TEAMSTERS
Teamsters Support House Introduction of Pension Accountability Act Teamster.org ...The Teamsters Union expressed its support today of the introduction of the House companion bill for Sen. Rob Portman’s (R-Ohio) Pension Accountability Act. The bill (HR 4029), which was introduced in the House by Reps. David Joyce (R-Ohio) and Tim Ryan (D-Ohio), would guarantee that the votes of thousands of retirees and participants would not be nullified as part of the process included in the Multi-employer Pension Reform Act (MPRA)...
Teamsters Applaud SFMTA Vote Ensuring Labor Harmony for Commuter Shuttles Teamster.org ...Today, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) voted to make the city’s commuter shuttle pilot program permanent, while also ensuring labor harmony for workers employed by commuter shuttle operators. The commuter shuttle program pertains to buses primarily serving Silicon Valley’s high tech industry, including Apple, Google, Facebook, and others. Consistent efforts by commuter shuttle drivers, Teamsters and community members to keep public attention on the critical labor harmony resolution resulted in final passage...
Miami Transfer Ratifies New 3 Year Contract Local 769 ...On Monday November 16, 2015, Teamsters Local 769 members from Miami Transfer ratified a new 3 year contract. Miami Transfer has been in business since 1896 and along with Florida Rigging they do a lot of work for Florida Power and Light. They also do a lot of rigging work for Pike and other utility pole companies throughout the Miami, Broward, and Palm Beach county areas...
Teamsters, Carhaul Employer Group to Reconvene Teamster.org ...The Teamsters National Automobile Transporters Negotiating Committee (TNATINC) will reconvene with the carhaul employer group this week to negotiate on the members’ behalf after carhaulers overwhelmingly voted to reject the national agreement and two supplemental agreements. The negotiations come after local unions held meetings over the past few weeks with the carhaul members to discuss the recently rejected tentative agreement...
Workers protest poverty wages at the U of MN Fight Back News ...More than 350 workers on the Twin Cities and Duluth campuses of the University of Minnesota braved the rain, Nov. 17, to rally and picket for raises and respect for unionized staff at the U of MN. Members of U of MN AFSCME and Teamsters Local 320, which collectively represent over 4000 university workers, are currently in contract negotiations...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Obama presses Canada for quick TPP approval Globe and Mail ...U.S. President Barack Obama is pressuring Canada and the other members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership to approve the trade deal as quickly as possible. The 12 leaders of TPP nations met Wednesday for the first time since they announced the deal in October and released the text on Nov. 5. The closed-door meeting was also the first opportunity for Canada’s new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to meet with TPP leaders...
Protests Continue as Obama Praises TPP at APEC Summit TeleSUR ...Activists protesting against the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit (APEC) in Manila, Philippines, clashed with police on Wednesday in attempts to take their demonstration to the site of the the APEC meetings, where world leaders also met to discuss the controversial Trans Pacific Partnership. Social movements including labor unions, women’s groups, students, Indigenous people, farmer organizations, and international activists have protested the negative impacts of APEC’s free trade model...
TPP activists storm Morgan Stanley office in Washington RT ...Activists united against the Trans Pacific Partnership deal disrupted the Washington, DC offices of investment firm Morgan Stanley. Protesters pushed by the company’s security as they charged their way into the building. Morgan Stanley is one of many US companies supporting the TPP and has spent almost $10m on lobbying over the past three years...
The Trans-Pacific Partnership could end US-made clothing New York Post ...The deal would eliminate tariffs between the US, Canada, Australia, Brunei, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. A key NYC industry, clothing and apparel, is more divided in its take on TPP. “They’re not encouraging the consumer to buy more American-made products,” says Ramdat Harihar, CEO of R&C Apparel. “If they’re cutting tariffs, they will manufacture more overseas”...
Greece, Lenders Reach Deal over Austerity Reforms; Aid Unlocked TeleSUR ...The Greek Finance Ministry said a payment of 2 billion euros will be made by creditors on Friday after reforms are ratified by parliament. Greece has reached an agreement with its European creditors Tuesday over financial reforms and austerity measures, allowing the country to receive bailout loans that were blocked because of disagreements over the reforms...
Honduran Union Leader, Family Leave Home after Threats Solidarity Center ...Honduran union leader Nelson Geovanni Nuñez Chavez was forced to leave his home with his family last week after repeatedly being followed and harassed, according to the Honduras-based nonprofit ACI-Participa. Nuñez Chavez is technical adviser to the Honduran agricultural workers’ union, Sindicato de Trabajadores de la Agroindustria y Similares (STAS), and host of the radio program, “The Unionist, Live”...
India cbank workers' strike on Thursday likely to disrupt settlements Reuters ...Nov 18 About 17,000 employees of the Reserve Bank of India are set to go on strike on Thursday for better retirement benefits and to oppose reforms to the central bank, raising the prospect of disruptions to banks and markets. The four unions that have called the strike say the reforms will reduce the RBI's regulatory powers and take away debt management operations away from the central bank...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Right To Work Is Debated in West Virginia The Intelligencer ...West Virginia Senate President Bill Cole said it is time to join the 25 other states that have passed right-to-work laws, but labor leaders Mike Caputo and Kenny Perdue said this is merely a Republican attempt to reduce wages for workers in an already poor state. State law currently allows companies to require membership in a union as a condition of employment. That practice is forbidden in right-to-work states...
Is "Right to Work" Right for W.Va.? WV Public ...Dozens of union members attended a joint committee meeting Sunday making their opposition for Right to Work legislation clear. For two hours, the Joint Committee on the Judiciary met to discuss possible Right to Work legislation and how it might affect West Virginia. Right to Work laws prohibit certain types of agreements between labor unions and employers...
Bills introduced by Simon address sexual orientation, campaign funds, paid sick leave WTVR ...HB07 wants full time employees to get a reasonable number of sick days. “Hard working Virginians shouldn’t have to choose between getting paid and going to work with a fever, the flu or worse,” Simon said. “It is essential to the health of Virginia’s workplaces that we provide a reasonable number of paid sick days for full time employees"...
L.A. County sets up wage enforcement program to police new minimum wage rules LA Times ...In the wake of this summer's decision to hike the minimum wage in unincorporated areas to $15 by 2020, Los Angeles County supervisors voted Tuesday to set up a new division to go after employers who violate the wage law. Details of how the enforcement program will work and what penalties will apply to offending employers remain to be worked out...
U.S. LABOR
Sonoma County SEIU workers strike amid contract talks Press Democrat ...About 1,500 Sonoma County government employees joined picket lines Tuesday for the first day of a planned three-day strike by the county’s largest group of unionized workers. The demonstrations, clustered mainly outside county offices in Santa Rosa, escalated a standoff between local government officials and rank-and-file employees about the rising cost of health care and other living expenses...
Ford-UAW contract passage in doubt as voting nears end Reuters ...Workers at two large Ford Motor Co (F.N) plants in Louisville, Kentucky, rejected a proposed four-year labor contract by 2-to-1 margin, putting its passage in doubt as voting at Ford plants factories nears an end. Of 7,408 votes cast at Louisville Assembly and Kentucky Truck plants, 65.5 percent voted against the contract, according to a UAW official...
Papa John's Franchisee Gets Jail Time For Failing To Pay Full Wages Huffington Post ...The owner of several Papa John's franchises in New York City will serve 60 days in jail for failing to pay his workers the minimum wage and overtime, New York's attorney general announced Monday. Two months isn't a particularly long time in the hoosegow, but any jail time at all is notable in a wage theft case...
McDonald's franchises must comply with NLRB subpoenas, judge says Reuters ...A U.S. judge has ordered 10 McDonald's franchisees in New York City to comply with subpoenas from the National Labor Relations Board seeking information on their relationship with McDonald's Corp, as the agency tries to prove that the fast food giant is a joint employer of franchise workers...
Airlines Do Fixes on the Cheap by Sending Planes Abroad to Unlicensed Mechanics Alternet ...Like outsourcing in every other industry, aviation outsourcing comes down to money. After 9/11, when America’s airline industry found itself in financial dire straits, commercial fliers introduced a number of cost-cutting measures. We’re now far too familiar with these practices, most of which remain with us. Less widely known is the fact that airlines also looked for ways to slash repair costs, a solution that required looking abroad...
The Lowest End Of The Income Spectrum Is A Dangerous Place For Mothers To Be Think Progress ...In a new research paper from Kristin S. Seefeldt and Heather Sandstrom published by the Russell Sage Foundation, the authors note that about 12 percent of all low-income mothers had neither a job nor welfare benefits in 2004, which jumped to about 20 percent by 2008. “The number of families with children who are without work and without cash welfare benefits has been growing over time since the implementation of welfare reform in 1996,” said Seefeldt...
U.S. Economy Increasingly Dominated by Monopolies as 2015 Corporate Mergers Continue Alternet ...There’s more evidence that corporate America is becoming ever more monopolistic and that’s not good for small businesses or consumers. This year is on track to see the most corporate mergers and takeovers since the Great Recession of 2008, according to many business page reports that said October was the fifth biggest month ever for mergers...
SEIU endorses Clinton Politico ...The powerful union behind the fast food workers' wage movement endorsed Hillary Clinton for president Tuesday. The 2-million-member Service Employees International Union approved the endorsement through a vote by its executive board. “Hillary Clinton has proven she will fight, deliver and win for working families,” said SEIU President Mary Kay Henry in a statement...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Poll shows support for reversing highway bill safety changes The Hill ...Safety advocates are touting a poll showing public support for reversing a host of regulatory changes that are included in a highway funding bill that is being negotiated by lawmakers. 77 percent of U.S. residents oppose a controversial proposal to increase a current limit on the length of double-trailer truck rigs from 28 feet to 33 feet. Only 22 percent of the poll's respondents said they support the longer truck proposal...
Koch brothers hijack historic criminal justice reform to make it tougher to go after corporate criminals Salon ...Not one Wall Street executive was criminally charged following the 2008 global financial collapse, and if the Koch brothers and House Republicans have their way, it’ll be harder to hold white collar criminals accountable for their future malfeasance. In an age when even acts of terror fail to lessen the tense political divisions in Washington, D.C. a rare beacon of bipartisanship comprise has taken root among elected federal officials working on criminal justice reform...
Paris attacks reshape U.S. debate on immigration, security Reuters ...U.S. lawmakers called on Tuesday for even tighter scrutiny of Syrian refugees fleeing to the United States as last week's deadly Paris attacks recast America's debate over immigration and national security, prompting a sharp rebuke from President Barack Obama, who said attempts to block entry were "offensive and contrary to American values"...
France Rejects Fear, Renews Commitment To Take In 30,000 Syrian Refugees Think Progress ...French President Francois Hollande promised to honor his commitment to take in tens of thousands of refugees on Wednesday. He said France would do so despite concerns raised by ultra-right nationalist leaders that refugees might pose a security threat to the country. Many immigration experts and political leaders noted that such humanitarian measures undermine ISIS’ argument that the West is at odds with Muslims...
"A Disturbing Increase in Islamophobia": U.S. Mosques Threatened, Canadian Mosque Set on Fire Democracy Now ...There are growing reports of Islamophobic attacks since Friday’s massacre in Paris. Just hours after the Paris assault, a caller left a voicemail laced with racial slurs for the Islamic Society of Pinellas County in St. Petersburg, Florida. The caller left his full name and threatened to "firebomb you, shoot whoever’s there on sight in the head." Meanwhile in Pflugerville, Texas, residents found a torn Qur’an covered in feces...
Latest Incidents Show Police Brutality Persists Despite Elevated Awareness Common Dreams ...Separate incidents in two U.S. cities over recent days reveal that tensions remain elevated over police brutality and use of excessive force in the United States. Captured last week on tape, the beating of a man in San Francisco has been likened to the infamous assault on Rodney King by the Los Angeles Police Department in 1991...
Showing posts with label wage theft. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wage theft. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 18, 2015
Tuesday, November 3, 2015
Today's Teamster News 11.03.15
TEAMSTERS
Pilgrim Parking Employees Stand Up Against Oppressive Pay, Benefits Offered by Company Teamster.org ...Workers at Pilgrim Parking facilities in Boston and Cambridge, Mass., are engaging in ongoing job actions at locations across the area to protest the company’s refusal to give employees a voice in the workplace. Pilgrim Parking workers are poorly compensated, as the company does not meet area standards for wages and benefits...
Port Driver and Warehouse Worker Strikes End With $3.5 Million In New Wage Theft Claims Filed Teamster.org ...After five days of active picketing that dramatically impacted trucking companies and the marine terminal operators that continued to allow the trucks of struck companies into their yards, misclassified “independent contractor” drivers from XPO Logistics, Intermodal Bridge Transport (IBT), and Gold Point Transportation ended their strike on October 30...
EVSC, Teamsters Reach Tentative Deal Tristate Homepage ...EVSC and Teamsters Local 215 have reached a tentative collective bargaining agreement. This information was announced at EVSC meeting on Monday night. EVSC Board President Mike Duckworth tells Eyewitness News the two sides reached an agreement some time Monday morning. Duckworth says the two sides had been meeting over the weekend and were able to come to a series of agreements...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
TPP May Not Pass Due to Anti-Free Trade Provisions That Lack GOP Support Free Beacon ...More than twenty Republican members of Congress have said that anti-free trade provisions within the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) are holding them back from supporting it, and without their support the deal may not pass. Several of those members have sent letters to President Obama’s lead adviser on trade, Michael Froman, regarding these concerns...
Transatlantic Trade And Investment Partnership: European Opposition To The TTIP Trade Pact Worries US IBTimes ...Europeans are having what U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman calls Europe’s “NAFTA moment.” Froman, who wants to finish the TTIP before President Barack Obama leaves office in 2017, has privately and publicly urged European countries to get ahead of the critics. “This is really the first trade agreement that has become a public controversy in Europe"...
Sounding the TTIP alarm across the European Union (opinion) New Internationalist ...Several weeks ago, hundreds of thousands of people across Europe and Britain marched to protest against the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), a massive planned new trade deal between Europe and the US. They were rightly sounding the alarm, as TTIP will greatly reduce the ability of local governments to spend public money for local development...
Oil Workers Strike in Brazil for Wages, Investments, Assets Rio Times ...Twelve oil work unions which are part of the Oil Workers Federation (FUP) in Brazil began on November 1st, a strike at Petrobras refineries all over the country. According to union officials, strikers are protesting against Petrobras’ asset sales, investment cuts, project suspensions, and reduction of some workers’ rights. “The strike was agreed on more than 45 days ago. We did try negotiating with Petrobras and the majority shareholder, i.e. the federal government, before stopping work"...
Mahallah Workers End Strike, After Written Guarantee of Demands Egyptian Streets ...Workers at Mahallah’s Misr Spinning and Weaving Company ended an 11-day strike Sunday following a written guarantee that they will be granted the 10 percent social allowance promised by the president to be given retroactively starting July. Operations have been “restored fully across all departments,” state-run news agency MENA reported. The company says that the strike has led to losses amounting to at least EGP 25 million...
‘The Nobel Prize Is for Labor Movements around the World’ Solidarity Center ...The Tunisian General Labor Union (Union Générale Tunisienne du Travail, UGTT), a longtime Solidarity Center partner, was at the forefront of the four organizations that recently won the Nobel Peace Prize, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler said today. In a ceremony at the AFL-CIO honoring UGTT Secretary-General Houcine Abassi, Shuler praised Abassi’s courage and tenacity and called the UGTT’s work “inspirational to us in the United States”...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
If Ohio Bans Gerrymandering Today, There Could be Hope for American Democracy The Nation ... Ohio Issue 1, a proposed constitutional amendment to ban partisan gerrymandering and establish a bipartisan Ohio Redistricting Commission to draw legislative district lines, is being pitched as a good-government reform. But that undersells its significance. This is a bold response to America’s broken political processes...
The toxic erosion of voter rights in Alabama Washington Post ...Alabama is one of many states with unnecessary voter ID laws, voter-suppression policies passed on the pretext of preventing virtually nonexistent forms of voter fraud. Last month, the state government made things even worse. Its new budget will make it harder to get a driver’s license...
Tacoma voters to decide whether to raise minimum wage KIRO ... a raise in the city’s minimum wage, and if so, how much it should be raised. Citizens’ Initiative Measure No. 1 and City of Tacoma Initiative Measure No. 1B concern an increase to the minimum wage. The results will be released at about 8:15 p.m. Tuesday. The first question is whether or not to raise the minimum wage. The second question, regardless if you voted yes or no on the first question, is, if the wage is raised, how much to raise it?...
Can Seattle Boot Big Money Out of Elections by Giving Voters "Democracy Vouchers?" Truthout ...A group of campaign reform advocates in the city of Seattle has a novel solution to curb the influence of money in political elections: more money. Today, Seattle voters will decide the fate of the Honest Elections ballot initiative, otherwise known as I-122...
U.S. LABOR
Detroit casino workers support strike option The Detroit News ...More than 1,300 union employees from Detroit’s three casinos voted Monday night to go on strike if their wage, health care and benefit demands aren’t met. Members of Local 24 of the hospitality union voted overwhelmingly to give their leaders the power to call a strike in order to reach a contract settlement...
VW opposing UAW skilled trades worker vote at Tennessee plant Reuters ...Volkswagen AG (VOWG_p.DE) opposes a union representation vote by a portion of workers at the automaker's sole U.S. vehicle assembly plant, according to a letter to Chattanooga, Tennessee, employees issued Monday night. Volkswagen has been the most open to the United Auto Workers (UAW) union among foreign manufacturers with assembly plants in the southern United States...
Chicago Teachers Union amps up rhetoric in fight with district Chicago Tribune ...The Chicago Teachers Union said Monday that it will check members' appetite for a strike with a "practice vote" later this week after the head of Chicago Public Schools again warned of "drastic cuts" absent a state bailout of district finances. Gov. Bruce Rauner also stepped into the fray, saying at a forum in Bloomington that "misguided state policies" were to blame...
For now, Columbia grad students can't form union - NLRB regional director Reuters ...Although a U.S. labor board decision on Friday blocked Columbia University graduate students from trying to form a union, the case could eventually become part of a bid to overturn an 11-year-old prohibition on graduate student unionization. National Labor Relations Board Regional Director Karen Fernbach in New York City rejected a petition from a United Auto Workers affiliate seeking to represent teaching and research assistants at Columbia...
Collective Victory Declared as Obama Takes Small Step to 'Ban the Box' Common Dreams ...Following years of organizing by formerly-incarcerated people and their families, President Barack Obama announced Monday that, henceforth, he will instruct some federal employers to "ban the box"—or delay inquiries into a job applicant's incarceration history to curb discrimination and stigma. The proclamation was embraced by rights campaigners...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Why California Jails Poor People Unless They Pay The Bail Bondsman Think Progress ...California jails could soon stop locking up tens of thousands of people who haven’t even appeared before a judge yet simply because they’re too poor to post bail, if a class-action lawsuit filed Wednesday succeeds. The bail scheduling system converts arrests and criminal allegations into a marketplace...
Seattle Declares Official State Of Emergency Over Homelessness Crisis Think Progress ...66 homeless people have died on the streets of Seattle and the surrounding area this year. Mayor Ed Murray has had enough. On Monday, Murray and King County Executive Down Constantine declared states of emergency in Seattle and the surrounding county...
Pilgrim Parking Employees Stand Up Against Oppressive Pay, Benefits Offered by Company Teamster.org ...Workers at Pilgrim Parking facilities in Boston and Cambridge, Mass., are engaging in ongoing job actions at locations across the area to protest the company’s refusal to give employees a voice in the workplace. Pilgrim Parking workers are poorly compensated, as the company does not meet area standards for wages and benefits...
Port Driver and Warehouse Worker Strikes End With $3.5 Million In New Wage Theft Claims Filed Teamster.org ...After five days of active picketing that dramatically impacted trucking companies and the marine terminal operators that continued to allow the trucks of struck companies into their yards, misclassified “independent contractor” drivers from XPO Logistics, Intermodal Bridge Transport (IBT), and Gold Point Transportation ended their strike on October 30...
EVSC, Teamsters Reach Tentative Deal Tristate Homepage ...EVSC and Teamsters Local 215 have reached a tentative collective bargaining agreement. This information was announced at EVSC meeting on Monday night. EVSC Board President Mike Duckworth tells Eyewitness News the two sides reached an agreement some time Monday morning. Duckworth says the two sides had been meeting over the weekend and were able to come to a series of agreements...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
TPP May Not Pass Due to Anti-Free Trade Provisions That Lack GOP Support Free Beacon ...More than twenty Republican members of Congress have said that anti-free trade provisions within the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) are holding them back from supporting it, and without their support the deal may not pass. Several of those members have sent letters to President Obama’s lead adviser on trade, Michael Froman, regarding these concerns...
Transatlantic Trade And Investment Partnership: European Opposition To The TTIP Trade Pact Worries US IBTimes ...Europeans are having what U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman calls Europe’s “NAFTA moment.” Froman, who wants to finish the TTIP before President Barack Obama leaves office in 2017, has privately and publicly urged European countries to get ahead of the critics. “This is really the first trade agreement that has become a public controversy in Europe"...
Sounding the TTIP alarm across the European Union (opinion) New Internationalist ...Several weeks ago, hundreds of thousands of people across Europe and Britain marched to protest against the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), a massive planned new trade deal between Europe and the US. They were rightly sounding the alarm, as TTIP will greatly reduce the ability of local governments to spend public money for local development...
Oil Workers Strike in Brazil for Wages, Investments, Assets Rio Times ...Twelve oil work unions which are part of the Oil Workers Federation (FUP) in Brazil began on November 1st, a strike at Petrobras refineries all over the country. According to union officials, strikers are protesting against Petrobras’ asset sales, investment cuts, project suspensions, and reduction of some workers’ rights. “The strike was agreed on more than 45 days ago. We did try negotiating with Petrobras and the majority shareholder, i.e. the federal government, before stopping work"...
Mahallah Workers End Strike, After Written Guarantee of Demands Egyptian Streets ...Workers at Mahallah’s Misr Spinning and Weaving Company ended an 11-day strike Sunday following a written guarantee that they will be granted the 10 percent social allowance promised by the president to be given retroactively starting July. Operations have been “restored fully across all departments,” state-run news agency MENA reported. The company says that the strike has led to losses amounting to at least EGP 25 million...
‘The Nobel Prize Is for Labor Movements around the World’ Solidarity Center ...The Tunisian General Labor Union (Union Générale Tunisienne du Travail, UGTT), a longtime Solidarity Center partner, was at the forefront of the four organizations that recently won the Nobel Peace Prize, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler said today. In a ceremony at the AFL-CIO honoring UGTT Secretary-General Houcine Abassi, Shuler praised Abassi’s courage and tenacity and called the UGTT’s work “inspirational to us in the United States”...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
If Ohio Bans Gerrymandering Today, There Could be Hope for American Democracy The Nation ... Ohio Issue 1, a proposed constitutional amendment to ban partisan gerrymandering and establish a bipartisan Ohio Redistricting Commission to draw legislative district lines, is being pitched as a good-government reform. But that undersells its significance. This is a bold response to America’s broken political processes...
The toxic erosion of voter rights in Alabama Washington Post ...Alabama is one of many states with unnecessary voter ID laws, voter-suppression policies passed on the pretext of preventing virtually nonexistent forms of voter fraud. Last month, the state government made things even worse. Its new budget will make it harder to get a driver’s license...
Tacoma voters to decide whether to raise minimum wage KIRO ... a raise in the city’s minimum wage, and if so, how much it should be raised. Citizens’ Initiative Measure No. 1 and City of Tacoma Initiative Measure No. 1B concern an increase to the minimum wage. The results will be released at about 8:15 p.m. Tuesday. The first question is whether or not to raise the minimum wage. The second question, regardless if you voted yes or no on the first question, is, if the wage is raised, how much to raise it?...
Can Seattle Boot Big Money Out of Elections by Giving Voters "Democracy Vouchers?" Truthout ...A group of campaign reform advocates in the city of Seattle has a novel solution to curb the influence of money in political elections: more money. Today, Seattle voters will decide the fate of the Honest Elections ballot initiative, otherwise known as I-122...
U.S. LABOR
Detroit casino workers support strike option The Detroit News ...More than 1,300 union employees from Detroit’s three casinos voted Monday night to go on strike if their wage, health care and benefit demands aren’t met. Members of Local 24 of the hospitality union voted overwhelmingly to give their leaders the power to call a strike in order to reach a contract settlement...
VW opposing UAW skilled trades worker vote at Tennessee plant Reuters ...Volkswagen AG (VOWG_p.DE) opposes a union representation vote by a portion of workers at the automaker's sole U.S. vehicle assembly plant, according to a letter to Chattanooga, Tennessee, employees issued Monday night. Volkswagen has been the most open to the United Auto Workers (UAW) union among foreign manufacturers with assembly plants in the southern United States...
Chicago Teachers Union amps up rhetoric in fight with district Chicago Tribune ...The Chicago Teachers Union said Monday that it will check members' appetite for a strike with a "practice vote" later this week after the head of Chicago Public Schools again warned of "drastic cuts" absent a state bailout of district finances. Gov. Bruce Rauner also stepped into the fray, saying at a forum in Bloomington that "misguided state policies" were to blame...
For now, Columbia grad students can't form union - NLRB regional director Reuters ...Although a U.S. labor board decision on Friday blocked Columbia University graduate students from trying to form a union, the case could eventually become part of a bid to overturn an 11-year-old prohibition on graduate student unionization. National Labor Relations Board Regional Director Karen Fernbach in New York City rejected a petition from a United Auto Workers affiliate seeking to represent teaching and research assistants at Columbia...
Collective Victory Declared as Obama Takes Small Step to 'Ban the Box' Common Dreams ...Following years of organizing by formerly-incarcerated people and their families, President Barack Obama announced Monday that, henceforth, he will instruct some federal employers to "ban the box"—or delay inquiries into a job applicant's incarceration history to curb discrimination and stigma. The proclamation was embraced by rights campaigners...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Why California Jails Poor People Unless They Pay The Bail Bondsman Think Progress ...California jails could soon stop locking up tens of thousands of people who haven’t even appeared before a judge yet simply because they’re too poor to post bail, if a class-action lawsuit filed Wednesday succeeds. The bail scheduling system converts arrests and criminal allegations into a marketplace...
Seattle Declares Official State Of Emergency Over Homelessness Crisis Think Progress ...66 homeless people have died on the streets of Seattle and the surrounding area this year. Mayor Ed Murray has had enough. On Monday, Murray and King County Executive Down Constantine declared states of emergency in Seattle and the surrounding county...
Monday, November 2, 2015
Today's Teamster News 11.02.15
TEAMSTERS
Teamsters see California as launching pad for drayage organizing efforts JOC ...The Teamsters union is eying California, a state with drivers clamoring for representation and a regulatory climate sympathetic to work misclassification, as a launching pad for a national drayage organizing push. The Teamsters union this past week intensified its organizing efforts in Los Angeles-Long Beach because drivers are clamoring for representation and the regulatory climate in California is favorable to champion issues such as worker misclassification, a union spokeswoman said Friday...
Port Driver and Warehouse Worker Strikes End With $3.5 Million In New Wage Theft Claims AJOT ...After five days of active picketing that dramatically impacted trucking companies and the marine terminal operators that continued to allow the trucks of struck companies into their yards, misclassified “independent contractor” drivers from XPO Logistics, Intermodal Bridge Transport (IBT), and Gold Point Transportation have ended their strike. Amazon warehouse workers employed by Wilmington-based California Cartage also ended their strike with the support of the Teamsters...
LA City Council backs port truck drivers in their strike action SPLASH247 ...Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously on Friday to support the port truck drivers who have been striking since Monday at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, according to Reuters. Council members passed a resolution backing the truckers against certain trucking firms which have allegedly been misclassifying the drivers as “independent contractors” rather than as “employees”. The distinction costs the drivers in earnings and benefits...
Dr Pepper Snapple production workers in Bethlehem vote to join union Morning Call ...Production workers at Dr Pepper Snapple Group in Bethlehem, formerly Davis Beverage Group, have voted to unionize. Glenn Fulcher, vice president of Teamsters Local 830 in Philadelphia, said Friday that 34 workers voted 19-15 on Oct. 9 for union representation. The union is now in contact with Dr Pepper Snapple Group's labor attorney and is in the process of setting up dates for contract negotiations, Fulcher said...
Teamsters Back Patrick Murphy for the Senate in 2016 Sunshine State News ...On Friday, the Florida Teamsters endorsed U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Fla., who is running for the Democratic nomination to replace U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., in 2016. "I'm humbled and excited by the support of the Florida Teamsters,” Murphy said on Friday. “Florida's working families need leadership — from the local level to the U.S. Senate to the White House"...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
US Invites Russia and China to Join TPP Deal - Kerry Sputnik ...The United States invites Russia and China to become part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) free trade agreement if they are open for cooperation, US State Secretary John Kerry said Monday. Countries all over the world, including Russia and China, are welcome to join various US-proposed initiatives, such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, Kerry stated...
US 'welcomes' Thailand to join TPP Bangkok Post ...The United States “would welcome with open arms” Thailand’s ruling junta wanting the country to participate in the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact without waiting for the return of a of a full democratic government to the country, the newly appointed US ambassador to Thailand said on Friday...
German frustration builds over TTIP secrecy from US DW.com ...German parliamentarians are demanding access to documents that contain the US position on transatlantic trade negotiations. TTIP supporters in the US argue that Washington shouldn't lay all of its cards on the table. In Germany, the documents are only available in the US embassy in Berlin...
UK Government austerity programme 'an international embarrassment' News.STV ...UK Government austerity measures are an "international embarrassment", according to the SNP. The comments were made as the United Nations launches an investigation into the impact of Conservative policies on "disadvantaged and marginalised individuals and groups" in the UK...
Petrobras Oil Workers Begin Strike, Seek to Block Asset Sales Bloomberg ...Brazil’s main oil union began a nationwide strike Sunday to halt asset sales by state-controlled Petroleo Brasileiro SA at a time the company is slashing investments to reduce the biggest debt load in the oil industry.
The Oil Workers Federation, known as FUP, said the nationwide strike started on Nov. 1. Some of the FUP’s regional member unions began work stoppages on Oct. 29...
Egyptian textile workers’ strike enters 10th day Middle East Monitor ...The workers’ strike at Egypt’s biggest textile factory has entered its 10th day as the administration threatens to end staff contracts if they do not return to work, Quds Press reported on Friday. In order to return to work, the workers’ have demanded that the company officially agree on payment of a “social allowance” equivalent to a ten per cent addition to their monthly pay...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Wisconsin Poised to Gut Its Campaign Finance and Anti-Corruption Laws Mother Jones ...Scott Walker's presidential bid may have failed, but the Wisconsin governor and his Republican allies are making a massive push to transform the way the state conducts elections and investigates illegal campaign activity. If they're successful—and by all indications, they will be—by the end of this week, they will have uprooted Wisconsin's anti-public corruption laws and lifted restrictions on the money pouring into state elections...
Koch Brothers Hit the Airwaves in Support of Wisconsin Corruption Measures Truthout ...The Koch-backed measures to eviscerate Wisconsin's limits on money in elections and neuter the state's election watchdog hit a stumbling block in the state senate last week, with a handful of Republican senators expressing concern that the measures go too far. So the Kochs are going on the offensive...
Counties experiment with right-to-work laws Washington Examiner ...An experiment in Kentucky could have major implications for workers' rights and union organizing: Can counties and other municipalities pass right-to-work laws? Conservative activists have gotten 12 counties in the Bluegrass State to pass right-to-work ordinances...
Group trying to repeal Michigan prevailing wage law starts new petition drive Detroit Business ...A ballot committee trying to repeal Michigan’s prevailing wage law said Friday it will start a new petition drive after it incorrectly submitted duplicate signatures to state election officials. The committee, Protecting Michigan Taxpayers, also said it asked the Board of State Canvassers to reject the petition it submitted last month to the Michigan Bureau of Elections...
Portland to vote on minimum wage increase tomorrow WCSH ...Starting January the minimum wage in Portland is set to go up to $10.10 an hour. This does not included tipped employees such as servers and bartenders. However on Tuesday, Portland residents will be able to vote to raise the minimum wage even more. Question number one on Tuesday's ballot is whether or not minimum wage should be raised to $15 an hour in the city of Portland...
U.S. LABOR
Steel talks enter 3rd month as USW frustration grows Chicago Tribune ...The rally was held as union steelworkers at ArcelorMittal and U.S. Steel were about to enter into their third month without a new contract and with no sign of any progress being made at the bargaining table in Pittsburgh. The last contract expired Sept. 1, and negotiators for both sides have been meeting since before that. They returned to the table Monday following a short recess...
SEIU reaches new four-year deal for Pittsburgh-area janitors Washington Times ...A union representing more than 1,000 Pittsburgh-area janitors says it has reached a new contract agreement with office building owners. The current contract is set to expire at midnight Saturday. The new, four-year deal runs through Oct. 31, 2019. The Managers, Owners and Contractors Association began negotiating with the janitors’ Service Employees International Union bargaining committee last month...
UAW members in Fairfax, Lansing split on GM contract The Detroit News ...Thousands of General Motors Co. hourly workers will vote Monday on a tentative agreement, which financially is richer than the company’s 2011 contract and what Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV employees ratified, but so far has received mixed support from UAW members at two GM assembly plants...
Milwaukie ratifies contract with AFSCME employees Portland Tribune ...With a unanimous City Council vote, the city of Milwaukie finalized the contract with its employee union on Thursday after city workers had been working with an expired contract since July 1. Although to Local 350-5 already had been making more than $15 hourly, they are also celebrating Milwaukie City Council’s Oct. 20 passage of a resolution to pay all city employees at least $15 an hour...
After Defending His Own Family Time, Paul Ryan Refuses To Support Paid Family Leave Think Progress ...On a number of Sunday shows this weekend, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) responded to recent calls that he support a federal paid family leave program after insisting on preserving his own family. The new speaker of the House made it clear that he won’t back such a policy. In order to consider a run, as many in his party had urged, he had laid out a number of conditions, including the protection of the weekends he flies back to Wisconsin...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Immigrants Launch Hunger Strike At Detention Center With Long History Of Abuse: ‘We Are Humans’ Think Progress ...At least 20 male immigrants, mainly from Central America, began a hunger strike at an adult immigration detention facility in California on Friday night, according to the advocacy group Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC). The hunger strike at the Adelanto Detention Facility is the fourth one launched by immigrant detainees across the nation...
Robert Reich: Everywhere You Look Huge Cartels Are Jacking Up Prices, Gouging You However They Can Alternet ...Much of the national debate about widening inequality focuses on whether and how much to tax the rich and redistribute their income downward. But this debate ignores the upward redistributions going on every day, from the rest of us to the rich. These redistributions are hidden inside the market...
Republicans 'cautious' about confronting Black Lives Matter on campaign trail The Guardian ...There are few areas of bipartisan consensus in the 2016 presidential election. Criminal justice has emerged as one. Republicans and Democrats are agreed: reform needs to happen. However, as the Black Lives Matter movement seeks a greater role in shaping the conversation around a justice system that disproportionately affects African Americans, candidates are reacting in decidedly different ways...
More Denial, More Problems: UN Predicts Millions of Climate Refugees to Come Truthout ...This year continues on pace to become, by far, the hottest year ever recorded. Thus, it is obvious why the dramatic impacts of anthropogenic climate disruption (ACD) are becoming increasingly prevalent and obvious. A recent NASA report reveals that the ice covering Greenland is melting faster than previously thought...
'Absolute Crap' But Brilliant: Corporate America's Plan to 'Misbehave Without Reproach Common Dreams ...An independent investigation by journalists featured in the New York Times on Sunday offers an in-depth look at the way American corporations have used the inclusion of "arbitration clauses" within consumer contracts to strategically circumvent judicial review of their behavior and immunize themselves from class action lawsuits –"realistically the only tool citizens have to fight illegal or deceitful business practices"...
For Some Americans, the Housing Crisis Isn't Over The Atlantic ...the housing markets in many of the hardest-hit areas have recovered, and cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York are even seeing record real-estate prices. Yet while the national housing market may be well on the way to recovery, the markets in some areas of the country are actually getting worse...
Teamsters see California as launching pad for drayage organizing efforts JOC ...The Teamsters union is eying California, a state with drivers clamoring for representation and a regulatory climate sympathetic to work misclassification, as a launching pad for a national drayage organizing push. The Teamsters union this past week intensified its organizing efforts in Los Angeles-Long Beach because drivers are clamoring for representation and the regulatory climate in California is favorable to champion issues such as worker misclassification, a union spokeswoman said Friday...
Port Driver and Warehouse Worker Strikes End With $3.5 Million In New Wage Theft Claims AJOT ...After five days of active picketing that dramatically impacted trucking companies and the marine terminal operators that continued to allow the trucks of struck companies into their yards, misclassified “independent contractor” drivers from XPO Logistics, Intermodal Bridge Transport (IBT), and Gold Point Transportation have ended their strike. Amazon warehouse workers employed by Wilmington-based California Cartage also ended their strike with the support of the Teamsters...
LA City Council backs port truck drivers in their strike action SPLASH247 ...Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously on Friday to support the port truck drivers who have been striking since Monday at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, according to Reuters. Council members passed a resolution backing the truckers against certain trucking firms which have allegedly been misclassifying the drivers as “independent contractors” rather than as “employees”. The distinction costs the drivers in earnings and benefits...
Dr Pepper Snapple production workers in Bethlehem vote to join union Morning Call ...Production workers at Dr Pepper Snapple Group in Bethlehem, formerly Davis Beverage Group, have voted to unionize. Glenn Fulcher, vice president of Teamsters Local 830 in Philadelphia, said Friday that 34 workers voted 19-15 on Oct. 9 for union representation. The union is now in contact with Dr Pepper Snapple Group's labor attorney and is in the process of setting up dates for contract negotiations, Fulcher said...
Teamsters Back Patrick Murphy for the Senate in 2016 Sunshine State News ...On Friday, the Florida Teamsters endorsed U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Fla., who is running for the Democratic nomination to replace U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., in 2016. "I'm humbled and excited by the support of the Florida Teamsters,” Murphy said on Friday. “Florida's working families need leadership — from the local level to the U.S. Senate to the White House"...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
US Invites Russia and China to Join TPP Deal - Kerry Sputnik ...The United States invites Russia and China to become part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) free trade agreement if they are open for cooperation, US State Secretary John Kerry said Monday. Countries all over the world, including Russia and China, are welcome to join various US-proposed initiatives, such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, Kerry stated...
US 'welcomes' Thailand to join TPP Bangkok Post ...The United States “would welcome with open arms” Thailand’s ruling junta wanting the country to participate in the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact without waiting for the return of a of a full democratic government to the country, the newly appointed US ambassador to Thailand said on Friday...
German frustration builds over TTIP secrecy from US DW.com ...German parliamentarians are demanding access to documents that contain the US position on transatlantic trade negotiations. TTIP supporters in the US argue that Washington shouldn't lay all of its cards on the table. In Germany, the documents are only available in the US embassy in Berlin...
UK Government austerity programme 'an international embarrassment' News.STV ...UK Government austerity measures are an "international embarrassment", according to the SNP. The comments were made as the United Nations launches an investigation into the impact of Conservative policies on "disadvantaged and marginalised individuals and groups" in the UK...
Petrobras Oil Workers Begin Strike, Seek to Block Asset Sales Bloomberg ...Brazil’s main oil union began a nationwide strike Sunday to halt asset sales by state-controlled Petroleo Brasileiro SA at a time the company is slashing investments to reduce the biggest debt load in the oil industry.
The Oil Workers Federation, known as FUP, said the nationwide strike started on Nov. 1. Some of the FUP’s regional member unions began work stoppages on Oct. 29...
Egyptian textile workers’ strike enters 10th day Middle East Monitor ...The workers’ strike at Egypt’s biggest textile factory has entered its 10th day as the administration threatens to end staff contracts if they do not return to work, Quds Press reported on Friday. In order to return to work, the workers’ have demanded that the company officially agree on payment of a “social allowance” equivalent to a ten per cent addition to their monthly pay...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Wisconsin Poised to Gut Its Campaign Finance and Anti-Corruption Laws Mother Jones ...Scott Walker's presidential bid may have failed, but the Wisconsin governor and his Republican allies are making a massive push to transform the way the state conducts elections and investigates illegal campaign activity. If they're successful—and by all indications, they will be—by the end of this week, they will have uprooted Wisconsin's anti-public corruption laws and lifted restrictions on the money pouring into state elections...
Koch Brothers Hit the Airwaves in Support of Wisconsin Corruption Measures Truthout ...The Koch-backed measures to eviscerate Wisconsin's limits on money in elections and neuter the state's election watchdog hit a stumbling block in the state senate last week, with a handful of Republican senators expressing concern that the measures go too far. So the Kochs are going on the offensive...
Counties experiment with right-to-work laws Washington Examiner ...An experiment in Kentucky could have major implications for workers' rights and union organizing: Can counties and other municipalities pass right-to-work laws? Conservative activists have gotten 12 counties in the Bluegrass State to pass right-to-work ordinances...
Group trying to repeal Michigan prevailing wage law starts new petition drive Detroit Business ...A ballot committee trying to repeal Michigan’s prevailing wage law said Friday it will start a new petition drive after it incorrectly submitted duplicate signatures to state election officials. The committee, Protecting Michigan Taxpayers, also said it asked the Board of State Canvassers to reject the petition it submitted last month to the Michigan Bureau of Elections...
Portland to vote on minimum wage increase tomorrow WCSH ...Starting January the minimum wage in Portland is set to go up to $10.10 an hour. This does not included tipped employees such as servers and bartenders. However on Tuesday, Portland residents will be able to vote to raise the minimum wage even more. Question number one on Tuesday's ballot is whether or not minimum wage should be raised to $15 an hour in the city of Portland...
U.S. LABOR
Steel talks enter 3rd month as USW frustration grows Chicago Tribune ...The rally was held as union steelworkers at ArcelorMittal and U.S. Steel were about to enter into their third month without a new contract and with no sign of any progress being made at the bargaining table in Pittsburgh. The last contract expired Sept. 1, and negotiators for both sides have been meeting since before that. They returned to the table Monday following a short recess...
SEIU reaches new four-year deal for Pittsburgh-area janitors Washington Times ...A union representing more than 1,000 Pittsburgh-area janitors says it has reached a new contract agreement with office building owners. The current contract is set to expire at midnight Saturday. The new, four-year deal runs through Oct. 31, 2019. The Managers, Owners and Contractors Association began negotiating with the janitors’ Service Employees International Union bargaining committee last month...
UAW members in Fairfax, Lansing split on GM contract The Detroit News ...Thousands of General Motors Co. hourly workers will vote Monday on a tentative agreement, which financially is richer than the company’s 2011 contract and what Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV employees ratified, but so far has received mixed support from UAW members at two GM assembly plants...
Milwaukie ratifies contract with AFSCME employees Portland Tribune ...With a unanimous City Council vote, the city of Milwaukie finalized the contract with its employee union on Thursday after city workers had been working with an expired contract since July 1. Although to Local 350-5 already had been making more than $15 hourly, they are also celebrating Milwaukie City Council’s Oct. 20 passage of a resolution to pay all city employees at least $15 an hour...
After Defending His Own Family Time, Paul Ryan Refuses To Support Paid Family Leave Think Progress ...On a number of Sunday shows this weekend, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) responded to recent calls that he support a federal paid family leave program after insisting on preserving his own family. The new speaker of the House made it clear that he won’t back such a policy. In order to consider a run, as many in his party had urged, he had laid out a number of conditions, including the protection of the weekends he flies back to Wisconsin...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Immigrants Launch Hunger Strike At Detention Center With Long History Of Abuse: ‘We Are Humans’ Think Progress ...At least 20 male immigrants, mainly from Central America, began a hunger strike at an adult immigration detention facility in California on Friday night, according to the advocacy group Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC). The hunger strike at the Adelanto Detention Facility is the fourth one launched by immigrant detainees across the nation...
Robert Reich: Everywhere You Look Huge Cartels Are Jacking Up Prices, Gouging You However They Can Alternet ...Much of the national debate about widening inequality focuses on whether and how much to tax the rich and redistribute their income downward. But this debate ignores the upward redistributions going on every day, from the rest of us to the rich. These redistributions are hidden inside the market...
Republicans 'cautious' about confronting Black Lives Matter on campaign trail The Guardian ...There are few areas of bipartisan consensus in the 2016 presidential election. Criminal justice has emerged as one. Republicans and Democrats are agreed: reform needs to happen. However, as the Black Lives Matter movement seeks a greater role in shaping the conversation around a justice system that disproportionately affects African Americans, candidates are reacting in decidedly different ways...
More Denial, More Problems: UN Predicts Millions of Climate Refugees to Come Truthout ...This year continues on pace to become, by far, the hottest year ever recorded. Thus, it is obvious why the dramatic impacts of anthropogenic climate disruption (ACD) are becoming increasingly prevalent and obvious. A recent NASA report reveals that the ice covering Greenland is melting faster than previously thought...
'Absolute Crap' But Brilliant: Corporate America's Plan to 'Misbehave Without Reproach Common Dreams ...An independent investigation by journalists featured in the New York Times on Sunday offers an in-depth look at the way American corporations have used the inclusion of "arbitration clauses" within consumer contracts to strategically circumvent judicial review of their behavior and immunize themselves from class action lawsuits –"realistically the only tool citizens have to fight illegal or deceitful business practices"...
For Some Americans, the Housing Crisis Isn't Over The Atlantic ...the housing markets in many of the hardest-hit areas have recovered, and cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York are even seeing record real-estate prices. Yet while the national housing market may be well on the way to recovery, the markets in some areas of the country are actually getting worse...
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Hoffa joins port truck drivers on SoCal picket line
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| Teamsters General President Hoffa speaks during press conference. |
Hoffa walked the picket line during the second day of an unfair labor practice walkout against Pacific 9 Transportation and XPO Logistics, which have continually engaged in misclassification, retaliation, harassment and intimidation against their workers for having filed wage theft claims with the California Labor Commissioner's Division of Labor Standards Enforcement.
Hoffa said:
We have already organized hundreds of port drivers. We have a lot of work to do. Yesterday I sat down with 40 drivers – and they told me how there is no dignity, favoritism, no seniority, and that it has got to end. Most of America doesn’t understand what independent contractors are. Wage theft ends here today.
 |
| Workers walk the picket line at the Port of Long Beach. |
After all, misclassification doesn't just hurt the workers and their families, it effects all Americans through pervasive and wide scale tax fraud that robs schools, roads and public safety services of billions in essential resources.
The plight of port truck drivers is being heard, however. Earlier this month, Local 848 member Alex Paz attended a White House forum and spoke out against wage theft. He told attendees how before he was hired as a full-time worker, he often didn't earn enough to support his family.
Friday, October 16, 2015
It's time to tamp down on law-breaking employers
Low-wage workers struggle for dignity on the job everyday. Not only do they have to put up with the dismal salaries they earn, but many have to fight to just to get all the money owed to them in their paychecks.As this blog has noted many times, port truck drivers struggle with wage theft, and the Teamsters are fighting on their behalf. But across other sectors of the economy, workers continue to suffer, many of them in silence. And that not only hurt those families, but America as well.
The latest example is four current and former Papa John's franchisees in New York City, who agreed to pay out nearly $500,000 to their workers to settle a wage theft probe brought by state and federal officials. Employees at nine restaurants in Queens, the Bronx and Brooklyn were affected.
It's a continuing problem not only for Papa John's, but the fast food industry as a whole, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said:
Once again, we’ve found Papa John’s franchises in New York that are ripping off their workers and violating critical state and federal laws. Fast food chains across the State should be on notice: we will not stop until your workers are treated with respect and paid lawful wages. Once again, I call on Papa John’s and other fast food companies to step up and stop the widespread lawlessness plaguing your businesses and harming the workers who make and deliver your food.
David Weil, administrator of the U.S. Department of Labor's wage and hour division, explains why such practices jeopardize businesses:
Employers who underpay their employees not only deprive workers of the funds needed to buy their food, pay their rent or attend to other necessities, they undercut those law-abiding employers who pay their employees properly in the first place
Wage theft is a significant issue in this country today. That's why the Teamsters included it in its "Let's Get America Working" platform. Why should everyday Americans suffer while corporations rake in huge profits? They shouldn't.
If policymakers and the private sector truly want to get the U.S. back on track, they'll do what's right and create a system that works for everyone.
Thursday, October 8, 2015
Talking wage theft at the White House
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| Alex Paz |
I talked about what it is like to be a misclassified driver, what it is like to go home without a paycheck. What it's like to be charged by a company to rent your truck, for registration, parking, tires, insurance. And what it's like to go home with a negative paycheck and tell your wife, 'I don't have any money to sustain the family.'Paz, a member of Local 848, took part in a panel on organizing during the White House Summit on Worker Voice. He said he and other participants were encouraged that President Obama and administration members issued their support for unions during the event.
But there is a lot of hard work that goes into increasing union membership. Paz said he got involved with the port campaign in June 2013, and since then has seen a dramatic improvement in conditions at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. That said, wage theft and unfair treatment remains a reality for all too many port truck drivers not only in Southern California where Paz resides, but across the country as well.
Nick Weiner, port campaign director for the Teamsters, said it is time more companies recognize the tide is turning against them:
Alex's opportunity to speak at the White House yesterday is an indication of the incredible progress and transformation we've been able to achieve collective as drivers over the last couple of years and accomplish the impossible. No one believed that trucking companies at the port would acknowledge that their drivers are employees. But today their are 500 Teamster port drives at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.
Thursday, September 17, 2015
Today's Teamster News 09.17.15
Teamsters
Bipartisan Coalition Upholds Gov. Nixon Veto of Right-to-Work in Victory for Working Families Teamster.org ...Today, a bipartisan group of state legislators in the Missouri House and Senate came together to protect working families by voting to sustain Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto of so-called right-to-work legislation. “I would like to thank the state legislators who put aside their partisan differences and came together to uphold Gov. Nixon’s veto,” said Teamsters General President James P. Hoffa...
Teamsters Support Murray-Scott Legislation to Strengthen Worker Protections Under NLRA Teamster.org ...The Teamsters applaud today’s introduction of the Workplace Action for a Growing Economy (WAGE) Act by Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) and Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA). The WAGE Act is a positive step forward, addressing the shortcomings of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) in the areas of workers protections and penalties for employers that violate workers’ rights...
Tucson bus strike ends after union vote Arizona Daily Star ...The 42-day Tucson bus strike ended Wednesday when drivers, mechanics and other members of Teamsters Local 104 voted to accept a new contract. The vote was 351-41, an 89 percent approval, said Teamsters Local 104 President Andy Marshall. Everyone gets a raise under the new contract, he said, but he wouldn’t release contract details, saying he didn’t want to inflame opinions...
Bus Strike Ends! The Teamsters Approve Sun Tran's Two-Year Deal Tucson Weekly ...With a vote of 351 to 41, the bus drivers and mechanics who have been picketing for six weeks approved a deal between the Teamsters Local Union 104 and Professional Transit Management—the company contracted by the city of Tucson to oversee Sun Tran. The two had reached a tentative agreement early Wednesday morning...
Global Labor & Trade
Obama upbeat on prospects for Pacific trade deal Reuters ...U.S. President Barack Obama said on Wednesday he was confident Pacific Rim nations could nail down an agreement on a free-trade pact this year although approval by the U.S. Congress was not guaranteed. Speaking to a group of corporate executives, Obama said trade ministers should soon have an opportunity to close a deal on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership...
Ministers to reconvene TPP talks in late September Japan Times ...Ministers from 12 Pacific Rim countries will meet in late September in Atlanta as they look to conclude years of negotiations on creating one of the world’s biggest free-trade zones, negotiation sources said Thursday. A meeting of chief negotiators from the United States, Japan, Canada and nine other member countries involved in the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership talks will begin from Sept. 26...
Final push for Pacific Rim pact set for end of September Globe and Mail ...An effort to land a massive Pacific Rim free trade agreement within weeks is under way, raising the prospect the wide-ranging Trans-Pacific Partnership could dominate the final stretch of the Canadian election campaign. Chief negotiators for the 12 countries involved, including Canada, will begin meeting in Atlanta on Sept. 26...
Chilean Airport Workers Strike, Leave Thousands Stranded Aviation Pros ...On the heels of strikes in throughout Europe last month and Seattle just last week, Chilean airport workers have begun a 24-hour strike that has left an estimated 70,000 travelers stranded in the South American country, according to a report from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The airport strike is led by air traffic controllers and ground support staff demanding better retirement benefits...
Worker Rights under Siege at Oil Refinery in Kyrgyzstan Solidarity Center ...The recent firing of a union leader at a Chinese-owned oil refinery in Kyrgyzstan is the company’s latest attempt in the past two years to prevent workers from forming a union, according to the global union IndustriALL and workers. Zhanaydar Ahmetov, leader of the trade union committee at China Petrol Company Zhongda was fired and locked out of the plant on August 29, the second union leader dismissed in two years, factory workers say...
Border Force workers strike over wages Daily Mail ...Strikes by Department of Immigration and Border Protection employees are expected to cause a week of disruptions at international and domestic airports across the country. The employees, including those from Border Force, began the protected industrial action in Queensland, Northern Territory and Western Australia on Wednesday and plan more until Wednesday next week. The action comes as Community and Public Sector Union members vote on a proposed enterprise agreement...
State & Living Wage Battles
'Right to work' measure dies in Missouri House St. Louis Post-Dispatch ...Applause erupted in the the House chamber Wednesday as Republican leaders' goal to make Missouri the 26th "right to work" state died when members failed to vote to override Gov. Jay Nixon's veto. The measure, which prohibits companies from requiring union membership or dues as conditions of employment, was pushed through the legislative session in May as Republicans used aggressive tactics...
Union members relieved after right-to-work legislation fails Columbia Missourian ...The Missouri House of Representatives voted 96-63 to uphold the governor's veto, falling 13 votes short of an override. House Bill 116 would have made it illegal for employers to require employees to join a union as a condition of employment. The victory for organized labor was watched closely nationwide. The bill would have made Missouri the 26th right-to-work state in the country, and its failure was cheered by dozens of union members in the House galleries...
Oregon's minimum wage will stay $9.25 in 2016 KATU ...Oregon's minimum wage will stay the same in 2016. The wage is re-calculated each year because of a state law passed by voters in 2002 that ties it to inflation. The wage will remain stuck at $9.25 this January because it is pegged to the Consumer Price Index, which showed little inflation, Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian said Wednesday. The Legislature considered several bills earlier this year that would have raised the minimum wage — each lacked sufficient support...
Missouri legislators block cities from raising minimum wage Business Journal ...Missouri legislators voted Wednesday to override Gov. Jay Nixon's veto of a measure to stop municipalities from raising minimum wages above the ceiling set by the state. The Missouri House voted 114-46, and later in the day the Senate voted 23-9 to override the veto. That exceeded the two-thirds majority needed to override the Democratic governor's July veto of House Bill 722...
California Workers Could See More Protection Against Wage Theft RH Reality Check ...While California has some of the strongest wage theft laws in the country, regulators have little authority to enforce those laws. That may change after a bill passed last week by the Democratic-led state legislature. SB 588, sponsored by Sen. Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles), would give the California labor commissioner such authority...
Bill seeks to raise minimum wage to $15 per hour in Florida Click Orlando ...As the debate over minimum wage continues across the country, two local bills could soon change the minimum wage in Florida. Two Florida state senators on Thursday will call on legislators to sign bills that would raise the minimum wage in the state to $15 per hour. Both bills would nearly double the state's current minimum wage, which is $8.05...
U.S. Labor
Seattle teachers back in the classroom after tentative deal ends strike Daily Kos ...Seattle teachers went back to work Wednesday to prepare for schools to open on Thursday after the Seattle Education Association and school district management reached a tentative deal to end the teachers strike that delayed the scheduled start of the school year. The teachers were pushing for improved pay after six years without a cost of living increase, as well as for mandatory recess, equity teams in all schools, and limits on the influence of standardized testing...
FCA-UAW contract sets new wage range for 2nd tier Detroit Free Press ...Both new and longtime autoworkers at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles represented by the UAW will receive wage increases under a new four-year contract if they vote to ratify it in the coming weeks, the Free Press has learned. A new tentative agreement between the UAW and Fiat Chrysler would set a new wage range for entry-level workers of more than $17 an hour to more than $25 per hour over a period of several years...
Healthcare Workers at Chapman Global Medical Center Vote to Join SEIU-UHW OC Weekly ...In a surprisingly quick campaign, hundreds of healthcare workers at Chapman Global Medical Center in Orange decided to unionize. The vote to join the Service Employee International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW) passed Tuesday by a dominating three-to-one margin. Two-hundred and twenty nurses, cooks, medical records clerks, janitors and others will now experience the benefits of being in a union...
Labor law has been frozen for 60 years. Democrats are trying to crack it open. Washington Post ...A new attempt by Democrats to boost worker bargaining power has a lot of failure behind it. The American workplace has changed a whole lot over the past half century. But the major law that governs how workers and employees interact — the National Labor Relations Act — has been essentially frozen since 1947, when the law was reformed to constrain worker power. Liberal legislators are trying to make the law a tool for collective action again...
How Unions Boost Democratic Participation American Prospect ...As part of ongoing research, James Feigenbaum, an economics PhD candidate at Harvard, ran a regression using American National Election Studies data suggesting that union members are about 4 percentage points more likely to vote and 3 points more likely to register (after controlling for demographic factors) and individuals living in a union household are 2.5 points more likely to vote and register...
America’s Poverty Problem Hasn’t Changed The Atlantic ...On Wednesday, the Census Bureau released its latest data on income and poverty for the country, and despite a falling unemployment rate and a rising GDP—two promising macroeconomic signs—things haven’t improved all that much for American families in the past year. America’s poverty problem is basically the same. So the biggest news in the data dump was the shifting methodology behind it all...
Social Justice & Other News
'Perilously' Outdated Voting Machines Threaten 2016 Election, Report Finds Common Dreams ...Electronic voting machines in 43 states are at least a decade old, "perilously close to the end of most systems' expected lifespan," and could pose a risk to the 2016 election, a new study from the the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law finds. After a 10 month probe that included interviews with over 100 election officials and experts in every state, the investigators concluded that the threat also extends to "significant percentages of machines" in swing states...
#NoHateDebate: GOP candidates met with protest over their anti-immigrant rants RT ...Hours before Republican presidential candidates are to clash in a televised debate, dozens of protesters rallied in Los Angeles to express their anger over GOP rhetoric on immigration. The rally occupied streets near the Ronald Reagan Library, where the debate is to start at 8 p.m. EST. Some of the protesters got their anger out on a giant effigy of the leading candidate Donald Trump, slapping and punching it...
Many Jails Are Illegal Debtors' Prisons Truthout ...Congress outlawed debtors' prisons nearly 200 years ago. Since then, federal courts have made it clear that indigent people can not be jailed for being unable to pay legal debts. Still, legal advocates estimate that thousands of low-income people in the South and across the United States are illegally jailed every year because they are unable to pay off legal debts to municipal courts, even when they are trying hard to do so. Debtors' prison practices have an especially heavy impact on communities of color...
Arrest of Muslim Teen for Bringing Clock to School 'Inevitable Byproduct of Culture of Fear' Common Dreams ...A Muslim teen with dreams of becoming an engineer brought a clock he made to his Texas high school on Monday. Then this happened: the teen, 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed, sporting a NASA t-shirt, was arrested, handcuffed, and suspended for three days. The ACLU says the arrest has sparked questions about racial profiling...
Huckabee Says Kim Davis Should Be Able To Discriminate Because Muslim Inmates Can Grow Beards Think Progress ...Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has been the most vocal supporter of Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk jailed for refusing to issue same-sex marriages licenses. He has said he would go to jail on her behalf and has used her situation to argue for strengthening “religious liberty.” But during Wednesday night’s GOP debate, he proved he doesn’t actually understand the meaning of religious freedom...
Bipartisan Coalition Upholds Gov. Nixon Veto of Right-to-Work in Victory for Working Families Teamster.org ...Today, a bipartisan group of state legislators in the Missouri House and Senate came together to protect working families by voting to sustain Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto of so-called right-to-work legislation. “I would like to thank the state legislators who put aside their partisan differences and came together to uphold Gov. Nixon’s veto,” said Teamsters General President James P. Hoffa...
Teamsters Support Murray-Scott Legislation to Strengthen Worker Protections Under NLRA Teamster.org ...The Teamsters applaud today’s introduction of the Workplace Action for a Growing Economy (WAGE) Act by Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) and Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA). The WAGE Act is a positive step forward, addressing the shortcomings of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) in the areas of workers protections and penalties for employers that violate workers’ rights...
Tucson bus strike ends after union vote Arizona Daily Star ...The 42-day Tucson bus strike ended Wednesday when drivers, mechanics and other members of Teamsters Local 104 voted to accept a new contract. The vote was 351-41, an 89 percent approval, said Teamsters Local 104 President Andy Marshall. Everyone gets a raise under the new contract, he said, but he wouldn’t release contract details, saying he didn’t want to inflame opinions...
Bus Strike Ends! The Teamsters Approve Sun Tran's Two-Year Deal Tucson Weekly ...With a vote of 351 to 41, the bus drivers and mechanics who have been picketing for six weeks approved a deal between the Teamsters Local Union 104 and Professional Transit Management—the company contracted by the city of Tucson to oversee Sun Tran. The two had reached a tentative agreement early Wednesday morning...
Global Labor & Trade
Obama upbeat on prospects for Pacific trade deal Reuters ...U.S. President Barack Obama said on Wednesday he was confident Pacific Rim nations could nail down an agreement on a free-trade pact this year although approval by the U.S. Congress was not guaranteed. Speaking to a group of corporate executives, Obama said trade ministers should soon have an opportunity to close a deal on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership...
Ministers to reconvene TPP talks in late September Japan Times ...Ministers from 12 Pacific Rim countries will meet in late September in Atlanta as they look to conclude years of negotiations on creating one of the world’s biggest free-trade zones, negotiation sources said Thursday. A meeting of chief negotiators from the United States, Japan, Canada and nine other member countries involved in the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership talks will begin from Sept. 26...
Final push for Pacific Rim pact set for end of September Globe and Mail ...An effort to land a massive Pacific Rim free trade agreement within weeks is under way, raising the prospect the wide-ranging Trans-Pacific Partnership could dominate the final stretch of the Canadian election campaign. Chief negotiators for the 12 countries involved, including Canada, will begin meeting in Atlanta on Sept. 26...
Chilean Airport Workers Strike, Leave Thousands Stranded Aviation Pros ...On the heels of strikes in throughout Europe last month and Seattle just last week, Chilean airport workers have begun a 24-hour strike that has left an estimated 70,000 travelers stranded in the South American country, according to a report from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The airport strike is led by air traffic controllers and ground support staff demanding better retirement benefits...
Worker Rights under Siege at Oil Refinery in Kyrgyzstan Solidarity Center ...The recent firing of a union leader at a Chinese-owned oil refinery in Kyrgyzstan is the company’s latest attempt in the past two years to prevent workers from forming a union, according to the global union IndustriALL and workers. Zhanaydar Ahmetov, leader of the trade union committee at China Petrol Company Zhongda was fired and locked out of the plant on August 29, the second union leader dismissed in two years, factory workers say...
Border Force workers strike over wages Daily Mail ...Strikes by Department of Immigration and Border Protection employees are expected to cause a week of disruptions at international and domestic airports across the country. The employees, including those from Border Force, began the protected industrial action in Queensland, Northern Territory and Western Australia on Wednesday and plan more until Wednesday next week. The action comes as Community and Public Sector Union members vote on a proposed enterprise agreement...
State & Living Wage Battles
'Right to work' measure dies in Missouri House St. Louis Post-Dispatch ...Applause erupted in the the House chamber Wednesday as Republican leaders' goal to make Missouri the 26th "right to work" state died when members failed to vote to override Gov. Jay Nixon's veto. The measure, which prohibits companies from requiring union membership or dues as conditions of employment, was pushed through the legislative session in May as Republicans used aggressive tactics...
Union members relieved after right-to-work legislation fails Columbia Missourian ...The Missouri House of Representatives voted 96-63 to uphold the governor's veto, falling 13 votes short of an override. House Bill 116 would have made it illegal for employers to require employees to join a union as a condition of employment. The victory for organized labor was watched closely nationwide. The bill would have made Missouri the 26th right-to-work state in the country, and its failure was cheered by dozens of union members in the House galleries...
Oregon's minimum wage will stay $9.25 in 2016 KATU ...Oregon's minimum wage will stay the same in 2016. The wage is re-calculated each year because of a state law passed by voters in 2002 that ties it to inflation. The wage will remain stuck at $9.25 this January because it is pegged to the Consumer Price Index, which showed little inflation, Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian said Wednesday. The Legislature considered several bills earlier this year that would have raised the minimum wage — each lacked sufficient support...
Missouri legislators block cities from raising minimum wage Business Journal ...Missouri legislators voted Wednesday to override Gov. Jay Nixon's veto of a measure to stop municipalities from raising minimum wages above the ceiling set by the state. The Missouri House voted 114-46, and later in the day the Senate voted 23-9 to override the veto. That exceeded the two-thirds majority needed to override the Democratic governor's July veto of House Bill 722...
California Workers Could See More Protection Against Wage Theft RH Reality Check ...While California has some of the strongest wage theft laws in the country, regulators have little authority to enforce those laws. That may change after a bill passed last week by the Democratic-led state legislature. SB 588, sponsored by Sen. Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles), would give the California labor commissioner such authority...
Bill seeks to raise minimum wage to $15 per hour in Florida Click Orlando ...As the debate over minimum wage continues across the country, two local bills could soon change the minimum wage in Florida. Two Florida state senators on Thursday will call on legislators to sign bills that would raise the minimum wage in the state to $15 per hour. Both bills would nearly double the state's current minimum wage, which is $8.05...
U.S. Labor
Seattle teachers back in the classroom after tentative deal ends strike Daily Kos ...Seattle teachers went back to work Wednesday to prepare for schools to open on Thursday after the Seattle Education Association and school district management reached a tentative deal to end the teachers strike that delayed the scheduled start of the school year. The teachers were pushing for improved pay after six years without a cost of living increase, as well as for mandatory recess, equity teams in all schools, and limits on the influence of standardized testing...
FCA-UAW contract sets new wage range for 2nd tier Detroit Free Press ...Both new and longtime autoworkers at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles represented by the UAW will receive wage increases under a new four-year contract if they vote to ratify it in the coming weeks, the Free Press has learned. A new tentative agreement between the UAW and Fiat Chrysler would set a new wage range for entry-level workers of more than $17 an hour to more than $25 per hour over a period of several years...
Healthcare Workers at Chapman Global Medical Center Vote to Join SEIU-UHW OC Weekly ...In a surprisingly quick campaign, hundreds of healthcare workers at Chapman Global Medical Center in Orange decided to unionize. The vote to join the Service Employee International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW) passed Tuesday by a dominating three-to-one margin. Two-hundred and twenty nurses, cooks, medical records clerks, janitors and others will now experience the benefits of being in a union...
Labor law has been frozen for 60 years. Democrats are trying to crack it open. Washington Post ...A new attempt by Democrats to boost worker bargaining power has a lot of failure behind it. The American workplace has changed a whole lot over the past half century. But the major law that governs how workers and employees interact — the National Labor Relations Act — has been essentially frozen since 1947, when the law was reformed to constrain worker power. Liberal legislators are trying to make the law a tool for collective action again...
How Unions Boost Democratic Participation American Prospect ...As part of ongoing research, James Feigenbaum, an economics PhD candidate at Harvard, ran a regression using American National Election Studies data suggesting that union members are about 4 percentage points more likely to vote and 3 points more likely to register (after controlling for demographic factors) and individuals living in a union household are 2.5 points more likely to vote and register...
America’s Poverty Problem Hasn’t Changed The Atlantic ...On Wednesday, the Census Bureau released its latest data on income and poverty for the country, and despite a falling unemployment rate and a rising GDP—two promising macroeconomic signs—things haven’t improved all that much for American families in the past year. America’s poverty problem is basically the same. So the biggest news in the data dump was the shifting methodology behind it all...
Social Justice & Other News
'Perilously' Outdated Voting Machines Threaten 2016 Election, Report Finds Common Dreams ...Electronic voting machines in 43 states are at least a decade old, "perilously close to the end of most systems' expected lifespan," and could pose a risk to the 2016 election, a new study from the the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law finds. After a 10 month probe that included interviews with over 100 election officials and experts in every state, the investigators concluded that the threat also extends to "significant percentages of machines" in swing states...
#NoHateDebate: GOP candidates met with protest over their anti-immigrant rants RT ...Hours before Republican presidential candidates are to clash in a televised debate, dozens of protesters rallied in Los Angeles to express their anger over GOP rhetoric on immigration. The rally occupied streets near the Ronald Reagan Library, where the debate is to start at 8 p.m. EST. Some of the protesters got their anger out on a giant effigy of the leading candidate Donald Trump, slapping and punching it...
Many Jails Are Illegal Debtors' Prisons Truthout ...Congress outlawed debtors' prisons nearly 200 years ago. Since then, federal courts have made it clear that indigent people can not be jailed for being unable to pay legal debts. Still, legal advocates estimate that thousands of low-income people in the South and across the United States are illegally jailed every year because they are unable to pay off legal debts to municipal courts, even when they are trying hard to do so. Debtors' prison practices have an especially heavy impact on communities of color...
Arrest of Muslim Teen for Bringing Clock to School 'Inevitable Byproduct of Culture of Fear' Common Dreams ...A Muslim teen with dreams of becoming an engineer brought a clock he made to his Texas high school on Monday. Then this happened: the teen, 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed, sporting a NASA t-shirt, was arrested, handcuffed, and suspended for three days. The ACLU says the arrest has sparked questions about racial profiling...
Huckabee Says Kim Davis Should Be Able To Discriminate Because Muslim Inmates Can Grow Beards Think Progress ...Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has been the most vocal supporter of Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk jailed for refusing to issue same-sex marriages licenses. He has said he would go to jail on her behalf and has used her situation to argue for strengthening “religious liberty.” But during Wednesday night’s GOP debate, he proved he doesn’t actually understand the meaning of religious freedom...
Wednesday, September 16, 2015
Today's Teamster News 09.16.15
Teamsters
Labor Department Awards Teamsters $4.6 Million Training Grant Teamster.org ...The Teamsters Safety and Health Department has been awarded a $4.6 million grant by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) to establish apprenticeship programs for workers in the trucking industry. The grant will be awarded over a five-year funding cycle. The DOL published a Notice of Funding Opportunity in the fall of 2014 in an effort to develop a trained workforce in industries that are deemed critical to the U.S. economy...
Bus operator to dissolve ‘sham’ union, in agreement with Teamsters SF Examiner ...Bauer’s Intelligent Transportation will dissolve its “sham” company union and allow local Teamsters to proceed with organizing employees of the bus company. That’s according to an agreement revealed by a formal settlement stipulation issued Monday by the National Labor Relations Board’s Local Region 20...
Tucson Teamster bus strikers standing strong FightBack News ...Nearly 500 members of the Teamsters Local 104 entered day 40 of their strike against Sun Tran Management. Bus drivers, mechanics and service island operators cite unaddressed safety concerns and undelivered pay increases as the reasons for the strike. Sun Tran Management is operated by Transdev, a corporation with a track record of union busting and using scab labor. Transdev is also a subsidiary of Veolia, one of the world’s largest water privatizers...
LA port truckers strike grows, drivers demanding employee classification status CCJ ...Truckers picketing Pacific 9 Transportation have been joined by drivers from two other Southern California drayage companies as Pac 9 enters its 10th week of strike. Carrying “We Are All Employees” signs, the recently unionized Shippers Transport Express and Eco Flo Transportation joined the protest at Pac 9’s Carson headquarters...
Global Labor & Trade
What's Going On With the TPP? Truthout ...At this late stage of negotiations, the US Trade Representative (USTR) has pretty much abandoned all remaining pretense of transparency in its consideration of these remaining policy issues. Since the failure to conclude the deal at the meeting in Hawaii over the summer, the USTR has held several closed-door meetings between high-level officials to finalize the agreement and it is under intensifying pressure to finish it off as soon as possible...
Senators: Address China Currency Manipulation in TPP Roll Call ...With Chinese President Xi Jinping due at the White House next week, seven senators are making a new push against currency manipulation. The lawmakers, led by Republican Rob Portman and Democrat Sherrod Brown of Ohio, want to see currency devaluation addressed as part of the ongoing Trans-Pacific Partnership trade talks, citing recent moves by both Vietnam and South Korea in response to China’s adjusting the value of its currency, the yuan...
Conservatives rush to resolve TPP auto-parts impasse before election Globe and Mail ...Stephen Harper finds himself in the toughest spot so far in negotiations to clinch a Pacific Rim trade deal, with Japan seemingly unwilling to bend on provisions that could sideswipe Canadian auto-sector jobs and with time running out for a deal before the Oct. 19 election. Efforts to create a Trans-Pacific Partnership trade bloc stretching from Chile to Japan hit a wall in Hawaii this summer after Canada and Mexico balked at import rules for vehicle imports...
EU proposes special dispute court for US trade deal Yahoo ...The European Union on Wednesday proposed a special court to resolve any disputes arising from a planned huge trade deal with the United States, instead of the widely criticized private tribunals that Washington wants. EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem said there was huge public skepticism about the previous dispute resolution plans, the most controversial element of the massive TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) deal with the United States...
New U.K. Opposition Leader Vows to Fight Austerity, Antiunion Legislation Wall Street Journal ...Jeremy Corbyn, the new far-left leader of the U.K.’s main opposition Labour Party, pledged to fight public-spending cuts and government efforts to curb trade-union powers as he sought to rally his deeply divided party. In his first policy speech as leader, Mr. Corbyn labeled the governing center-right Conservatives as “poverty deniers” and said a more equal Britain wasn’t a far-fetched dream...
Petrobras Oil Output May Face Interruptions If Workers Strike Bloomberg ...Oil production in Brazil may be interrupted if Petroleo Brasileiro SA workers decide to strike for an extended period, said Deyvid Bacelar, the company’s board member representing workers. Workers may decide whether to go on strike as soon as Friday, Bacelar, who is also an oil union coordinator in the state of Bahia, said in an interview Tuesday...
A Migration Juggernaut Is Headed for Europe New York Times ...European leaders probably don’t want to hear this now, as they frantically try to close their borders to stop hundreds of thousands of desperate migrants and asylum seekers escaping hunger and violence in Africa and the Middle East. But they are dealing with the unstoppable force of demography...
State & Living Wage Battles
Missouri right to work issue continues Wednesday KMBZ ...The Missouri General Assembly starts it's veto session Wednesday. The main issue is Right to Work. Legislators passed a bill to eliminate workplace contracts with mandatory union fees. Governor Jay Nixon vetoed it, and has been campaigning to keep the veto "off the critical list.There is more talk about Missouri's need for skilled workers, than about Right to Work, said Nixon...
Sponsor may drop 'right to work' union measure in Oregon after adverse legal ruling Oregon Live ...The sponsor of a proposed ballot measure aimed at making union dues voluntary for public employees may well drop the initiative after receiving a politically unpalatable ballot title. Portland attorney Jill Gibson said she is leaning toward abandoning the proposal after the Oregon Supreme Court upheld a ballot description that will make the measure harder to sell to voters...
Group seeking repeal of prevailing wage law submits signatures Michigan Radio ...A group called Protecting Michigan Taxpayers wants to repeal Michigan's 50-year-old prevailing wage law. It recently turned in to the Secretary of State about 391,000 signatures collected in a petition drive to repeal Michigan's law which requires workers on state-financed construction projects to be paid prevailing union-scale wages...
Wage Theft Penalties Would Be Increased Under New Bill Wisconsin Public Radio ...The Senate's labor committee is considering a bill that would increase penalties for employers who illegally withhold wages from their workers and make it easier for workers to win wage claims filed with the state. The bill makes changes to current law that protects employees from what is commonly called "wage theft," comprising everything from forcing people to work off the clock to paying workers less than minimum wage...
Dozens gather in Mountain Brook to protest bill blocking Birmingham minimum wage hike AL.com ...Supporters of a higher minimum wage gathered in Mountain Brook Village Tuesday to protest a bill by one state lawmaker to block Birmingham's wage hike. Dozens chanted and marched in suburban Mountain Brook because it's the home of Republican state Rep. David Faulkner, who proposed a bill to prevent cities from setting a minimum wage for private employers...
Taxpayer tab for changes to voting laws tops $8 million Express News ...Republicans used their majority in 2011 to muscle through the Legislature a controversial voter ID law and new redistricting maps — and Texas taxpayers haven’t stopped picking up the bill for the state to defend those measures in courts ever since. Texas’ total legal tab to date: more than $8 million, data obtained under the state’s Public Information Act show...
U.S. Labor
Striking Seattle Teachers to Return to Classroom ABC ...Seattle teachers ended a weeklong strike and headed to their classrooms Wednesday after winning a 9.5 percent pay raise over three years, mandatory 30-minute recesses for elementary students, a longer school day and more say over standardized tests. The union's board of directors and representative assembly voted Tuesday evening to suspend the strike and urged the 5,000 members to approve the three-year deal...
UAW, Fiat Chrysler strike tentative labor pact Market Watch ...The United Auto Workers union has struck a tentative deal with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV that will eventually remove a controversial two-tier wage system that saw newer hires paid less than their mo re-experienced co-workers, according to people familiar with the agreement. Under the current arrangement, newer employees earn about $9 an hour less than more senior factory employees...
Elizabeth Warren Wants To Stop Companies From Checking Your Credit Before They Hire You Think Progress ...They’re riddled with errors. They’re difficult to correct. And they may be keeping you from getting a job. But a spotty credit report could cease being a reason for employers to reject applicants, if legislation introduced Tuesday by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) becomes law...
Scott Walker Is Down in the Polls. His Strategy To Climb Back Up: More Union-Busting. In These Times ...Having plummeted in the presidential primary polls, Walker needs to figure out a way to stand out in the pack, and he has apparently decided that running hard against labor unions and their “bosses” can endear him to many blue-collar voters as well as such billionaire backers as the Koch brothers...
CA farm workers allege wage theft, bad working conditions WDAM ...Wage theft and dangerous working conditions are abuses that often happen to farm workers in Santa Barbara County, according to a survey from an advocacy group. It released a report filled with analysis from a survey it conducted over the past couple of months. The group CAUSE, or Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy, said all of the data comes from farm workers in Santa Barbara County...
50 years ago, Cesar Chavez led a crusade to unite and empower farmworkers LA Times ...On a Thursday night 50 years ago, at the height of the table grape harvest in California's Central Valley, hundreds of Mexican American farmworkers crowded expectantly into a Delano church hall. They were tired of being treated like disposable farm tools. Tired of being cheated out of even their meager wages. Tired of watching their mothers and sisters humiliated and harassed. Tired of being stripped of dignity. Tired of being invisible...
Social Justice & Other News
Mass Incarceration Has Become the New Welfare The Atlantic ...Mass incarceration is not just (or even mainly) a response to crime, but rather a perverse form of social spending that uses state power to address a host of social problems at the back end, from poverty to drug addiction to misbehavior in school. These are problems that voters, taxpayers, and politicians—especially white voters, taxpayers, and politicians—seem unwilling to address in any other way...
A Man Who’s Probably Innocent Will Die Today, And Lawyers Can’t Save Him Think Progress ...Eighteen years after the murder of motel owner Barry Van Treese, there is no concrete evidence to suggest Oklahoma death row inmate Richard Glossip was involved in the crime. According to witnesses, the actual killer, Justin Sneed, has repeatedly bragged about setting his former boss up by pinning him as the mastermind behind Treese’s murder. Still, after a long battle to prove his innocence and have his sentence overturned, Glossip will be executed by lethal injection Wednesday afternoon...
The Ugly Message of Trump-Mania Slate ...Trump is a sideshow, and in the presence of his personality, it’s easy to overlook the ugliness behind his campaign. But it’s there, a debased successor to the nationalist white resentment of Pat Buchanan and George Wallace. And although spectators may miss it, it’s more than clear for the targets of his xenophobia, and the people who hate them...
Labor Department Awards Teamsters $4.6 Million Training Grant Teamster.org ...The Teamsters Safety and Health Department has been awarded a $4.6 million grant by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) to establish apprenticeship programs for workers in the trucking industry. The grant will be awarded over a five-year funding cycle. The DOL published a Notice of Funding Opportunity in the fall of 2014 in an effort to develop a trained workforce in industries that are deemed critical to the U.S. economy...
Bus operator to dissolve ‘sham’ union, in agreement with Teamsters SF Examiner ...Bauer’s Intelligent Transportation will dissolve its “sham” company union and allow local Teamsters to proceed with organizing employees of the bus company. That’s according to an agreement revealed by a formal settlement stipulation issued Monday by the National Labor Relations Board’s Local Region 20...
Tucson Teamster bus strikers standing strong FightBack News ...Nearly 500 members of the Teamsters Local 104 entered day 40 of their strike against Sun Tran Management. Bus drivers, mechanics and service island operators cite unaddressed safety concerns and undelivered pay increases as the reasons for the strike. Sun Tran Management is operated by Transdev, a corporation with a track record of union busting and using scab labor. Transdev is also a subsidiary of Veolia, one of the world’s largest water privatizers...
LA port truckers strike grows, drivers demanding employee classification status CCJ ...Truckers picketing Pacific 9 Transportation have been joined by drivers from two other Southern California drayage companies as Pac 9 enters its 10th week of strike. Carrying “We Are All Employees” signs, the recently unionized Shippers Transport Express and Eco Flo Transportation joined the protest at Pac 9’s Carson headquarters...
Global Labor & Trade
What's Going On With the TPP? Truthout ...At this late stage of negotiations, the US Trade Representative (USTR) has pretty much abandoned all remaining pretense of transparency in its consideration of these remaining policy issues. Since the failure to conclude the deal at the meeting in Hawaii over the summer, the USTR has held several closed-door meetings between high-level officials to finalize the agreement and it is under intensifying pressure to finish it off as soon as possible...
Senators: Address China Currency Manipulation in TPP Roll Call ...With Chinese President Xi Jinping due at the White House next week, seven senators are making a new push against currency manipulation. The lawmakers, led by Republican Rob Portman and Democrat Sherrod Brown of Ohio, want to see currency devaluation addressed as part of the ongoing Trans-Pacific Partnership trade talks, citing recent moves by both Vietnam and South Korea in response to China’s adjusting the value of its currency, the yuan...
Conservatives rush to resolve TPP auto-parts impasse before election Globe and Mail ...Stephen Harper finds himself in the toughest spot so far in negotiations to clinch a Pacific Rim trade deal, with Japan seemingly unwilling to bend on provisions that could sideswipe Canadian auto-sector jobs and with time running out for a deal before the Oct. 19 election. Efforts to create a Trans-Pacific Partnership trade bloc stretching from Chile to Japan hit a wall in Hawaii this summer after Canada and Mexico balked at import rules for vehicle imports...
EU proposes special dispute court for US trade deal Yahoo ...The European Union on Wednesday proposed a special court to resolve any disputes arising from a planned huge trade deal with the United States, instead of the widely criticized private tribunals that Washington wants. EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem said there was huge public skepticism about the previous dispute resolution plans, the most controversial element of the massive TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) deal with the United States...
New U.K. Opposition Leader Vows to Fight Austerity, Antiunion Legislation Wall Street Journal ...Jeremy Corbyn, the new far-left leader of the U.K.’s main opposition Labour Party, pledged to fight public-spending cuts and government efforts to curb trade-union powers as he sought to rally his deeply divided party. In his first policy speech as leader, Mr. Corbyn labeled the governing center-right Conservatives as “poverty deniers” and said a more equal Britain wasn’t a far-fetched dream...
Petrobras Oil Output May Face Interruptions If Workers Strike Bloomberg ...Oil production in Brazil may be interrupted if Petroleo Brasileiro SA workers decide to strike for an extended period, said Deyvid Bacelar, the company’s board member representing workers. Workers may decide whether to go on strike as soon as Friday, Bacelar, who is also an oil union coordinator in the state of Bahia, said in an interview Tuesday...
A Migration Juggernaut Is Headed for Europe New York Times ...European leaders probably don’t want to hear this now, as they frantically try to close their borders to stop hundreds of thousands of desperate migrants and asylum seekers escaping hunger and violence in Africa and the Middle East. But they are dealing with the unstoppable force of demography...
State & Living Wage Battles
Missouri right to work issue continues Wednesday KMBZ ...The Missouri General Assembly starts it's veto session Wednesday. The main issue is Right to Work. Legislators passed a bill to eliminate workplace contracts with mandatory union fees. Governor Jay Nixon vetoed it, and has been campaigning to keep the veto "off the critical list.There is more talk about Missouri's need for skilled workers, than about Right to Work, said Nixon...
Sponsor may drop 'right to work' union measure in Oregon after adverse legal ruling Oregon Live ...The sponsor of a proposed ballot measure aimed at making union dues voluntary for public employees may well drop the initiative after receiving a politically unpalatable ballot title. Portland attorney Jill Gibson said she is leaning toward abandoning the proposal after the Oregon Supreme Court upheld a ballot description that will make the measure harder to sell to voters...
Group seeking repeal of prevailing wage law submits signatures Michigan Radio ...A group called Protecting Michigan Taxpayers wants to repeal Michigan's 50-year-old prevailing wage law. It recently turned in to the Secretary of State about 391,000 signatures collected in a petition drive to repeal Michigan's law which requires workers on state-financed construction projects to be paid prevailing union-scale wages...
Wage Theft Penalties Would Be Increased Under New Bill Wisconsin Public Radio ...The Senate's labor committee is considering a bill that would increase penalties for employers who illegally withhold wages from their workers and make it easier for workers to win wage claims filed with the state. The bill makes changes to current law that protects employees from what is commonly called "wage theft," comprising everything from forcing people to work off the clock to paying workers less than minimum wage...
Dozens gather in Mountain Brook to protest bill blocking Birmingham minimum wage hike AL.com ...Supporters of a higher minimum wage gathered in Mountain Brook Village Tuesday to protest a bill by one state lawmaker to block Birmingham's wage hike. Dozens chanted and marched in suburban Mountain Brook because it's the home of Republican state Rep. David Faulkner, who proposed a bill to prevent cities from setting a minimum wage for private employers...
Taxpayer tab for changes to voting laws tops $8 million Express News ...Republicans used their majority in 2011 to muscle through the Legislature a controversial voter ID law and new redistricting maps — and Texas taxpayers haven’t stopped picking up the bill for the state to defend those measures in courts ever since. Texas’ total legal tab to date: more than $8 million, data obtained under the state’s Public Information Act show...
U.S. Labor
Striking Seattle Teachers to Return to Classroom ABC ...Seattle teachers ended a weeklong strike and headed to their classrooms Wednesday after winning a 9.5 percent pay raise over three years, mandatory 30-minute recesses for elementary students, a longer school day and more say over standardized tests. The union's board of directors and representative assembly voted Tuesday evening to suspend the strike and urged the 5,000 members to approve the three-year deal...
UAW, Fiat Chrysler strike tentative labor pact Market Watch ...The United Auto Workers union has struck a tentative deal with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV that will eventually remove a controversial two-tier wage system that saw newer hires paid less than their mo re-experienced co-workers, according to people familiar with the agreement. Under the current arrangement, newer employees earn about $9 an hour less than more senior factory employees...
Elizabeth Warren Wants To Stop Companies From Checking Your Credit Before They Hire You Think Progress ...They’re riddled with errors. They’re difficult to correct. And they may be keeping you from getting a job. But a spotty credit report could cease being a reason for employers to reject applicants, if legislation introduced Tuesday by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) becomes law...
Scott Walker Is Down in the Polls. His Strategy To Climb Back Up: More Union-Busting. In These Times ...Having plummeted in the presidential primary polls, Walker needs to figure out a way to stand out in the pack, and he has apparently decided that running hard against labor unions and their “bosses” can endear him to many blue-collar voters as well as such billionaire backers as the Koch brothers...
CA farm workers allege wage theft, bad working conditions WDAM ...Wage theft and dangerous working conditions are abuses that often happen to farm workers in Santa Barbara County, according to a survey from an advocacy group. It released a report filled with analysis from a survey it conducted over the past couple of months. The group CAUSE, or Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy, said all of the data comes from farm workers in Santa Barbara County...
50 years ago, Cesar Chavez led a crusade to unite and empower farmworkers LA Times ...On a Thursday night 50 years ago, at the height of the table grape harvest in California's Central Valley, hundreds of Mexican American farmworkers crowded expectantly into a Delano church hall. They were tired of being treated like disposable farm tools. Tired of being cheated out of even their meager wages. Tired of watching their mothers and sisters humiliated and harassed. Tired of being stripped of dignity. Tired of being invisible...
Social Justice & Other News
Mass Incarceration Has Become the New Welfare The Atlantic ...Mass incarceration is not just (or even mainly) a response to crime, but rather a perverse form of social spending that uses state power to address a host of social problems at the back end, from poverty to drug addiction to misbehavior in school. These are problems that voters, taxpayers, and politicians—especially white voters, taxpayers, and politicians—seem unwilling to address in any other way...
A Man Who’s Probably Innocent Will Die Today, And Lawyers Can’t Save Him Think Progress ...Eighteen years after the murder of motel owner Barry Van Treese, there is no concrete evidence to suggest Oklahoma death row inmate Richard Glossip was involved in the crime. According to witnesses, the actual killer, Justin Sneed, has repeatedly bragged about setting his former boss up by pinning him as the mastermind behind Treese’s murder. Still, after a long battle to prove his innocence and have his sentence overturned, Glossip will be executed by lethal injection Wednesday afternoon...
The Ugly Message of Trump-Mania Slate ...Trump is a sideshow, and in the presence of his personality, it’s easy to overlook the ugliness behind his campaign. But it’s there, a debased successor to the nationalist white resentment of Pat Buchanan and George Wallace. And although spectators may miss it, it’s more than clear for the targets of his xenophobia, and the people who hate them...
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
Today's Teamster News 09.15.15
Teamsters
Thousands Of Teamsters March In New York Labor Day Parade Teamster.org ...Thousands of Teamsters in New York participated in the annual Labor Day parade on Saturday. Members from local unions representing a variety of industries including construction, motion picture, theatrical trades, warehouse, public services, sanitation, parking, brewery, soft drink, freight, funeral, moving and printing participated. In each of the local union contingents members held the new "Let's Get America Working - Union Strong, America Stronger" signs...
Atlanta Teamsters Ratify Sysco Contract, First Ever in Georgia Teamster.org ...Teamsters Local 528 members, whose fight to win union representation has lasted more than 18 months, ratified a first contract that provides strong union protections for more than 400 workers at Sysco’s Atlanta facility on Saturday. “This has been an uphill struggle, but these workers stood together through it all to negotiate a strong first contract that will protect them for years to come,” said Maurice Cobb, Teamsters Local 528 President...
Port truck drivers enter 10th week of wage-theft protests Press Telegram ...Truck drivers for a transportation company serving the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports entered their 10th week protesting what they say are more than $6 million in wages and expenses stolen by their employer, a Teamsters official said Monday. The drivers picketing at Pacific 9 Transportation’s Carson truck yard say they should be on the pay roll as employees but are instead misclassified as independent contractors...
Teamsters Vehemently Voice Opposition to Harmful Soda Tax Local 727 ...Teamster representatives and beverage industry members showed their strength and solidarity in vehement opposition of 12th Ward Ald. George Cardenas’ proposed penny-an-ounce soda tax. Dozens of Local 727 members dressed proudly in work shirts displaying Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper and other soft drink logos packed Chicago’s City Council chambers for a Health Committee hearing on Sept. 9 as opponents of the harmful tax outnumbered supporters by an estimated 40 to 1...
Local 727 Continues to Raise Hotel Industry’s Working Standards Local 727 ...Teamsters Local 727’s campaign to raise wages and working standards at Chicago-area hotels recorded another victory last week when DoubleTree Arlington Heights shuttle bus drivers ratified their first union contract. The five-year agreement includes annual wage increases, paid sick/personal days and crucial job protections such as a grievance and arbitration procedure, seniority and non-discrimination clauses, and roll-off for discipline...
Teamsters Raise $37,500 for Camp Papillon Teamsters Canada ...On Thursday, the Teamsters Union sent the profits from the Teamsters Quebec Omnium to the Director General of the Quebec Society for Disabled Children and Camp Papillon, Ronald Davidson. A total of $37 500 was donated to the camp that that, each year, welcomes close to 700 children with disabilities by giving them a chance to experience outdoor living in a secure environment...
Global Labor & Trade
Labor Will Keep Up Trade Pressure on Democrats National Journal ...Two months after the passage of controversial trade legislation that stirred tensions within the Democratic Party, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said organized labor has no plans to back down when it comes time for Congress to ratify passage of a sweeping Pacific trade deal. Asked if his group would apply pressure to Democrats on the issue—even if it came up close to the election—Trumka replied, “Yes”...
Auto parts differences between Japan, U.S. and others seen clouding prospects for next TPP ministerial talks Japan Times ...The 12 countries taking part in Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade negotiations are likely to face difficulties in arranging a ministerial meeting as Japan, the United States and others were unable to narrow the gap over the automotive sector in recent working-level talks. The participating nations are aiming to hold a ministerial session later this month or in early October, after they failed to reach a broad TPP accord at their previous ministerial discussions...
Thailand looks to join US-led TPP Today Online ...Thailand is interested in joining the ambitious Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact being touted by the United States, but needs to study the terms and conditions of the new trade bloc first, Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak has said. “We are very interested, but we must weigh the advantages and disadvantages carefully,” Mr Somkid told the Bangkok Post...
Uruguay Pulls Out Of ‘Secret’ Talks On Trade In Services Eurasia Review ...Just a week before the deadline for submitting national offers on liberalisation of services sectors under the on-going “secret” talks for a Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA), Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez decided on September 7 to abandon the plurilateral negotiations. The Uruguayan president’s action follows a decision taken on September 5 by a large majority of the Frente Amplio, the governing leftist political coalition, against Uruguay continuing to be part of the TiSA negotiations...
Germany Closes Its Border With Austria, Hoping to Stop the Refugee Flow Mother Jones ...The German government has announced that the country is closing its border with Austria and also suspending train traffic to and from its southern neighbor, the route by which tens of thousands of refugees have entered Germany in recent days. Those borders have been open for nearly 20 years under the Schengen Agreement, which turned most of the European Union into one large free-travel zone with no internal border checks...
Brazil unveils a massive $17 billion austerity package that won't make people happy Business Insider ...Brazil announced a massive $17 billion austerity package Monday in a bid to boost its ailing economy amid a deepening crisis that has already caused a shock downgrade of its credit rating. The package -- announced at a news conference by Planning Minister Nelson Barbosa -- includes freezing public sector salary raises and hiring, entirely eliminating 10 of 39 ministries, cutting 1,000 jobs and slashing housing and health-related social spending...
Forced Labor Rampant in Uzbekistan Fall Cotton Harvest Solidarity Center ...Health care workers in Uzbekistan are toiling in cotton fields and third- and fourth-year university students are now on their way as well, forced by the government to labor in the country’s fall harvest, according to stories compiled by the Uzbek-German Forum for Human Rights. The nonprofit organization also is highlighting news that minors again may be forced into picking cotton...
State & Living Wage Battles
Missouri GOP governor candidates urge right-to-work override Kansas City Star ...Five likely Republican candidates for Missouri governor have sent a letter to state lawmakers urging them to overturn Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto of so-called right to work legislation. The candidates are Eric Greitens, Catherine Hanaway, Peter Kinder, Randy Asbury, and John Brunner. The veto session starts Wednesday. The bill under consideration would prohibit the collection of mandatory union dues. The vote is likely to be close...
Vote postponed on minimum wage bill WIAT ...A vote on legislation to keep municipalities in Alabama from independently raising the minimum wage has been postponed in the state House of Representatives. The bill was introduced last week by Rep. David Faulkner (R – Mountain Brook), not long after the Birmingham City Council voted to raise minimum wage from $7.25 an hour, the federal rate, to $10.10 an hour, to be phased in over two years...
Anti-union group offers petition to end prevailing wage Detroit Free Press ...A group looking to end Michigan's prevailing-wage law turned in enough signatures Monday to put the issue before the Legislature. The 390,959 signatures in 44 boxes still have to go through a review with the Michigan Secretary of State to determine whether there are at least 252,523 valid signatures...
NJ's paid sick leave bill stalls North Jersey ...A bill that would require employers to give workers paid sick time off remains stalled over whether the statewide law should be the final word on what employers must do, or whether it should allow towns to pass their own laws in the future. The bill, which has the backing of committees in the Senate and the Assembly, has gotten bogged down over whether the law should supersede nine municipal paid sick leave laws...
10 Cities Where It’s Most Terrifying To Scrape By On Minimum Wage Huffington Post ...Recently, New York became the first state to approve a $15 minimum wage for the state’s 200,000 fast-food cooks and cashiers. Gov. Andrew Cuomo used the occasion to announce a campaign to make New York the first state in the nation to adopt the same standard for all of its workers. In fact, workers making minimum wage in New York counties have had it relatively easy, at least compared with the following 10 counties...
U.S. Labor
No deal yet: UAW, Fiat Chrysler pulled an all-nighter Detroit Free Press ...No deal yet as the UAW and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles continued to negotiate through the night after extending the existing collective agreement on an hour-by-hour basis in anticipation of signing a tentative agreement soon. The pace of the talks slowed a bit in the predawn hours but a core group continued to soldier on. Full resumption of bargaining is expected to resume by midday...
The Verizon Standoff and the Future of Labor, Communication and Privacy Counterpunch ...On August 1, 2015, the IBEW and CWA contract with Verizon expired. However, unlike previous years, they decided to not strike, a move meant to undermine the company’s hiring and housing of scabs. This is a labor struggle that will have a major impact on the entire labor movement. “I think the days of the short strike is over. Verizon wants to break the union and is willing to overwork lower levels of management in the process,” said Dan Murphy, a retired member of the union...
ATI declines USW offer to return to bargaining table Times Online ...he United Steelworkers tried to get Allegheny Technologies back to the bargaining table ahead of a scheduled mediation Friday, but the company declined to bargain. USW spokesman Wayne Ranick said the company still stands firm to its “last, best and final” offer made more than a month ago before the company locked out thousands of union members...
This Is How Bad the Sharing Economy Is for Workers The Nation ... The “sharing” or “gig” economy—think Airbnb, Uber, and Taskrabbit—has made massive fortunes reducing labor to disassembled microtasks; unfortunately, it’s shrunk workers’ rights too. But as our jobs are redefined by labor-brokering platforms, some advocates are trying to redefine labor rights for a digital economy. Currently, the gig economy trades labor fluidly across online platforms...
How Cities Can Join the Fight Against Wage Theft Truthout ...Unpaid labor, which is sometimes referred to as wage theft, is a national problem that affects working families and deprives large amounts of money from being circulated in our communities. Estimates on the issue range as high as $30 billion in unpaid wages. The US Department of Labor alone collects hundreds of millions of dollars in wages that were originally not paid, touching only the tip of the iceberg...
Scott Walker wants to destroy what’s left of America’s unions Slate ...On Monday, the Wisconsin governor released his plan to strangle unions, titled “My Plan to Give Power to the People, Not the Union Bosses.” He would end collective bargaining for federal employees, as per his move in 2011; he would require complete disclosure for union expenditures and total compensation of union officers; he would sign a national “right to work law;” he would repeal wage controls for federal infrastructure projects; and he would eliminate the National Labor Relations Board...
Social Justice & Other News
Why Non-Voters Matter The Atlantic ...In 2014, just 41.9 percent of the voting-age citizen population of the United States voted. But the people who voted are not only in the minority, they form an unrepresentative minority. In many salient ways, voters are not like nonvoters: voters are richer, whiter, and older than other Americans. "Why Voting Matters," shows how their votes produce a government that caters to their interests—and how boosting turnout would lead to a more representative democracy...
Colleges Flush With Cash Saddle Poorest Students With Debt Common Dreams ...NYU is not the only university with a billion-dollar endowment to leave its poorest students with heavy debt loads. More than a quarter of the nation’s 60 wealthiest universities leave their low-income students owing an average of more than $20,000 in federal loans. At the University of Southern California, which has a $4.6 billion endowment, low-income students graduate with slightly more debt than NYU’s graduates: $23,375...
Ferguson "People's Report" Unveils Bold Plan To Achieve Racial Equity Common Dreams ...A panel of activists, researchers, community members, and other volunteers on Monday unveiled a new report with 189 "calls to action" to address the scourge of racial inequity in and around St. Louis, Missouri, illuminated by a year of protests following the police shooting death of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown last August. Brown's death at the hands of a white police officer galvanized new questions and demands over institutional racism in the U.S...
The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration The Atlantic ...Influenced by the civil-rights movement, Moynihan focused on the black family. He believed that an undue optimism about the pending passage of civil-rights legislation was obscuring a pressing problem: a deficit of employed black men of strong character. “The Negro Family” argued that the federal government was underestimating the damage done to black families by “three centuries of sometimes unimaginable mistreatment” as well as a “racist virus in the American blood stream”...
Thousands Of Teamsters March In New York Labor Day Parade Teamster.org ...Thousands of Teamsters in New York participated in the annual Labor Day parade on Saturday. Members from local unions representing a variety of industries including construction, motion picture, theatrical trades, warehouse, public services, sanitation, parking, brewery, soft drink, freight, funeral, moving and printing participated. In each of the local union contingents members held the new "Let's Get America Working - Union Strong, America Stronger" signs...
Atlanta Teamsters Ratify Sysco Contract, First Ever in Georgia Teamster.org ...Teamsters Local 528 members, whose fight to win union representation has lasted more than 18 months, ratified a first contract that provides strong union protections for more than 400 workers at Sysco’s Atlanta facility on Saturday. “This has been an uphill struggle, but these workers stood together through it all to negotiate a strong first contract that will protect them for years to come,” said Maurice Cobb, Teamsters Local 528 President...
Port truck drivers enter 10th week of wage-theft protests Press Telegram ...Truck drivers for a transportation company serving the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports entered their 10th week protesting what they say are more than $6 million in wages and expenses stolen by their employer, a Teamsters official said Monday. The drivers picketing at Pacific 9 Transportation’s Carson truck yard say they should be on the pay roll as employees but are instead misclassified as independent contractors...
Teamsters Vehemently Voice Opposition to Harmful Soda Tax Local 727 ...Teamster representatives and beverage industry members showed their strength and solidarity in vehement opposition of 12th Ward Ald. George Cardenas’ proposed penny-an-ounce soda tax. Dozens of Local 727 members dressed proudly in work shirts displaying Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper and other soft drink logos packed Chicago’s City Council chambers for a Health Committee hearing on Sept. 9 as opponents of the harmful tax outnumbered supporters by an estimated 40 to 1...
Local 727 Continues to Raise Hotel Industry’s Working Standards Local 727 ...Teamsters Local 727’s campaign to raise wages and working standards at Chicago-area hotels recorded another victory last week when DoubleTree Arlington Heights shuttle bus drivers ratified their first union contract. The five-year agreement includes annual wage increases, paid sick/personal days and crucial job protections such as a grievance and arbitration procedure, seniority and non-discrimination clauses, and roll-off for discipline...
Teamsters Raise $37,500 for Camp Papillon Teamsters Canada ...On Thursday, the Teamsters Union sent the profits from the Teamsters Quebec Omnium to the Director General of the Quebec Society for Disabled Children and Camp Papillon, Ronald Davidson. A total of $37 500 was donated to the camp that that, each year, welcomes close to 700 children with disabilities by giving them a chance to experience outdoor living in a secure environment...
Global Labor & Trade
Labor Will Keep Up Trade Pressure on Democrats National Journal ...Two months after the passage of controversial trade legislation that stirred tensions within the Democratic Party, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said organized labor has no plans to back down when it comes time for Congress to ratify passage of a sweeping Pacific trade deal. Asked if his group would apply pressure to Democrats on the issue—even if it came up close to the election—Trumka replied, “Yes”...
Auto parts differences between Japan, U.S. and others seen clouding prospects for next TPP ministerial talks Japan Times ...The 12 countries taking part in Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade negotiations are likely to face difficulties in arranging a ministerial meeting as Japan, the United States and others were unable to narrow the gap over the automotive sector in recent working-level talks. The participating nations are aiming to hold a ministerial session later this month or in early October, after they failed to reach a broad TPP accord at their previous ministerial discussions...
Thailand looks to join US-led TPP Today Online ...Thailand is interested in joining the ambitious Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade pact being touted by the United States, but needs to study the terms and conditions of the new trade bloc first, Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak has said. “We are very interested, but we must weigh the advantages and disadvantages carefully,” Mr Somkid told the Bangkok Post...
Uruguay Pulls Out Of ‘Secret’ Talks On Trade In Services Eurasia Review ...Just a week before the deadline for submitting national offers on liberalisation of services sectors under the on-going “secret” talks for a Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA), Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez decided on September 7 to abandon the plurilateral negotiations. The Uruguayan president’s action follows a decision taken on September 5 by a large majority of the Frente Amplio, the governing leftist political coalition, against Uruguay continuing to be part of the TiSA negotiations...
Germany Closes Its Border With Austria, Hoping to Stop the Refugee Flow Mother Jones ...The German government has announced that the country is closing its border with Austria and also suspending train traffic to and from its southern neighbor, the route by which tens of thousands of refugees have entered Germany in recent days. Those borders have been open for nearly 20 years under the Schengen Agreement, which turned most of the European Union into one large free-travel zone with no internal border checks...
Brazil unveils a massive $17 billion austerity package that won't make people happy Business Insider ...Brazil announced a massive $17 billion austerity package Monday in a bid to boost its ailing economy amid a deepening crisis that has already caused a shock downgrade of its credit rating. The package -- announced at a news conference by Planning Minister Nelson Barbosa -- includes freezing public sector salary raises and hiring, entirely eliminating 10 of 39 ministries, cutting 1,000 jobs and slashing housing and health-related social spending...
Forced Labor Rampant in Uzbekistan Fall Cotton Harvest Solidarity Center ...Health care workers in Uzbekistan are toiling in cotton fields and third- and fourth-year university students are now on their way as well, forced by the government to labor in the country’s fall harvest, according to stories compiled by the Uzbek-German Forum for Human Rights. The nonprofit organization also is highlighting news that minors again may be forced into picking cotton...
State & Living Wage Battles
Missouri GOP governor candidates urge right-to-work override Kansas City Star ...Five likely Republican candidates for Missouri governor have sent a letter to state lawmakers urging them to overturn Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto of so-called right to work legislation. The candidates are Eric Greitens, Catherine Hanaway, Peter Kinder, Randy Asbury, and John Brunner. The veto session starts Wednesday. The bill under consideration would prohibit the collection of mandatory union dues. The vote is likely to be close...
Vote postponed on minimum wage bill WIAT ...A vote on legislation to keep municipalities in Alabama from independently raising the minimum wage has been postponed in the state House of Representatives. The bill was introduced last week by Rep. David Faulkner (R – Mountain Brook), not long after the Birmingham City Council voted to raise minimum wage from $7.25 an hour, the federal rate, to $10.10 an hour, to be phased in over two years...
Anti-union group offers petition to end prevailing wage Detroit Free Press ...A group looking to end Michigan's prevailing-wage law turned in enough signatures Monday to put the issue before the Legislature. The 390,959 signatures in 44 boxes still have to go through a review with the Michigan Secretary of State to determine whether there are at least 252,523 valid signatures...
NJ's paid sick leave bill stalls North Jersey ...A bill that would require employers to give workers paid sick time off remains stalled over whether the statewide law should be the final word on what employers must do, or whether it should allow towns to pass their own laws in the future. The bill, which has the backing of committees in the Senate and the Assembly, has gotten bogged down over whether the law should supersede nine municipal paid sick leave laws...
10 Cities Where It’s Most Terrifying To Scrape By On Minimum Wage Huffington Post ...Recently, New York became the first state to approve a $15 minimum wage for the state’s 200,000 fast-food cooks and cashiers. Gov. Andrew Cuomo used the occasion to announce a campaign to make New York the first state in the nation to adopt the same standard for all of its workers. In fact, workers making minimum wage in New York counties have had it relatively easy, at least compared with the following 10 counties...
U.S. Labor
No deal yet: UAW, Fiat Chrysler pulled an all-nighter Detroit Free Press ...No deal yet as the UAW and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles continued to negotiate through the night after extending the existing collective agreement on an hour-by-hour basis in anticipation of signing a tentative agreement soon. The pace of the talks slowed a bit in the predawn hours but a core group continued to soldier on. Full resumption of bargaining is expected to resume by midday...
The Verizon Standoff and the Future of Labor, Communication and Privacy Counterpunch ...On August 1, 2015, the IBEW and CWA contract with Verizon expired. However, unlike previous years, they decided to not strike, a move meant to undermine the company’s hiring and housing of scabs. This is a labor struggle that will have a major impact on the entire labor movement. “I think the days of the short strike is over. Verizon wants to break the union and is willing to overwork lower levels of management in the process,” said Dan Murphy, a retired member of the union...
ATI declines USW offer to return to bargaining table Times Online ...he United Steelworkers tried to get Allegheny Technologies back to the bargaining table ahead of a scheduled mediation Friday, but the company declined to bargain. USW spokesman Wayne Ranick said the company still stands firm to its “last, best and final” offer made more than a month ago before the company locked out thousands of union members...
This Is How Bad the Sharing Economy Is for Workers The Nation ... The “sharing” or “gig” economy—think Airbnb, Uber, and Taskrabbit—has made massive fortunes reducing labor to disassembled microtasks; unfortunately, it’s shrunk workers’ rights too. But as our jobs are redefined by labor-brokering platforms, some advocates are trying to redefine labor rights for a digital economy. Currently, the gig economy trades labor fluidly across online platforms...
How Cities Can Join the Fight Against Wage Theft Truthout ...Unpaid labor, which is sometimes referred to as wage theft, is a national problem that affects working families and deprives large amounts of money from being circulated in our communities. Estimates on the issue range as high as $30 billion in unpaid wages. The US Department of Labor alone collects hundreds of millions of dollars in wages that were originally not paid, touching only the tip of the iceberg...
Scott Walker wants to destroy what’s left of America’s unions Slate ...On Monday, the Wisconsin governor released his plan to strangle unions, titled “My Plan to Give Power to the People, Not the Union Bosses.” He would end collective bargaining for federal employees, as per his move in 2011; he would require complete disclosure for union expenditures and total compensation of union officers; he would sign a national “right to work law;” he would repeal wage controls for federal infrastructure projects; and he would eliminate the National Labor Relations Board...
Social Justice & Other News
Why Non-Voters Matter The Atlantic ...In 2014, just 41.9 percent of the voting-age citizen population of the United States voted. But the people who voted are not only in the minority, they form an unrepresentative minority. In many salient ways, voters are not like nonvoters: voters are richer, whiter, and older than other Americans. "Why Voting Matters," shows how their votes produce a government that caters to their interests—and how boosting turnout would lead to a more representative democracy...
Colleges Flush With Cash Saddle Poorest Students With Debt Common Dreams ...NYU is not the only university with a billion-dollar endowment to leave its poorest students with heavy debt loads. More than a quarter of the nation’s 60 wealthiest universities leave their low-income students owing an average of more than $20,000 in federal loans. At the University of Southern California, which has a $4.6 billion endowment, low-income students graduate with slightly more debt than NYU’s graduates: $23,375...
Ferguson "People's Report" Unveils Bold Plan To Achieve Racial Equity Common Dreams ...A panel of activists, researchers, community members, and other volunteers on Monday unveiled a new report with 189 "calls to action" to address the scourge of racial inequity in and around St. Louis, Missouri, illuminated by a year of protests following the police shooting death of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown last August. Brown's death at the hands of a white police officer galvanized new questions and demands over institutional racism in the U.S...
The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration The Atlantic ...Influenced by the civil-rights movement, Moynihan focused on the black family. He believed that an undue optimism about the pending passage of civil-rights legislation was obscuring a pressing problem: a deficit of employed black men of strong character. “The Negro Family” argued that the federal government was underestimating the damage done to black families by “three centuries of sometimes unimaginable mistreatment” as well as a “racist virus in the American blood stream”...
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