Thursday, November 5, 2015
Poll: America the worried
Income inequality is increasingly hitting the nation's workforce. But now its taking a toll on families' mental well-being as well, a new study reports.
The Marketplace-Edison Research Poll found that while the U.S. economy is rebounding, everyday Americans are still worried about their wallets. In fact, 63 percent of the more than 1,000 respondents said they are sometimes or frequently anxious about their financial situation, while 27 percent said they are not financially secure.
Much of the fear is focused on not being able to pay the bills or having enough money for future needs, according to the poll:
The Teamsters have been listening and know a new plan is needed. But it is one that needs a buy-in from both sides of the political aisle. That's why the "Let's Get America Working" platform was crafted.
Hardworking Americans deserve some peace of mind. They toil long hours to put food on the table and keep a roof over their head. But due to bad trade deals pushing good-paying jobs overseas, their margins are thinner than ever before. They need help.
Investing in America by improving infrastructure would go a long way to help the economy. And it would help settle the fears of many who have been on the wrong side of the income divide in recent years.
The Marketplace-Edison Research Poll found that while the U.S. economy is rebounding, everyday Americans are still worried about their wallets. In fact, 63 percent of the more than 1,000 respondents said they are sometimes or frequently anxious about their financial situation, while 27 percent said they are not financially secure.Much of the fear is focused on not being able to pay the bills or having enough money for future needs, according to the poll:
Americans also report “a lot” of fear about paying monthly bills. More than 10 percent fear being unable to make a car payment, more than 10 percent fear being unable to make a mortgage payment, more than 25 percent fear being unable to pay rent and more than 33 percent fear not being able to make a student loan payment.
More than 30 percent have “a lot” of fear over not having enough saved for retirement, nearly a quarter fear facing an unexpected medical bill and more than 20 percent fear not being able to afford college for their children.Undoubtedly, these issues are already beginning to play themselves out in advance of the 2016 presidential election. Large swaths of workers aren't happy with the economic status quo, and they are letting the candidates know it.
The Teamsters have been listening and know a new plan is needed. But it is one that needs a buy-in from both sides of the political aisle. That's why the "Let's Get America Working" platform was crafted.
Hardworking Americans deserve some peace of mind. They toil long hours to put food on the table and keep a roof over their head. But due to bad trade deals pushing good-paying jobs overseas, their margins are thinner than ever before. They need help.
Investing in America by improving infrastructure would go a long way to help the economy. And it would help settle the fears of many who have been on the wrong side of the income divide in recent years.
Today's Teamster News 11.05.15
TEAMSTERS
Teamsters Suspend Safeway Protests - For Now DC Labor ...Teamsters locals 730 and 639 have agreed to suspend their protests over the threatened closure of the Safeway Distribution Center in Upper Marlboro after State Senator Anthony Muse on Wednesday asked representatives of Safeway and Collington Services (which operates the center), along with the Teamsters, to participate in discussions aimed at preserving jobs at the center. The companies have until November 10 to respond to Muse’s request...
Despite Coca-Cola’s Regressive Proposals, Union Works to Fix Overtime Issues in Negotiations Local 727 ...As Coca-Cola management continued to drag its feet, the Teamsters Local 727 Bargaining Committee worked to tackle major non-economic issues during contract negotiations on Wednesday, November 4. The union revisited its proposal to clarify overtime assignments and ensure Coca-Cola effectively communicates with workers when posting mandatory overtime. The Teamsters’ proposal also establishes and guarantees 40-hour workweek schedules...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Pacific partners release TPP details Reuters ...The long-awaited text of a landmark US-backed Pacific trade deal has been released. It reveals the details of a pact aimed at freeing up commerce in 40 per cent of the world's economy but is criticised for its opacity. If ratified, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will be a legacy-defining achievement for US President Barack Obama and his administration's pivot to Asia, aimed at countering China's rising economic and political influence...
TPP trade deal: text published online The Guardian ...New Zealand has put the text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) online, offering the first detailed look at the world’s largest free trade deal, the most ambitious effort in years to remove barriers to commerce. The New Zealand government, which signed on to the deal, put the contents of the agreement on its website on Thursday, saying it would continue to undergo legal review...
Full Text of TPP Released to Public... And It's Horrible Common Dreams ...It's a disaster for people, the planet, democracy, and the future of the global economy. That was the immediate assessment of informed critics as world governments, including the United States, on Thursday morning made the full text of the controversial Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) available to the public for the first time...
What to Look for When the Trans-Pacific Partnership Text Is Released Huffington Post ...The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) has been completed. The agreement is a big deal. It is said it writes the rules for doing business in the 21st century and covers 40 percent of the world's economy. The agreement will determine whether the giant corporations will increase their domination or if regular people will instead be able to fight back...
Trans-Pacific Partnership critics concerned about environment, IP clauses in trade pact's fine print ABC ...Critics of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) warn the full text of the agreement highlights serious concerns about environmental protections and intellectual property rights. For the first time the fine print of the agreement — which would eliminate 98 per cent of all tariffs between the 12 nations including Australia — has been released...
TPP leaders to meet on sidelines of APEC forum summit in Philippines Japan Times ...The leaders of 12 countries involved in the recently sealed Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade initiative will meet later this month in the Philippines to ensure early implementation of the pact, a government source said Wednesday. The meeting will be held on the sidelines of a two-day summit...
Thousands expected in student protest against austerity CBC ...Thousands of students from CEGEPs and universities are expected to take part in a large demonstration today against austerity measures imposed by the Quebec government. Close to 20 student associations representing more than 50,000 students have a strike mandate for the province-wide protest on Nov. 5...
Brazil President’s Own Party Resists Her Austerity Plans Wall Street Journal ...Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, who is struggling to get the country’s Congress to pass legislation meant to curb a widening budget gap, faces more resistance from members of her own party than almost any other grouping, according to a recent survey of lawmakers. Ms. Rousseff’s left-wing Workers’ Party is reluctant to embrace spending cuts...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Fast-food workers plan new strike, aim to sway election USA Today ...Fast-food workers, already a potent political force, are planning their largest nationwide strike yet next week and this time will leverage their crusade for a $15-an-hour wage in a bid to sway the 2016 presidential election. The group representing the workers, Fight for $15, plans on Tuesday to stage protests at restaurants in 270 cities, the most since it began organizing the demonstrations three years ago...
Missouri House sponsor of bill backers call ‘paycheck protection’ wants to bring it back in 2016 Missourinet ...The House sponsor of what supporters call “paycheck protection” and opponents call “paycheck deception” wants to file that bill again in 2016. A “right-to-work” bill was vetoed this year by Governor Nixon and supporters fell 13 votes short of overturning that veto in the state House. Some Republicans are now debating whether it should be brought back up in 2016...
400,000 People Could Lose Their Health Care Because No One Turned Out To Vote Think Progress ...If you live in Kentucky, you probably didn’t vote yesterday. Turnout in Tuesday’s gubernatorial election was simply dreadful. According to the state’s chief elections officer, preliminary results show that only 30.7 percent of voters actually cast a ballot in this off-off-year election. That compares with 45.9 percent of voters in 2014...
Will State Courts Fill a Void on Voting Rights? The Atlantic ...In recent years, as the U.S. Supreme Court has limited its protections of the right to vote, some state courts have stepped in to fill the void. State judges have looked to their state constitutions—which are more explicit in conferring the right to vote—to provide relief from onerous election laws. And, in doing so, they have shown how these documents can be powerful tools to improve America’s democracy...
Paid Sick Leave Wins At The Voting Booth Think Progress ...On Tuesday, voters in Elizabeth, New Jersey approved a paid sick days law that guarantees all residents the right to earn leave. Once it goes into effect, the city’s 25,000 private sector workers will be able to earn an hour of sick time for every 30 they work, capped at five days a year for those at companies with 10 or more employees and at three days at smaller companies, to care for themselves or a sick family member...
Campaign to raise Maine's minimum wage tops 90K signatures WCSH ...A proposal to raise Maine's minimum wage is set to appear on next year's ballot. The group "Mainers For Fair Wages" has collected more than 90,000 signatures, which is well over the minimum requirement to get the issue on the ballot. The proposal for the statewide ballot would raise Maine's minimum wage to $9 an hour in 2017...
Tacoma, Washington, Passes $12 Minimum Wage Huffington Post ...Residents of Tacoma, Washington, are ready to raise the minimum wage -- just not too quickly. Voters in the city of 200,000 appear to have approved a ballot measure this week that would gradually raise the minimum wage in the city to $12 per hour. At the same time, they seem to have turned down a more ambitious measure...
U.S. LABOR
UAW Warns of General Motors Strike If Workers Fail to Approve Contract Wall Street Journal ...United Auto Workers leaders are pressing members to ratify a proposed contract from General Motors Co. after a handful of factories turned it down in initial rounds of voting, with union officials saying a costly strike is likely unavoidable if the deal fails, according to several people familiar with the matter. The UAW’s voting on GM’s proposed agreement to 52,700 of its U.S. factory workers began late last week and ends Saturday...
UAW-GM agreement reportedly en route to ratification MLive ...A new, four-year contract between General Motors and 52,600 UAW workers in the U.S. appears headed for ratification. The Detroit Free Press reports that workers at GM's Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly, three sites in Pontiac and large plants in Missouri and Tennessee all gave the new contract clear majorities on Wednesday...
B&H Photo Warehouse Employees Vote to Join USW Union PR Newswire ...Today, workers at two B&H warehouses in Bushwick and in the Brooklyn Navy Yard voted by a 200-to-88 margin for representation by the United Steelworkers (USW) union. Workers had complained that they had been forced to work long hours in unsafe environments without proper training, while subject to discrimination...
NLRB Rejects Target’s Petition to Invalidate Union Vote in Brooklyn Wall Street Journal ...A small group of Target Corp. pharmacy workers in New York City are one step closer to becoming the retailer’s first ever union. The National Labor Relations Board on Tuesday rejected Target’s appeal to invalidate the group’s September vote to unionize. In a letter denying the appeal, the NLRB said Target hadn’t raised any “substantial issues warranting review”...
Oxfam Calls Out ‘Big Chicken’ for Rampant Labor Abuses In These Times ...One of the world’s most prominent hunger-fighting organizations has launched a publicity campaign aimed at improving wages and workplace safety in U.S. chicken processing plants. Oxfam kicked off the campaign with a report released October 26 that details substandard wages and benefits, unsafe working conditions, and a culture of hostility to labor rights for the estimated 250,000 workers employed in chicken plants...
Elizabeth Warren Wants to Give Seniors a Raise Mother Jones ...Elizabeth Warren wants to give seniors the same pay raise enjoyed by CEOs—and to raise taxes on some executive pay in the process. The liberal senator from Massachusetts is introducing a bill on Thursday to boost Social Security payments for 2016 with a one-time bump in benefits...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Half Of Black Millennials Know A Victim Of Police Violence. What That Means For The 2016 Election. Think Progress ...Far before the Black Lives Matter movement was launched and before high-profile cases of police brutality permeated the national media, more than half of black millennials said in 2009 that they knew a victim of police violence. The University of Chicago released a report titled “Black Millennials in America” with the 2009 survey data that highlights how many people of color know victims of police violence...
With Historic Release of Drug Offenders & Help for Re-entry, US Takes "First Step" on Prison Crisis Democracy Now ...In the largest one-time release of federal prisoners in U.S. history, more than 6,000 inmates have been freed early under a resentencing effort for people convicted of nonviolent drug crimes. Decisions by the U.S. Sentencing Commission last year reduced prison terms for certain drug offenses and applied those changes retroactively...
America’s Prison Population Is Falling, but Too Slowly to Undo Decades of Growth Mother Jones ...Here’s the good news: The number of prisoners in the United States dropped last year to its lowest point since 2005, a trend likely to continue following the release of about 6,000 inmates from federal prisons in the past few days. And here’s the bad: The prison population still only dropped by 1 percent in 2014...
Teamsters Suspend Safeway Protests - For Now DC Labor ...Teamsters locals 730 and 639 have agreed to suspend their protests over the threatened closure of the Safeway Distribution Center in Upper Marlboro after State Senator Anthony Muse on Wednesday asked representatives of Safeway and Collington Services (which operates the center), along with the Teamsters, to participate in discussions aimed at preserving jobs at the center. The companies have until November 10 to respond to Muse’s request...
Despite Coca-Cola’s Regressive Proposals, Union Works to Fix Overtime Issues in Negotiations Local 727 ...As Coca-Cola management continued to drag its feet, the Teamsters Local 727 Bargaining Committee worked to tackle major non-economic issues during contract negotiations on Wednesday, November 4. The union revisited its proposal to clarify overtime assignments and ensure Coca-Cola effectively communicates with workers when posting mandatory overtime. The Teamsters’ proposal also establishes and guarantees 40-hour workweek schedules...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Pacific partners release TPP details Reuters ...The long-awaited text of a landmark US-backed Pacific trade deal has been released. It reveals the details of a pact aimed at freeing up commerce in 40 per cent of the world's economy but is criticised for its opacity. If ratified, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will be a legacy-defining achievement for US President Barack Obama and his administration's pivot to Asia, aimed at countering China's rising economic and political influence...
TPP trade deal: text published online The Guardian ...New Zealand has put the text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) online, offering the first detailed look at the world’s largest free trade deal, the most ambitious effort in years to remove barriers to commerce. The New Zealand government, which signed on to the deal, put the contents of the agreement on its website on Thursday, saying it would continue to undergo legal review...
Full Text of TPP Released to Public... And It's Horrible Common Dreams ...It's a disaster for people, the planet, democracy, and the future of the global economy. That was the immediate assessment of informed critics as world governments, including the United States, on Thursday morning made the full text of the controversial Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) available to the public for the first time...
What to Look for When the Trans-Pacific Partnership Text Is Released Huffington Post ...The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) has been completed. The agreement is a big deal. It is said it writes the rules for doing business in the 21st century and covers 40 percent of the world's economy. The agreement will determine whether the giant corporations will increase their domination or if regular people will instead be able to fight back...
Trans-Pacific Partnership critics concerned about environment, IP clauses in trade pact's fine print ABC ...Critics of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) warn the full text of the agreement highlights serious concerns about environmental protections and intellectual property rights. For the first time the fine print of the agreement — which would eliminate 98 per cent of all tariffs between the 12 nations including Australia — has been released...
TPP leaders to meet on sidelines of APEC forum summit in Philippines Japan Times ...The leaders of 12 countries involved in the recently sealed Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade initiative will meet later this month in the Philippines to ensure early implementation of the pact, a government source said Wednesday. The meeting will be held on the sidelines of a two-day summit...
Thousands expected in student protest against austerity CBC ...Thousands of students from CEGEPs and universities are expected to take part in a large demonstration today against austerity measures imposed by the Quebec government. Close to 20 student associations representing more than 50,000 students have a strike mandate for the province-wide protest on Nov. 5...
Brazil President’s Own Party Resists Her Austerity Plans Wall Street Journal ...Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, who is struggling to get the country’s Congress to pass legislation meant to curb a widening budget gap, faces more resistance from members of her own party than almost any other grouping, according to a recent survey of lawmakers. Ms. Rousseff’s left-wing Workers’ Party is reluctant to embrace spending cuts...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Fast-food workers plan new strike, aim to sway election USA Today ...Fast-food workers, already a potent political force, are planning their largest nationwide strike yet next week and this time will leverage their crusade for a $15-an-hour wage in a bid to sway the 2016 presidential election. The group representing the workers, Fight for $15, plans on Tuesday to stage protests at restaurants in 270 cities, the most since it began organizing the demonstrations three years ago...
Missouri House sponsor of bill backers call ‘paycheck protection’ wants to bring it back in 2016 Missourinet ...The House sponsor of what supporters call “paycheck protection” and opponents call “paycheck deception” wants to file that bill again in 2016. A “right-to-work” bill was vetoed this year by Governor Nixon and supporters fell 13 votes short of overturning that veto in the state House. Some Republicans are now debating whether it should be brought back up in 2016...
400,000 People Could Lose Their Health Care Because No One Turned Out To Vote Think Progress ...If you live in Kentucky, you probably didn’t vote yesterday. Turnout in Tuesday’s gubernatorial election was simply dreadful. According to the state’s chief elections officer, preliminary results show that only 30.7 percent of voters actually cast a ballot in this off-off-year election. That compares with 45.9 percent of voters in 2014...
Will State Courts Fill a Void on Voting Rights? The Atlantic ...In recent years, as the U.S. Supreme Court has limited its protections of the right to vote, some state courts have stepped in to fill the void. State judges have looked to their state constitutions—which are more explicit in conferring the right to vote—to provide relief from onerous election laws. And, in doing so, they have shown how these documents can be powerful tools to improve America’s democracy...
Paid Sick Leave Wins At The Voting Booth Think Progress ...On Tuesday, voters in Elizabeth, New Jersey approved a paid sick days law that guarantees all residents the right to earn leave. Once it goes into effect, the city’s 25,000 private sector workers will be able to earn an hour of sick time for every 30 they work, capped at five days a year for those at companies with 10 or more employees and at three days at smaller companies, to care for themselves or a sick family member...
Campaign to raise Maine's minimum wage tops 90K signatures WCSH ...A proposal to raise Maine's minimum wage is set to appear on next year's ballot. The group "Mainers For Fair Wages" has collected more than 90,000 signatures, which is well over the minimum requirement to get the issue on the ballot. The proposal for the statewide ballot would raise Maine's minimum wage to $9 an hour in 2017...
Tacoma, Washington, Passes $12 Minimum Wage Huffington Post ...Residents of Tacoma, Washington, are ready to raise the minimum wage -- just not too quickly. Voters in the city of 200,000 appear to have approved a ballot measure this week that would gradually raise the minimum wage in the city to $12 per hour. At the same time, they seem to have turned down a more ambitious measure...
U.S. LABOR
UAW Warns of General Motors Strike If Workers Fail to Approve Contract Wall Street Journal ...United Auto Workers leaders are pressing members to ratify a proposed contract from General Motors Co. after a handful of factories turned it down in initial rounds of voting, with union officials saying a costly strike is likely unavoidable if the deal fails, according to several people familiar with the matter. The UAW’s voting on GM’s proposed agreement to 52,700 of its U.S. factory workers began late last week and ends Saturday...
UAW-GM agreement reportedly en route to ratification MLive ...A new, four-year contract between General Motors and 52,600 UAW workers in the U.S. appears headed for ratification. The Detroit Free Press reports that workers at GM's Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly, three sites in Pontiac and large plants in Missouri and Tennessee all gave the new contract clear majorities on Wednesday...
B&H Photo Warehouse Employees Vote to Join USW Union PR Newswire ...Today, workers at two B&H warehouses in Bushwick and in the Brooklyn Navy Yard voted by a 200-to-88 margin for representation by the United Steelworkers (USW) union. Workers had complained that they had been forced to work long hours in unsafe environments without proper training, while subject to discrimination...
NLRB Rejects Target’s Petition to Invalidate Union Vote in Brooklyn Wall Street Journal ...A small group of Target Corp. pharmacy workers in New York City are one step closer to becoming the retailer’s first ever union. The National Labor Relations Board on Tuesday rejected Target’s appeal to invalidate the group’s September vote to unionize. In a letter denying the appeal, the NLRB said Target hadn’t raised any “substantial issues warranting review”...
Oxfam Calls Out ‘Big Chicken’ for Rampant Labor Abuses In These Times ...One of the world’s most prominent hunger-fighting organizations has launched a publicity campaign aimed at improving wages and workplace safety in U.S. chicken processing plants. Oxfam kicked off the campaign with a report released October 26 that details substandard wages and benefits, unsafe working conditions, and a culture of hostility to labor rights for the estimated 250,000 workers employed in chicken plants...
Elizabeth Warren Wants to Give Seniors a Raise Mother Jones ...Elizabeth Warren wants to give seniors the same pay raise enjoyed by CEOs—and to raise taxes on some executive pay in the process. The liberal senator from Massachusetts is introducing a bill on Thursday to boost Social Security payments for 2016 with a one-time bump in benefits...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
Half Of Black Millennials Know A Victim Of Police Violence. What That Means For The 2016 Election. Think Progress ...Far before the Black Lives Matter movement was launched and before high-profile cases of police brutality permeated the national media, more than half of black millennials said in 2009 that they knew a victim of police violence. The University of Chicago released a report titled “Black Millennials in America” with the 2009 survey data that highlights how many people of color know victims of police violence...
With Historic Release of Drug Offenders & Help for Re-entry, US Takes "First Step" on Prison Crisis Democracy Now ...In the largest one-time release of federal prisoners in U.S. history, more than 6,000 inmates have been freed early under a resentencing effort for people convicted of nonviolent drug crimes. Decisions by the U.S. Sentencing Commission last year reduced prison terms for certain drug offenses and applied those changes retroactively...
America’s Prison Population Is Falling, but Too Slowly to Undo Decades of Growth Mother Jones ...Here’s the good news: The number of prisoners in the United States dropped last year to its lowest point since 2005, a trend likely to continue following the release of about 6,000 inmates from federal prisons in the past few days. And here’s the bad: The prison population still only dropped by 1 percent in 2014...
Wednesday, November 4, 2015
Voters elect six Teamsters in N.J., N.Y.
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| Kevin McCaffrey on the campaign trail. |
It was a good night to be a Teamster running for office yesterday, as six who have served their communities in New Jersey and New York were returned to office by local voters.
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| Joe Scott |
The highest ranking of the elected officials was Kevin McCaffrey, president of Local 707, who was re-elected to serve the 14th District of the Suffolk County, N.Y. Legislature. McCarthy has a long and distinguished career in local government, beginning as a trustee and deputy mayor of the Village of Lindenhurst.
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| Amy Lewis |
Joining McCaffrey in the winner's circle was Tom Hufnell and Joe Scott, who will be returning to the Deptford Township, N.J. council. Both men are affiliated with Local 830. Hufnell has lived in Deptford for more than 50 years and has long been involved with youth sports. Meanwhile, Scott is a 40-year resident who has been involved with aging and veterans issues.
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| Tom Hufnell |
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| Ronald Camacho |
Frank Phillips will bereturning to the Abescon, N.J. city council as well. A vice president and business agent for Local 331, Phillips has been actively involved in parks and recreation issues for his community, as well as public safety and public works.
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| Frank Phillips |
And Ronald Camacho will again be a member of the Dover, N.J. Board of Alderman. Camacho, a member of Local 496, previously served as an alderman between 2002 and 2004. He works as a service tech mechanic for Region Oil in Dover and has been involved in youth sports for many years.
Congratulations to all our civic-minded Teamsters!
Today's Teamster News 11.04.15
TEAMSTERS
Union Resubmits Proposals, Seeks Strong Comprehensive Agreement With Great Lakes Coca-Cola Local 727 ...Bargaining continued for a third day on Monday, November 2, as the Teamsters Local 727 Bargaining Committee resubmitted its non-economic proposals to Great Lake Coca-Cola Distribution management. Although GLCCD representatives have not yet offered any substantive movement on initial proposals, the union is making significant organizational progress throughout negotiations...
Drivers at three Port of Long Beach, Los Angeles carriers end strike Landline ...A strike by port drivers working for three port motor carriers at the twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach has ended. Labor organizers, however, say a dispute over the classification of drivers as independent contractors rolls on. A five-day driver strike and picket at XPO Logistics, Intermodal Bridge Transport and Gold Pint Transportation ended late last week according to Justice for Port Drivers organization, which is backed by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Indian capital a mess as sanitation workers strike USA Today ...Delhi is a mess, and a worse one than usual. Since late last month sanitation workers here have been on strike, refusing to pick up garbage and even dumping piles of trash in the streets. Sanitation workers have one key demand: their salaries...
Petrobras Oil Output Cut as Workers Protest Austerity Bloomberg ...Petroleo Brasileiro SA said its oil and natural-gas production has been cut because of a strike by workers protesting job losses, spending reductions and asset sales at Brazil’s state-controlled producer. The biggest output cuts came on Monday, the second day of the strike, when production fell 273,000 barrels a day...
Policy fights await release of trade deal The Hill ...The Obama administration is preparing to release the text of the sweeping Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement, setting the stage for a host of policy fights that could threaten congressional approval of the president’s prized trade deal. Obama has little margin for error as his administration and supporters of the deal press lawmakers to back a 12-nation pact...
TPPA deal will be made public in 2 weeks, says minister Malaysian Insider ...The contents of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) will be made public in two weeks' time, Second International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Seri Ong Ka Chuan said. He said as the government had concluded the TPP with the parties involved, the next step is to present the details to the people. It will then be brought before a special parliamentary session in January next year for debate and a vote by the 222 lawmakers...
Text Still Secret One Month After TPP Deal (opinion) Huffington Post ...Negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a 12 nation agreement seven years in the making, were finally concluded a month ago. Yet the Obama administration still has not released the text of the agreement. Not even to Congress, much less the public. But this has not stopped the United States Trade Representative (USTR), the office responsible for the negotiations, from making outlandish claims about how great the TPP is...
Political Expert Calls US-Initiated Trans-Pacific Partnership ‘Nonsense’ Sputnik ...The US invited Russia and China to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). According to political expert Alexei Skopin, the United States pursues its own goals creating such partnerships and does not always declare them openly. The Agreement on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which includes 12 countries so far, was reached on October 5 and is designed to create a free trade area (FTA) in the Asia-Pacific region...
An Urgent Warning Of What TTIP Has In Store Morning Star ...Canada is the most sued country in the “developed” world, and that should sound alarm bells in Britain. Several weeks ago hundreds of thousands of people across Europe and Britain marched to protest against the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), a massive planned new trade deal between Europe and the US...
Canada presses pause on austerity after Justin Trudeau’s election win The Guardian ...While Canada is hitting the pause button on austerity, the UK chancellor, is on fast-forward. George Osborne’s 2015 spending review will see a further £20bn cut from public spending to achieve balance by 2019, a move which follows a halving of the deficit over the course of the last parliament...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Kentucky elects right-to-work governor Politico ...Tea Party Republican Matt Bevin beat Democrat Jack Conway for Kentucky’s governorship Tuesday night, an upset victory in one of the last strongholds for Democrats in the right-to-work South. Activists on both side of the right-to-work debate led aggressive outreach in the run-up to the election, and this loss surely stings for the AFL-CIO and its affiliate Working America...
GOP candidates for governor talk right-to-work, rural issues in first forum Columbia Missourian ...It didn't take Republican gubernatorial candidates long to hit their party's bread and butter Tuesday night. A full choir of supporters and GOP lawmakers at Missouri Farm Bureau headquarters applauded promises to ban mandatory union fees with a right-to-work law and resist Medicaid expansion...
Thanks To Virginia Reforms, These People Are Voting For The First Time In Decades Think Progress ...Before McAuliffe’s reforms, felons in Virginia had a particularly hard time becoming full citizens after their convictions. In most states, voting rights are automatically restored once a felon is released from prison. But in Virginia, felons were required to first get off parole or probation, then file a voting rights restoration application with the governor’s office, a process that was supposed to take 45 to 60 days but often took much longer...
Leading Fight Against Money in Politics, Maine Voters Back Clean Elections Common Dreams ...Maine voters on Tuesday reaffirmed their desire to keep the influence of big money out of politics by passing the Clean Elections Initiative, a move that campaigners say serves as a "flare to a nation" desperate to "reclaim control of our democracy" in the wake of the Citizens United Supreme Court decision. According to the Bangor Daily News, the Initiative passed 55 to 45 percent...
Scandal, Explicit Emails, Behind The Most Expensive Supreme Court Race In American History Think Progress ...$15,850,297. That’s how much candidates and interested groups have spent to influence the race for three seats on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, according to Justice At Stake, a watchdog group which tracks state judicial races. And that number is only likely to grow as it is based on records that have already been filed in this election...
SEIU starts competing effort to put minimum wage on California ballot SacBee ...California’s largest labor union on Tuesday unveiled its own bid to increase the statewide minimum wage, setting up dueling pay measures aimed for next year’s ballot amid persistent concerns over income inequality. The proposed initiative, supported by the Service Employees International Union’s state council, would boost the base wage to $15 per hour by 2020...
Portland, Maine, Rejects $15 Minimum Wage Huffington Post ...In a rare setback for living wage activists, voters in Portland, Maine, shot down a $15 minimum wage proposal on Tuesday, voting against a ballot measure that would have doubled the wage floor in just four years. Under the proposal, all employers with 500 or more workers would have had to pay at least $15 per hour by 2017...
The Puerto Rican Debt Crisis: Tax Breaks Offered to Rich While Austerity Measures Imposed on Poor Democracy Now ...The Obama administration recently warned Puerto Rico faces a humanitarian crisis unless Congress takes steps to address its crushing debt. The White House wants lawmakers to approve bankruptcy protection for the U.S. territory, expand Medicaid and impose a control board to oversee Puerto Rico’s finances...
U.S. LABOR
NLRB hearing to delay UAW election at Chattanooga's VW plant Times Free Press ...A union election planned for later this week at Volkswagen's Chattanooga plant is expected to be delayed due to a hearing over whether the 164 maintenance workers slated to vote are too small of a unit. Attorneys for VW and the United Auto Workers argued today at a National Labor Relations Board hearing in Chattanooga that will continue into Wednesday...
Slight majority support GM-UAW deal so far The Detroit News ...With about one-third of ballots cast, voting on General Motors Co.’s tentative agreement with the UAW is close, with a slight majority of workers supporting the deal. Voting results at some larger facilities have been tight and roughly two-thirds of the 52,600 hourly workers have not had the opportunity to vote yet. The union is expected to release final results as early as this weekend...
USW files additional unfair labor charges against ATI Business Times ...The United Steelworkers have filed a total of 18 unfair labor practice charges against Allegheny Technologies Inc., the union said in an update to its members Monday. The pending charges cover ATI's decision to lock out more than 2,000 union employees in August as well as the company's conduct at the bargaining table, according to the union...
The Uphill Battle For Strippers’ Rights Think Progress ...Some dancers flock to the industry in part because of perceived scheduling flexibility, but they often end up just as binding as many other jobs. Most clubs require a dancer to come in a minimum number of days a week and assign them to either a day or night shift. Some also tell dancers what time to show up – even charging them a fine if they’re late...
Wages for top earners soared in 2014: Fly top 0.1 percent, fly EPI ...After dipping slightly in 2013, annual earnings of the top 1.0 percent of wages earners grew 4.9 percent in 2014, and the top 0.1 percent’s earnings grew 8.9 percent, according to our analysis of the latest Social Security Administration wage data. This analysis provides the first look at the likely trend of the household incomes of the top 1.0 percent...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
How Bathroom Fears Conquered Transgender Rights in Houston The Atlantic ...After a hard-fought campaign that drew national attention from Hollywood celebrities and presidential. candidates, voters rejected the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, or Proposition 1, handing a victory to conservative critics who argued that its expansive protections for transgender people could endanger women and children...
Republicans Demonize Disabled Social Security Recipients in Latest Budget Alternet ...Having failed in numerous frontal assaults on Social Security, the Republican congressional leadership several years ago adopted a new strategy for dismantling the program: attack and demonize Disability Insurance, which they consider to be its soft underbelly. With last week’s passage of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, they drew blood...
New Study Shows Antarctic Melting Approaching 'Unstoppable' Tipping Point Common Dreams ...A new study published Monday warns that "unstoppable" melting in West Antarctica could make a three-meter increase in sea level "unavoidable." According to researchers at Germany's Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, the vulnerable Amundsen Sea sector of West Antarctica "has most likely been destabilized." They point to recent studies indicating that this area of the ice continent is "the first element in the climate system about to tip"...
How GOP & HMOs Undercut Obamacare's Nonprofit Option, Leaving 500K Uninsured Democracy Now ...As the Obamacare open enrollment period begins, it’s the end for many healthcare co-ops, leaving hundreds of thousands of people scrambling to find coverage. The co-ops were founded to offer a cheaper alternative on insurance exchanges after Democrats stopped demanding a public option. But since going live three years ago, the co-ops have faced major cutbacks from the Republican-controlled Congress...
Union Resubmits Proposals, Seeks Strong Comprehensive Agreement With Great Lakes Coca-Cola Local 727 ...Bargaining continued for a third day on Monday, November 2, as the Teamsters Local 727 Bargaining Committee resubmitted its non-economic proposals to Great Lake Coca-Cola Distribution management. Although GLCCD representatives have not yet offered any substantive movement on initial proposals, the union is making significant organizational progress throughout negotiations...
Drivers at three Port of Long Beach, Los Angeles carriers end strike Landline ...A strike by port drivers working for three port motor carriers at the twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach has ended. Labor organizers, however, say a dispute over the classification of drivers as independent contractors rolls on. A five-day driver strike and picket at XPO Logistics, Intermodal Bridge Transport and Gold Pint Transportation ended late last week according to Justice for Port Drivers organization, which is backed by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters...
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Indian capital a mess as sanitation workers strike USA Today ...Delhi is a mess, and a worse one than usual. Since late last month sanitation workers here have been on strike, refusing to pick up garbage and even dumping piles of trash in the streets. Sanitation workers have one key demand: their salaries...
Petrobras Oil Output Cut as Workers Protest Austerity Bloomberg ...Petroleo Brasileiro SA said its oil and natural-gas production has been cut because of a strike by workers protesting job losses, spending reductions and asset sales at Brazil’s state-controlled producer. The biggest output cuts came on Monday, the second day of the strike, when production fell 273,000 barrels a day...
Policy fights await release of trade deal The Hill ...The Obama administration is preparing to release the text of the sweeping Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement, setting the stage for a host of policy fights that could threaten congressional approval of the president’s prized trade deal. Obama has little margin for error as his administration and supporters of the deal press lawmakers to back a 12-nation pact...
TPPA deal will be made public in 2 weeks, says minister Malaysian Insider ...The contents of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) will be made public in two weeks' time, Second International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Seri Ong Ka Chuan said. He said as the government had concluded the TPP with the parties involved, the next step is to present the details to the people. It will then be brought before a special parliamentary session in January next year for debate and a vote by the 222 lawmakers...
Text Still Secret One Month After TPP Deal (opinion) Huffington Post ...Negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a 12 nation agreement seven years in the making, were finally concluded a month ago. Yet the Obama administration still has not released the text of the agreement. Not even to Congress, much less the public. But this has not stopped the United States Trade Representative (USTR), the office responsible for the negotiations, from making outlandish claims about how great the TPP is...
Political Expert Calls US-Initiated Trans-Pacific Partnership ‘Nonsense’ Sputnik ...The US invited Russia and China to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). According to political expert Alexei Skopin, the United States pursues its own goals creating such partnerships and does not always declare them openly. The Agreement on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which includes 12 countries so far, was reached on October 5 and is designed to create a free trade area (FTA) in the Asia-Pacific region...
An Urgent Warning Of What TTIP Has In Store Morning Star ...Canada is the most sued country in the “developed” world, and that should sound alarm bells in Britain. Several weeks ago hundreds of thousands of people across Europe and Britain marched to protest against the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), a massive planned new trade deal between Europe and the US...
Canada presses pause on austerity after Justin Trudeau’s election win The Guardian ...While Canada is hitting the pause button on austerity, the UK chancellor, is on fast-forward. George Osborne’s 2015 spending review will see a further £20bn cut from public spending to achieve balance by 2019, a move which follows a halving of the deficit over the course of the last parliament...
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Kentucky elects right-to-work governor Politico ...Tea Party Republican Matt Bevin beat Democrat Jack Conway for Kentucky’s governorship Tuesday night, an upset victory in one of the last strongholds for Democrats in the right-to-work South. Activists on both side of the right-to-work debate led aggressive outreach in the run-up to the election, and this loss surely stings for the AFL-CIO and its affiliate Working America...
GOP candidates for governor talk right-to-work, rural issues in first forum Columbia Missourian ...It didn't take Republican gubernatorial candidates long to hit their party's bread and butter Tuesday night. A full choir of supporters and GOP lawmakers at Missouri Farm Bureau headquarters applauded promises to ban mandatory union fees with a right-to-work law and resist Medicaid expansion...
Thanks To Virginia Reforms, These People Are Voting For The First Time In Decades Think Progress ...Before McAuliffe’s reforms, felons in Virginia had a particularly hard time becoming full citizens after their convictions. In most states, voting rights are automatically restored once a felon is released from prison. But in Virginia, felons were required to first get off parole or probation, then file a voting rights restoration application with the governor’s office, a process that was supposed to take 45 to 60 days but often took much longer...
Leading Fight Against Money in Politics, Maine Voters Back Clean Elections Common Dreams ...Maine voters on Tuesday reaffirmed their desire to keep the influence of big money out of politics by passing the Clean Elections Initiative, a move that campaigners say serves as a "flare to a nation" desperate to "reclaim control of our democracy" in the wake of the Citizens United Supreme Court decision. According to the Bangor Daily News, the Initiative passed 55 to 45 percent...
Scandal, Explicit Emails, Behind The Most Expensive Supreme Court Race In American History Think Progress ...$15,850,297. That’s how much candidates and interested groups have spent to influence the race for three seats on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, according to Justice At Stake, a watchdog group which tracks state judicial races. And that number is only likely to grow as it is based on records that have already been filed in this election...
SEIU starts competing effort to put minimum wage on California ballot SacBee ...California’s largest labor union on Tuesday unveiled its own bid to increase the statewide minimum wage, setting up dueling pay measures aimed for next year’s ballot amid persistent concerns over income inequality. The proposed initiative, supported by the Service Employees International Union’s state council, would boost the base wage to $15 per hour by 2020...
Portland, Maine, Rejects $15 Minimum Wage Huffington Post ...In a rare setback for living wage activists, voters in Portland, Maine, shot down a $15 minimum wage proposal on Tuesday, voting against a ballot measure that would have doubled the wage floor in just four years. Under the proposal, all employers with 500 or more workers would have had to pay at least $15 per hour by 2017...
The Puerto Rican Debt Crisis: Tax Breaks Offered to Rich While Austerity Measures Imposed on Poor Democracy Now ...The Obama administration recently warned Puerto Rico faces a humanitarian crisis unless Congress takes steps to address its crushing debt. The White House wants lawmakers to approve bankruptcy protection for the U.S. territory, expand Medicaid and impose a control board to oversee Puerto Rico’s finances...
U.S. LABOR
NLRB hearing to delay UAW election at Chattanooga's VW plant Times Free Press ...A union election planned for later this week at Volkswagen's Chattanooga plant is expected to be delayed due to a hearing over whether the 164 maintenance workers slated to vote are too small of a unit. Attorneys for VW and the United Auto Workers argued today at a National Labor Relations Board hearing in Chattanooga that will continue into Wednesday...
Slight majority support GM-UAW deal so far The Detroit News ...With about one-third of ballots cast, voting on General Motors Co.’s tentative agreement with the UAW is close, with a slight majority of workers supporting the deal. Voting results at some larger facilities have been tight and roughly two-thirds of the 52,600 hourly workers have not had the opportunity to vote yet. The union is expected to release final results as early as this weekend...
USW files additional unfair labor charges against ATI Business Times ...The United Steelworkers have filed a total of 18 unfair labor practice charges against Allegheny Technologies Inc., the union said in an update to its members Monday. The pending charges cover ATI's decision to lock out more than 2,000 union employees in August as well as the company's conduct at the bargaining table, according to the union...
The Uphill Battle For Strippers’ Rights Think Progress ...Some dancers flock to the industry in part because of perceived scheduling flexibility, but they often end up just as binding as many other jobs. Most clubs require a dancer to come in a minimum number of days a week and assign them to either a day or night shift. Some also tell dancers what time to show up – even charging them a fine if they’re late...
Wages for top earners soared in 2014: Fly top 0.1 percent, fly EPI ...After dipping slightly in 2013, annual earnings of the top 1.0 percent of wages earners grew 4.9 percent in 2014, and the top 0.1 percent’s earnings grew 8.9 percent, according to our analysis of the latest Social Security Administration wage data. This analysis provides the first look at the likely trend of the household incomes of the top 1.0 percent...
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
How Bathroom Fears Conquered Transgender Rights in Houston The Atlantic ...After a hard-fought campaign that drew national attention from Hollywood celebrities and presidential. candidates, voters rejected the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, or Proposition 1, handing a victory to conservative critics who argued that its expansive protections for transgender people could endanger women and children...
Republicans Demonize Disabled Social Security Recipients in Latest Budget Alternet ...Having failed in numerous frontal assaults on Social Security, the Republican congressional leadership several years ago adopted a new strategy for dismantling the program: attack and demonize Disability Insurance, which they consider to be its soft underbelly. With last week’s passage of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, they drew blood...
New Study Shows Antarctic Melting Approaching 'Unstoppable' Tipping Point Common Dreams ...A new study published Monday warns that "unstoppable" melting in West Antarctica could make a three-meter increase in sea level "unavoidable." According to researchers at Germany's Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, the vulnerable Amundsen Sea sector of West Antarctica "has most likely been destabilized." They point to recent studies indicating that this area of the ice continent is "the first element in the climate system about to tip"...
How GOP & HMOs Undercut Obamacare's Nonprofit Option, Leaving 500K Uninsured Democracy Now ...As the Obamacare open enrollment period begins, it’s the end for many healthcare co-ops, leaving hundreds of thousands of people scrambling to find coverage. The co-ops were founded to offer a cheaper alternative on insurance exchanges after Democrats stopped demanding a public option. But since going live three years ago, the co-ops have faced major cutbacks from the Republican-controlled Congress...
Tuesday, November 3, 2015
Voting begins for Clark County school workers
According to Local 14 Secretary-Treasurer Larry Griffith, the vote for representation by simple majority was a result of support staff's determination for strong union representation:
The unit first came to us in the early 2000s seeking strong union representation. The odds were against them but they never gave up. I couldn’t be prouder of this unit’s determination. Finally, we will put an end to the pay cuts and concessions by uniting at the bargaining table to win support staff a strong Teamster-backed contract.CCSD support staff has already voted overwhelmingly two times in favor of Local 14 representation – in a vote tabulated Feb. 3 and in 2006. Despite democratically voting to join the Teamsters, in both elections a supermajority, 50-percent-plus-1 of eligible voters was required to unseat the unit’s current representation, the Education Support Employees Association (ESEA).
After Local 14 overwhelmingly won with 71 percent of workers voting to join the Teamsters over the ESEA in February, however, the workers rallied in protest. Following the vote, on Feb. 12, support staff united once again at the Employee Management Relation Board (EMRB).
This time their voice could no longer be ignored and the EMRB ruled in favor of a third election – this time by a simple-majority vote – take place, acknowledging that the supermajority election rule for the support staff was not in the best interest of the employees. After hundreds of workers joined Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa on stage at the Teamsters Unity Conference this year, CCSD support staff launched a new campaign. This time, the rules are fair and democratic.
The excitement for Teamster representation is at an all-time high, says Carlos Pinto, head custodian at CCSD:
It’s been a long time coming, but change is finally here. We are all thrilled to become members of Local and win back what we have lost. We can’t wait to win a Teamster contract that will provide the respect workers deserve and the security our families need.
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
Congress needs to solve stagnant wages
The U.S. economic recovery is not what it seems. Yes, it is clear that the unemployment rate has fallen dramatically since the Great Recession ended. But the benefits that usually follow such a change, like wage hikes for everyday Americans, have been much harder to find.
In fact, low- and middle-income earners are struggling just to reach their salary levels before the recession. Nearly 15 percent of Americans lived in poverty last year, and the household median income hasn't budged in recent years. Why is that? There are a multitude of reasons.
As former labor reporter Steven Greenhouse wrote in The New York Times:
It begins by having Congress reject lousy trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would ship thousands of jobs overseas and reduces the wages for many that are left behind. Elected officials also need to invest in infrastructure, which in turn will create good-paying jobs. And they must allow workers to organize for more power and fairness on the job.
Lawmakers can no longer turn a blind eye to the nation's workers. They need to be recognized and represented. That means approving policies that help them, not just big business.
In fact, low- and middle-income earners are struggling just to reach their salary levels before the recession. Nearly 15 percent of Americans lived in poverty last year, and the household median income hasn't budged in recent years. Why is that? There are a multitude of reasons.As former labor reporter Steven Greenhouse wrote in The New York Times:
In fact, the labor market is a lot softer than a 5.1 percent jobless rate would indicate. For one thing, the percentage of Americans who are working has fallen considerably since the recession began. This disappearance of several million workers — as labor force dropouts they are not factored into the jobless rate — has meant continued labor market weakness, which goes far to explain why wage increases remain so elusive. End of story, many economists say.
But work force experts assert that economists ignore many other factors that help explain America’s stubborn wage stagnation. Outsourcing, offshoring and imports exert a steady downward tug on wages. Labor unions have lost considerable muscle. Many employers have embraced pay-for-performance policies that often mean nice bonuses for the few instead of across-the-board raises for the many.The Teamsters have been sticking up for workers on this issue for years, and renewed that push as part of our "Let's Get America Working" platform rolled out in September. Finally, it seems others are beginning to take notice as well. Income inequality is becoming rampant in this country. But how do we overcome it?
It begins by having Congress reject lousy trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would ship thousands of jobs overseas and reduces the wages for many that are left behind. Elected officials also need to invest in infrastructure, which in turn will create good-paying jobs. And they must allow workers to organize for more power and fairness on the job.
Lawmakers can no longer turn a blind eye to the nation's workers. They need to be recognized and represented. That means approving policies that help them, not just big business.
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