extended through July of 2018...

Today's Teamster News 06.05.13

Low-wage workers seek Obama’s help  Washington Post   ...This week the Obama administration plans to ask Congress to amend the law so the government will not have to reimburse companies almost $1 million for the salaries of individual executives who work on government projects...
The Latest Report On Medicare Shows The Program Is Getting Stronger  ThinkProgress   ...The Medicare Trustees had great news for American seniors on Friday: the program’s solvency has been extended for two full years past what the trustees predicted in 2012...
IMF says US cutting spending too much too fast  Associated Press   ...The International Monetary Fund chief criticized the U.S. on Tuesday for cutting back government spending too much too fast, saying it was taking a toll on growth in one of the world's main economic engines...
US proposes labeling some banks threats  Associated Press   ...Federal regulators have proposed that a group of firms that aren't banks be deemed potential threats to the financial system that need stricter government oversight. Big insurers American International Group Inc. and Prudential Financial Inc., and General Electric Co.'s finance arm GE Capital...
Protesters Hit Bentonville Ahead of Wal-Mart's Annual Meeting  Arkansas Business   ...The national organization "Our Walmart" staged its rally today in Bentonville. Reps tell us one of their goals is to encourage the world's largest retailer to raise minimum salaries for associates...
Locked doors a sign of China work-safety failings  Associated Press   ...A fire breaks out in a Chinese factory, and panicked workers discover one exit after another is locked. That describes not only the poultry plant fire that killed 119 people Monday, but a toy-factory blaze that left 87 workers dead 20 years earlier...
'Chained CPI' hurts senior citizens (opinion)  Journal News   ...Here we go again! We’re going to balance the budget on the backs of senior citizens who had little to do with the present national debt, while corporate America enjoys massive subsidies and tax loopholes...
Elizabeth Warren Calls for Grassroots Movement on Student Loan Debt  Mother Jones   ...Over the past decade, student loan debt has nearly quadrupled, and now stands close to $1 trillion. On July 1, rates for federal need-based student loans are set to double from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent. The deadline has lawmakers scrambling for a fix...
Union backers protest Ohio right-to-work bill  NewsNet5   ...Hundreds showed up Tuesday at the Ohio Statehouse, where the first -- and probably the last -- hearing was being held on right-to-work legislation proposed by Republican state Reps. Kristina Roegner and Ron Maag...
Protesters Crowd Legislature For Fifth 'Moral Monday'  WUNC 91.5 ...151 people were arrested at the General Assembly Monday night. It was the fifth “Moral Monday” demonstration at the legislature, and it was the largest yet...
Foreclosed NH homeowners to get settlement checks  Associated Press   ...More than 4,000 New Hampshire residents who lost their homes to foreclosure will receive checks this month as part of the $26 billion national mortgage settlement involving five of the nation’s largest lenders...
Enterprise zones under fire in Sacramento  KGO-TV   ...The financial perk designed to attract businesses to troubled neighborhoods is under fire in Sacramento. Under this program, even strip clubs qualify for tax breaks for hiring in economically depressed areas. As much as $37,400 per employee can be claimed even though many jobs are barely above minimum wage...
Cd'A board supports anti-union resolution  Coeur d'Alene Press ...School trustees in Coeur d'Alene on Monday voted unanimously to, as a board, support the Idaho School Boards Association's efforts to lobby state lawmakers for legislation that would tighten Idaho's right to work statute in the state's schools...
Connecticut Truck Safety Crackdown Underway  WTIC News Talk 1080   ...Once again, Connecticut’s Department of Motor Vehicles is conducting a three-day truck safety enforcement campaign...
This Is What Killing Democracy Looks Like: Ryan Wherley on WI AB225  Monologues of Dissent   ...The bill introduced by Jeff Stone is straight out of the ALEC playbook and an all-out, full-frontal assault on democracy...
Unionized liquor store clerks cheer Ferlo opposition to Corbett privatization plan  Pittsburgh Tribune-Review   ...To cheers of union workers in the crowd, Democratic Sen. Jim Ferlo on Tuesday delivered a tongue-lashing to the Corbett administration for pushing liquor privatization...

Today's Teamster News 05.25.13

It’s Called Deceptive Price-Gouging  Working Life   ...AT&T Inc. has added a new monthly administrative fee of 61 cents to the bills of all of its contract wireless lines as of May 1, a move that could bring in more than a half-billion dollars in annual revenue to the telecom giant...
EU oil pricing probe spurs lawsuit against BP, others  Reuters   ...A Chicago-based commodities trading firm has filed suit against three of the world's largest oil companies, accusing them of colluding to fix oil prices after European authorities opened an investigation last week...
Wall Street Seeks Dodd-Frank Changes Through Trade Talks  Bloomberg   ....U.S. bankers and insurers are trying to use trade deals, which can trump existing legislation, to weaken parts of the Dodd-Frank Act designed to prevent a repeat of the 2008 financial crisis...
It's a "Trade" Pact not "Free-Trade" Pact  CEPR   ...the pact has to do with a range of regulatory issues, in many cases seeking to impose rules that might not pass muster if they had to go through the conventional political process...
Budget Cuts Get Personal; Those Who Are Hurt, Holler  ABC News   ... Nearly four in 10 Americans now say sequestration has hurt them personally, up substantially since it began in March – and they’re far less sanguine than others about the economy’s prospects overall...
I-5 bridge collapses over Skagit River; possibly triggered by truck  Seattle Times   ...A law-enforcement source said investigators believe a truck with an over-sized load heading south struck the bridge, which started bouncing, then fell...
Bangladesh factory collapse probe uncovers abuses  BBC News   ...It also recommended life sentences for the building's owner and the owners of five garment factories operating there...
Sweden riots spread beyond Stockholm despite extra police  BBC News   ...In the affected areas themselves, some people say the riots are a response to discrimination and relatively high unemployment. Sweden, once a by-word for equality, has seen a widening gap between rich and poor...
Chief Edward Flynn blasts Scott Walker, Legislature  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel   ..."I don't know of a governor anywhere in the country who succeeded in turning his state's economy around by actively facilitating the decline of his biggest city," Flynn said...
Ohio unions remain vigilant against anti-worker blitz  People's World   ...Labor and the huge We Are Ohio coalition have been holding a series of mass meetings across the state, organizing against introduction of three right to work (for less) bills by right-wing GOP Ohio legislators this session...
Maryland Bucks Trend, Expands Prevailing Wage Law  AFL-CIO Washington DC Metro Council   ...While other states are passing anti-union laws, Maryland passed the largest expansion of the prevailing wage law in the state’s history...
Florida Governor Signs Election Reform Bill Reversing His Own Voter Suppression Laws  ThinkProgress   ...Though Scott initially insisted he “did the right thing” by implementing these laws, vehement backlash and plummeting approval ratings prompted the governor to embrace election reforms:..
Kansas lawmaker opposes ‘encouraging the behavior of purchasing food’ with lower food taxes  Raw Story   ...A Republican state lawmaker in Kansas says that he opposes cutting the taxes on groceries because it would be a form of “social engineering” that encourages people to buy food over other items...

Today's Teamster News 05.15.13

Fast-food workers stage protests for higher wages  USA Today   ...A recent wave of strikes by fast-food employees in four cities is expected to spread to Milwaukee Wednesday as demands for higher pay shake up an industry previously insulated from worker unrest...
Tougher drunken driving threshold weighed  Associated Press  ...Federal accident investigators were weighing a recommendation Tuesday that states reduce their threshold for drunken driving from the current .08 blood alcohol content to .05, a standard that has been shown to substantially reduce highway deaths in other countries...
Walmart Sues Labor Organizations Over 'Disorderly Conduct' That Helped Spark National Protests  Huffington Post ...Walmart is accusing two labor organizations of "disorderly conduct" during a protest at a Los Angeles-area Walmart last year that helped set off a chain of demonstrations nationwide against the retail giant...
Gap, Walmart Fail To Endorse Bangladesh Safety Accord Backed By Europe's Biggest Retailers  Reuters   ...Major U.S. retailers, including Gap Inc, declined to endorse an accord on Bangladesh building and fire safety backed by Europe's two biggest fashion chains, a trans-Atlantic divide that may dilute garment industry reform efforts...

Eight top fashion retailers fail to sign Bangladesh safety accord  The Guardian   ..."Are 1,200 dead workers not enough to make them realise something needs to be done?"...
DOD poised to trim furlough days, add exemptions  Associated Press   ...The Defense Department is poised to trim the number of civilian furlough days from 14 to 11 and will allow the military to exempt thousands of additional workers from the unpaid day off requirements, according to defense officials...
CBO Update: Deficit Shrinking Rapidly  Calculated Risk   ...The rapidly declining deficit might provide policymakers some room to alter the ill-conceived sequestration budget cuts. But at the least, this takes all short term (next 2 to 3 years) deficit reduction proposals off the table... 
Elizabeth Warren Pushes Feds For Answer On Big Bank Enforcement  Huffington Post   ...Sen. Elizabeth Warren raised the stakes of her quest to find out why a single Wall Street bank has not been prosecuted in the aftermath of the financial crisis Tuesday, sending a letter to the heads of three federal agencies...
New Amtrak Engines Unveiled for Northeast  New York Times   ...Amtrak rolled out three new locomotives on Monday, the first step in the railroad’s plan to modernize its aging fleet of trains...
Former Florida GOP Hispanic outreach director switches to Democrat  Miami Herald   ...Pablo Pantoja, who was at one time employed as the RNC's Hispanic outreach director in Florida but has switched to Democrat, citing "the culture of intolerance surrounding the Republican Party…
Officials mark new W.Va. pipeline safety law  Associated Press   ...State and local officials are marking West Virginia's new pipeline safety law. The legislation raises state penalties for safety violations to federal levels...
NJ Governor Vetoes Early Voting Bill  FMF News   ...New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) vetoed a bill on Thursday that would have created 14 days of in-person early voting in New Jersey...
Workers strike at IKEA Richmond store  CBC News   ...IKEA's Richmond store is behind picket lines after the Teamsters union served the company with a strike notice last week. Teamsters Local 213 in Vancouver, BC — which represents 350 store employees — takes issue with the company's contract offers, rejected twice by members, which proposed a return to a tiered-wage system...

Today's Teamster News 04.07.13

Number of the Week: Youth Unemployment at 22.9%?  Wall Street Journal   ...many graduates are carrying hefty debt burdens, and those who can find work are often being forced to low-skill jobs...
Shocking study reveals mortality rates for women are increasing in over 43% of U.S. counties compared to just 3.4% for men  Daily Mail   ...1,334 counties in the U.S. had increased mortality rates for women in the 14 year period while only 108 counties had increased rates for men...
Corporate evil creeps up unobserved  PressTV   ...if you thought the World Trade Organization (which forced the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act) and the North American Free Trade Agreement are bad then the TPP is awful!...
Obama Administration Takes Aim at TPP Countries' Public Interest Policies in New Report  Public Citizen   ...The 406-page USTR report indicts a wide array of public health policies, financial regulations, politically sensitive manufacturing and agricultural policies and even religious standards as “trade barriers” that should be dismantled...
Task force will aim to ease farmers’ TPP worries  The Japan Times   ...Farmers say they fear their livelihoods will be devastated by an influx of cheap imported produce if Japan joins the TPP...
Money-Laundering Banks Still Get a Pass From U.S.  Bloomberg   ... the largest financial companies are unlikely to face criminal actions or meaningful sanctions. The Department of Justice has decided that these banks are too big to prosecute to the full extent of the law, though why this also gets employees and executives off the hook remains a mystery. And the Federal Reserve refuses to rescind bank licenses, undermining the credibility, legitimacy and stability of the financial system...
Scientists angry about budget cuts come out of the lab and onto the streets  McClatchy   ...Thousands of prominent cancer and other medical researchers will rally in the nation’s capital Monday to protest federal funding cuts that began several years ago and were accelerated by additional forced reductions beginning to take effect under the congressionally mandated process of sequestration...
China, Destroyer-of-Worlds  Forbes   ...the Chinese government is aware of this, yet is willing to lose money on its capital investments in order to provide jobs for people moving to the city...
Union members opposed to "Right to Work" legislation in Missouri campaign against the measure  KY3 News   ...Members of "We Are Missouri" canvassed several Springfield neighborhoods on Saturday--all in Representative Burlison's district,--to campaign against the legislation...
Emergency Manager Protest Jams Up Traffic On I-75  CBS Detroit   ...For more than an hour Friday morning, a section of southbound I-75  looked pretty much like a parking lot. Motorists were riding the brakes along the freeway near Mack Avenue in  protest of the state’s financial takeover of Detroit...
Job slump is Walker's fault (opinion)  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel   ...in the first year of Walker's budget - July 2011 through June 2012 - public employees gave back over $850 million in take-home pay. This contracted the economy in every corner of the state, anywhere there's a public school teacher, garbage collector, county jail or public park...

Kitty litter in cigarettes, horsemeat in burritos

As Congress  flushes the U.S. economy into into the toilet allows across-the-board government spending cuts, Gawker brings us two gems that show why consumers need more (not less) government protection from powerful corporations.

First we learn the spreading horse meat scandal now hits Taco Bell:

The latest round of tests conducted by Britain's Food Standards Agency found that ground beef used at all local Taco Bell locations contained trace amounts of horse DNA...

Ikea had to stop selling Swedish meatballs after horse meat was found in them. Burger King also acknowledged that some of its burgers had horse meat in them.

Taco Bell released a statement in the U.S., saying:

Our domestic restaurants have not been, and will not be, impacted because we do not use any meat from Europe. We stand for quality and we use 100% premium beef. Like all beef in the United States, ours is USDA inspected and then passes our own 20 quality checkpoints.

Well, maybe not for long, according to Food Safety News:

...the nearly 9 percent across-the-board budget cut could mean that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which oversees 80 percent of the food supply, could cut 2,100 food facility inspections and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, in charge of meat and poultry safety, could be forced to furlough all its employees for a total of 15 days to meet the reductions.

Then there's this charming item about tobacco companies putting kitty litter in cigarettes to avoid a federal excise tax. Gawker tells us:

Apparently there is cat litter in cigarettes—or rather the clay found in cat litter is used in cigarettes as filler. This allows tobacco companies to "weigh down" their cigarettes so that they will fall into the "large cigar" category-helping the companies avoid a federal excise tax increase of 2,653%. The rule goes as follows:

It requires "a rolled tobacco product to weigh at least 3 pounds per 1,000 to be labeled as a 'large' or 'premium' cigar where taxes increased just 155 percent."

This filler is legal; though the rule states that weight must be achieved to qualify as a large cigar, there is no stipulation about how this weight is achieved.

Corporate tax avoidance is a big reason the U.S. government doesn't have enough revenue to meet its obligations. Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa commented on that today:

We cannot allow working people to again be victimized by the Republican Party’s ongoing battle to protect billionaires and multinational corporations from their responsibility to pay their fair share of taxes. 

By not acting to end the sequester, Republicans are telling us that that these tax loopholes and their billionaire benefactors are more important than creating jobs and stimulating commercial activity in their own country. They prefer to defend an unfair tax code while attacking retirement and health benefits that Americans work all their lives to earn.

Read the whole thing here.

Dial 888-659-9401. Tell Congress to have a heart, stop the cuts

Deadenders in Congress are taking American workers hostage again. They're threatening to allow drastic budget cuts starting on March 1 unless Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are slashed.

Economists (at least the non-Arthur Laffer sane ones) say cutting the budget will depress business activity and throw hundreds of thousands of people  out of work.

The Teamsters are urging members to call their representatives in Congress at 888-659-9491 today to tell them to have a heart:

Call your members of Congress today, and tell them to stand up to these bullies, reject benefit cuts for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and cancel the across-the-board budget cuts under the sequester that would affect working families, such as cuts to food and workplace safety, education, and more. Instead, Congress should close loopholes for Wall Street and the richest 2%—especially loopholes that encourage job offshoring, allow corporations to pay no taxes, enrich the already wealthy, and bar the government from negotiating lower prices with drug companies.

The chart below shows what will happen if the automatic budget cuts scheduled for March 1 (under "sequestration") actually happen.

Call your members of Congress today at 888-659-9401

Today's Teamster News 02.14.13

Today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of James R. Hoffa. Happy Birthday, Jimmy!
Jimmy Hoffa's son, Teamsters work to burnish tarnished image  Detroit News   ...Teamsters President Jim Hoffa is working to polish the legacy of his father, James R. Hoffa, the legendary Detroit labor leader who would have turned 100 today...

EU and US free-trade talks launched  BBC ...The US said that "everything is on the table" in the talks. A deal would bring down trading barriers between the two biggest economies in the world...
Federal workers’ unions rally near Capitol to protest sequestration  Washington Post   ...Public servants were out in force Tuesday, protesting potential federal budget cuts that would severely hinder their ability to serve the public...
Retail Sales in U.S. Increase for Third Straight Month  Bloomberg   ...Department stores and online merchants were among those showing growing demand as improving job prospects and a strengthening housing market helped companies...
American Airlines and US Airways agree to merge and create world’s biggest airline  Associated Press   ...The deal caps a turbulent period of bankruptcies and consolidation that leaves the U.S. airline industry dominated by four big carriers. The boards of American parent AMR Corp. and US Airways approved the deal late Wednesday...
Mexico unveils new strategy in war on drugs  The Guardian   ...Mexico's new administration has offered the first details of its new strategy in the country's war on drugs, saying the government will spend $9.2bn (£5.9bn) this year on social programmes...the announcement was a forceful rejection of his predecessor...
House Kills Latest Effort To Make Right-To-Work Law In N.H.  New Hampshire Public Radio   ...Union workers broke into raucous applause after Speaker of the House Terrie Norelli announced the tally of votes on the right to work bill brought before the full House on Wednesday...
Right-to-work building interest in Missouri  St. Louis Post-Dispatch   ...Legislation that could deal a blow to labor unions in Missouri is drawing increased interest at the Capitol, though the measure may still face a tough road to passage this year...
Mo. Sen. Committee Considers Bill That Would Eliminate Prevailing Wage Rule  KBIA   ...Randy Long is a non-union mechanical contractor from southwestern Missouri who sided with labor unions in opposing the bill. “Everybody deserves a good quality wage in this day and time," Long said...
MO House Speaker, Congressman candidate bury ALEC connections in campaign finance documents  DailyKos   ...you won't see the wining and dining of Missouri GOP leaders by ALEC special interests spelled out in lobbying documents filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission....The expenses, and there are plenty, are buried in finance documents filed with the Commission...
Americans for Prosperity tabulate at least 229 fiscal proposals, including Arch tax, on April ballot  St. Louis Beacon   ...In a sign that fiscally conservative groups are gearing up again in Missouri, the state’s chapter of Americans for Prosperity will be raising alarm bells Wednesday about the number of local tax proposals to be on ballots across the state on April 2...
Unions pack Assembly to protest labor-law rewrite  Anchorage Daily News   ...More than 750 people, many representing eight labor groups, clogged the Tuesday night Anchorage Assembly meeting in a sign of the fight to come over Mayor Dan Sullivan's proposal to weaken city unions...
Tax chief, legislators spar over Kasich’s budget  Columbus Dispatch   ... They questioned the state tax commissioner for hours about details of the sales-tax expansion, the impact of the income-tax cut and the facts behind a new severance tax on shale drilling...
Gov. Corbett Insists on Full Privatization of Pa. Liquor Store System  CBS Philly   ...even before he made his privatization proposal late last month, legislative leaders –- including the state House speaker — signalled that modernizing liquor sales, such as allowing beer and wine sales in grocery stores, seems more likely than full privatization...
Anti-union bill makes way through Kansas Legislature  Kansas City Business Journal   ...In addition to preventing the payment of union dues, House Bill 2023 would eliminate collective bargaining laws, change the process for workers' compensation appeals and delay unemployment benefits, the report says. The bill is a replica of model legislation by the American Legislative Exchange Council...
Canonsburg approves contract for 20 employees  Observer-Reporter   ...the contract, between Canonsburg Borough and Teamsters Local 205...calls for a 70-cent per hour raise in 2013; 75-cent raise in 2014 and an 80-cent per hour raise in 2015...
Rhinebeck, Spackenkill school bus strike averted for now  Poughkeepsie Journal   ..."We have agreed to hold off on any kind of job action until they come back to the table and we will reevaluate at that point,” Teamsters Local 445 business agent Lori Polesel said...

Teamsters take to Capitol Hill to say 'Hell, No,' to Social Security, Medicare cuts

More than a thousand union members standing in the shadow of the Capitol today didn't just say no to the severe government cuts scheduled for March 1.

We said, "Hell No!"

Teamsters chanted "Leave Grandma Alone" along with the raucous crowd of union members on Capitol Hill to protest cuts to Social Security, Medicare, education and other vital programs. AFGE National President David Cox, Sr., delivered a stirring speech filled with applause lines such as:

We've gotta protect Social Security. We've gotta protect Medicare. But most of all, we need jobs!

Cox's fear is that members of Congress, buoyed by greedy CEO lobbyists, will trim Social Security and Medicare benefits. Such cuts -- once unthinkable -- would replace automatic reductions scheduled for March 1 under so-called "sequestration." The sequester is the product of a manufactured budget crisis by radical Republicans in Congress. One of today's speakers called it a "guillotine."

Federal workers who spoke to the large crowd today painted a grim picture of locked Social Security offices and uninspected meat and dairy products. Signs read, "Sink the Sequester," "Hands off Social Security," and the ubiquitous "Stop the War on Workers."

Today's lunchtime rally took place just hours before President Obama's scheduled State of The Union speech. The action was part of a wave of protests and rallies planned around the country over the next few weeks. Tweeters are asked to use the #jobsnotcuts and #SOTU1U (SOTU1U=State of the union 1 union) hashtags during the speech.

Several dozen news conferences and rallies will be held on Valentine's Day. Fair Share will hold news conferences at broken bridges and schools from Boston to Roseville, Calif., pointing out how corporations get sweetheart tax deals. Housing advocates will deliver messages to members of Congress from coast to coast, asking them to have a heart. Working people are urged to call their representative on Feb. 14 to tell them to keep their hands off Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

A second wave of protests is planned for Wednesday, Feb. 20 by the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, Health Care for America Now and the American Federation of Teachers. Keep your ears open for an action near you.

And for those who think government budget cuts are necessary -- though they will slow business activity and harm countless Americans -- we direct you to Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse. He's proposing reforms that will require corporations and billionaires to pay their fair share. According to the AFL-CIO Now blog:

Says Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), who is soon to introduce legislation to stop sequestration:  

We should make every effort to prevent this needless, self-inflicted harm. Many Republicans have said they want the sequester, as part of their clamor for "austerity." In Europe, countries that responded to the economic downturn by slashing their budgets suffered shrinking economies and persistent double-digit unemployment rates. But the failure of austerity in practice does not deter our Republican colleagues.

...Sen. Whitehouse’s proposals to close tax loopholes would generate more than $1 trillion in new revenue over 10 years—more than the $960 billion total amount of sequestration cuts. His proposals include:

• Implementing the Buffett Rule, which would require millionaires to pay at least a 30% effective tax rate;
• Reducing tax incentives for sending jobs overseas;
• Implementing a modest 0.03% financial speculation tax on Wall Street trading in stocks, bonds and other complex financial products to discourage destabilizing high-frequency trading;
• Assessing a financial crisis responsibility fee on the largest financial institutions to let the financial sector pay back taxpayers for the financial crisis; and
• Limiting the extra benefit of tax deductions for the richest 2% of Americans.

Today's Teamster News 02.08.13

US citizens braced for austerity impact  Financial Times   ...The Pentagon has said that 800,000 civilian employees would see their hours cut by 20 per cent for the rest of the year and 46,000 temporary workers would be laid off. Other agencies would also see deep cuts in staff. There are estimates of a 25 per cent drop in border patrol agents, 600 fewer food safety inspectors at slaughterhouses and meat processing plants, and 1,200 fewer air traffic control operators...
Tax Holiday Ends, Consumers Scrimp  Wall Street Journal   ...Surveys show the majority of Americans who are aware of the tax increase say they plan to cut spending, and consumer confidence has wavered. Companies like Target Corp. and women's clothier Cato Corp. say the tax increase has crimped sales...
Profound Weight of Layoffs Is Seen in Work Trends Survey  New York Times   ...While about 8 percent of Americans are unemployed, nearly a quarter of Americans say they were laid off at some point during the recession or afterward...Of those laid off in recent years, nearly a quarter said they still had not found a job...
Postal Service dying from 1,000 cuts and a GOP stab in the back (opinion)  Los Angeles Times   ...Republicans are always insisting that the USPS be run like a good capitalist enterprise, but few, if any, private businesses could bear the burden of funding three-quarters of a century of retired employees’ medical costs over just one decade...
American Airlines And US Airways Near Merger Deal  Forbes   ...AA’s parent company, AMR Corp., is in the final stages of talks with US Airways Group on a merger deal, and an agreement could be reached as soon as February 15th...
Tunisia faces general strike after Belaid assassination sparks crisis  The Guardian   ...The UGTT, Tunisia's trade union federation, called the strike in protest at the murder of Chokri Belaid on Wednesday. It will be the first such strike since 1978...
Senators look to revamp local pension plans  Sun-Sentinel   ...A panel of Florida lawmakers on Wednesday debated how best to revamp 492 municipal pension plans across the state...
Washtenaw County takes stance against right-to-work legislation with unanswered legal questions  AnnArbor.com   ...the commission voted 6-1 to approve the resolution that not only served as a formal expression of the majority of the commission's opposition to the right-to-work measures passed by the lame duck Michigan legislature in December, but also to direct staff to expedite union contract negotiations...
Dayton: Tax cuts caused Minn. economic problems  Minnesota Public Radio   ..."In the decade after Minnesota's income tax reductions, our economy fared worse than the nation and most other states," Dayton said...
Voter poll pulls losing numbers for Corbett's lotto plan  Philly.com   ...Sixty-four percent of the voters polled said they oppose his plan to turn over control of the lottery to a British company, Camelot Global Services...
Walmart Workers Are Back on Strike Over a New Wave of Alleged Threats  The Nation   ...half a dozen workers in Laurel, Maryland, walked off the job in protest of alleged retaliation by Walmart management...
Workers at UNFI vote to ratify 5-year contract agreement  Auburn Reporter   ...Warehouse workers and drivers, represented by Teamsters Local 117, overwhelmingly voted to ratify a fully-recommended 5-year contract agreement with United Natural Foods, Inc. on Thursday...The agreement provides for the reinstatement of all workers, including the 72 who had been permanently replaced, health and welfare protections for workers, and meaningful wage increases...
Moreno Valley warehouse charged with harassing union  Press Enterprise   ...The National Labor Relations Board, the federal agency that enforces workplace laws and supervises union elections, has issued a complaint against a Moreno Valley food distribution center... union officials filed labor board charges alleging that employees were harassed and threatened by company officials...
Arbitrator rules in favor of deputy sheriffs on pay  Capital Gazette   ...An arbitrator has ruled in favor of the county's deputy sheriffs union in its grievance against the county for failing to pay negotiated wage increases in fiscal 2010...The sheriff's deputies are represented by Teamsters Union Local 355...
Teamsters Release Video Of Sanitation Workers At Martin Luther King, Jr. March  IBT   ...more than 400 sanitation workers from Atlanta, Ga., Pensacola, Fla., Mobile, Ala. and Memphis, Tenn. joined workers from the 1968 Memphis sanitation strike to demand that Republic Services/Allied Waste treat its workers with respect...

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2013/02/07/5173245/teamsters-release-video-of-sanitation.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2013/02/07/5173245/teamsters-release-video-of-sanitation.html#storylink=cpy

Today's Teamster News 02.06.13

Obama seeks $5T European trade deal  The Hill  ...The Obama administration is poised to launch trade talks with the European Union that would form a $5 trillion trans-Atlantic free-trade zone...
No Evidence of U.S. Manufacturing Revival  Wall Street Journal   ...For the past 13 years, the rate of factory closings in the U.S. has been declining. The bad news is that over that time the rate of ribbon cuttings on new operations have consistently fallen even more...
Homes Sell in Two Weeks With Low Supply for Spring Buyers  Bloomberg   ...A plunge in U.S. home listings to a 12-year low is driving up prices and preventing transactions from returning to historically normal levels. Many potential sellers are holding off until values rise more, while investors are snatching up distressed properties before they reach the market. Builders, reporting their best orders in years, can’t increase production fast enough...
Banks No Match for Trucks Where Rigs Pay Twice as Much  Bloomberg   ...(There is) a wave of job growth at trucking companies as they post payroll increases at more than double the pace of the nation’s workforce since the end of 2010. Demand is being driven by the economic expansion, new regulations that cap driver hours and rising turnover caused by long days and time away from home...
Study Says States Lose Billions in Offshore Tax Avoidance  Bloomberg   ...State governments in the U.S. lost $39.8 billion in 2011 because of offshore tax avoidance...
E-mails show plotting by lawmakers, GOP on Florida redistricting  Tampa Bay Times   ...The emails show that a month after voters in 2010 approved an amendment banning coordination between the party and lawmakers, GOP consultant and Gaetz adviser Rich Heffley called a redistricting "brainstorming" meeting at the chairman's conference room at party headquarters in Tallahassee...
Virginia GOP no longer even trying to hide true purpose of voter ID laws  Salon   ...Concealed carry permits, but not utility bills, now accepted at Virginia polling places...
Unions protest ahead of governor's budget  Herald-Standard   ...John Rzodkiewicz, business representative for the UFWU, said the governor’s plan to privatize state-owned liquor stores will destroy 5,000 jobs...
Colorado Senate gives first OK to bill making it easier for firefighters to unionize  Denver Post   ...The Colorado Senate gave initial approval Monday to a Democratic bill expanding unionization rights for firefighters – legislation virtually the same as a bill vetoed four years earlier under a Democratic governor...
Negotiations Between Teamsters, Durham Falter  Summerville Patch  ...Negotiations between a school bus contractor and its union employees have deteriorated, putting school transportation for three Lowcountry school districts into question...The contractor's representatives allegedly walked out of a meeting with its employees during negotiations Tuesday morning...
Teamsters Local 332 president is named health care adviser for union's Michigan council  Michigan Live  ...The president of Teamsters Local 332 in Flint has been named health care adviser for Michigan Teamsters Joint Council 43...

Congress set to kill 1M jobs

Congress is about to make a colossal blunder unmatched in 76 years. It was in 1937 that lawmakers decided to cut government spending, which put the brakes on rapidly increasing business activity and sent the country back into the Great Depression.

We are 24 days away from "sequestration," arbitrary across-the-board spending cuts that congressional Republicans demanded. Sequestration can only be avoided if a super-committee can agree to something else. It doesn't look like that's going to happen. The "thinking" is that getting the government out of the way will let the private sector flourish.

Um, that didn't happen in the last quarter when GDP fell because of the steepest defense cuts since 1972.

The New York Times estimates sequestration will kill a million U.S. jobs. Others say it could cost 1.4 million jobs. Reports the Times:

...beginning at the end of this month, at least half that amount — more than a million jobs — will start to disappear because of a mindless government austerity program that no one in Washington seems able to stop... 

bring on the unemployment. The first jobs to go will be in the defense sector, but the losses will soon spread as contracts to states and cities are cut, education and police grants are cut, and payments to Medicare providers are cut. Even the aid just approved for victims of Hurricane Sandy will fall under the sequester’s ax. Americans are about to find out what happens when an entire political party demands deficit reduction at all costs, because those costs will be enormous...

Here's what will happen to the military, according to Stars and Stripes:

...the military is being forced to cut training, cancel construction projects, defer maintenance of ships, aircraft and vehicles, cancel professional conferences, halt most temporary duty assignments, and interrupt supply and equipment purchases. 

Quality of life for the military also is being impacted as dependents lose jobs, local economies and businesses lose contracts, and base operations, including family support programs, take immediate budget cuts. 

The entire Department of Defense has imposed a civilian-hiring freeze. At least 46,000 temporary employees are getting pink slips and many more employees under “term” contracts won’t see those contracts renewed.

There are better ways to shrink the deficit. One proposal by ThinkProgress raises $1 trillion over 10 years by making the wealthy pay their fair share and closing tax loopholes for corporate jets, business entertainment and horse breeding. Read the whole thing here.

Today's Teamster News 10.22.12

Psst, taxes go up in 2013 for 163 million workers  Associated Press   ...A temporary reduction in Social Security payroll taxes is due to expire at the end of the year and hardly anyone in Washington is pushing to extend it. Neither Obama nor Romney has proposed an extension, and it probably wouldn't get through Congress anyway, with lawmakers in both parties down on the idea...
Looming federal cuts big risk to small companies  Associated Press   ...many in Washington believe that the budget reductions will be put off. But if a deal falls through, it's estimated that 10 percent of the federal budget will be cut. No one knows yet where exactly the cuts might be made, but many economists and lawmakers expect they would have a devastating effect on small companies and slow an already lumbering economy...
Fighting waste and abuse in defense contractor pay  Economic Policy Institute   ...Current law permits federal contractors to charge the government up to $763,029 a year for their employees, while even federal cabinet secretaries are paid no more than $200,000 a year, and the president is paid only $400,000 a year. Manchin’s amendment would lower the cap on maximum allowable compensation paid by government funds to all DoD contract employees from $763,029 to $230,700...
British protesters demand end to "failing" austerity  Reuters   ...Tens of thousands of British protesters marched through London on Saturday calling for an end to public spending cuts and tax rises launched by a government they accuse of elitism and ignorance about the plight of recession-hit voters...
Armed Forces Show Overwhelming Support for Obama  OpenSecrets.org   ...the president has received $536,414 from military donors, compared to Paul's $399,274 and Romney's $287,435, according to research by the Center for Responsive Politics...
Inside Bain's Chinese Sensata Factories, Where Workers Put in 12-Hour Days for $.99-$1.35 an Hour  Alternet   ...They'll get a small tax break for relocating the plant – the one Mitt Romney insisted did not exist during the first debate – and then use those offshore funds to defer taxes on some of the income the company generates...