People Before Profit blog

AFL-CIO tells Bush and Congress: Get real on the economy

Fri, 31 Jan 2003 08:46:00 +0000

see related story below

The AFL-CIO charged in a Jan. 27 report that, despite President Bush’s rosy claims, the economy is in worse shape than it was two years ago when measured by all the key indicators important to working families.

“Americans feel anxious about the economy for serious reasons,” said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney in a statement that accompanied the report. “Jobs are fewer today than two years ago, individuals are filing for bankruptcy at a record pace, health care is more expensive and less available, and states are cutting back on basic services important to families – from education to health care to public safety.”

The report, titled “A Check-Up on the Nation’s Economic Health at the Mid-Point of the Bush Presidency,” was released on the eve of George W. Bush’s State of the Union address in which he was expected to tout his tax cut for the rich as a panacea and defend his drive for war on Iraq despite surging opposition at home and abroad. The AFL-CIO report points to what it calls “economic markers”:

* The nation has lost 1.7 million jobs over the past two years after adding five million jobs in 1999 and 2000. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, there are 2.5 job seekers for every job opening.

* Unemployment is at an eight-year high and expected to grow.

* The number of people without health insurance rose to nearly 41 million in 2001. Most Americans without insurance – 80 percent – are in working families.

* Workers’ health insurance premium payments rose 27 percent for single coverage and 16 percent for family coverage in 2002.

* Personal bankruptcy filings in the three-month period ending last September set the national record for any three-month period in U.S. history.

* States are experiencing their worst financial crisis since World War II, with cumulative three-year budget shortfalls that exceed $180 billion, forcing states to cut hours out of the school week, raised college tuition, delayed construction of schools, cut public health services, cut child care assistance, ended youth violence programs, stopped jury trials and raised taxes.

Bush’s only answer to the “deep concerns” of America’s families is another “flawed and unfair” trillion-dollar-trickle-down tax plan that will not create jobs, will not improve schools or public safety, will not restore health care coverage or retirement savings of workers and their families, will not help the states and will not strengthen and protect Social Security, the labor federation charged.

The study says the Bush $674 billion plan to restructure the tax code – with a price tag of at least a trillion dollars when debt payments are added – will provide “lots of benefits” for the very wealthy but will not reverse the “breathtaking turnaround in the economy” that has occurred during Bush’s watch. Nor, the report says, will the Bush plan “restore economic security for ordinary Americans.”

The AFL-CIO says it is time to “get real” about creating jobs, improving health care, education and reining in corporate abuse, strengthening basic programs such as Social Security and Medicare. To that end the AFL-CIO report calls for a six point program that meets the nation’s needs:

1) Tax cuts that broadly benefit most families, such as credits for all workers along with a fully refundable $1,000 child tax credit and elimination of the marriage penalty;

2) Financial help for the states so they can restore critical services – such as education, health care and public safety – and avert further damage;.

3) Investment in schools, transportation and transit systems, clean water and our industrial base to create jobs and spur growth;

4) Meaningful health care reform that will make high quality, affordable care available to all and include prescription drug coverage under Medicare for the elderly and people with disabilities.

5) Real retirement security that will strengthen and protect Social Security for all, safeguard workers’ guaranteed pension benefits and protect savings in 401(k) plans; and

6) An increase in the minimum wage to correct the gross underpayment of low-wage workers, many of whom remain poor despite working full time.

Unlike the Bush giveaway to the rich, the AFL-CIO agenda will provide real economic security to the nation’s families “today, tomorrow and in the years ahead,” the report states.

The AFL-CIO’s “Check-Up on the Nation’s Economic Health” ends where it began:

* More workers are losing their jobs and fewer employers are adding jobs.

* Health care coverage is eroding and costs are rising.

* Productivity is up but workers wages are flat.

* Manufacturing is reeling.

* States are wrestling with the worst fiscal crisis in more than half a century.

“This is the real economy for America’s families, one in which the economic tailspin that began in March 2001 has not slowed or reversed,” the authors of the report conclude, adding: “Congress and the president must get real about the economy’s problems and solutions. We will not boost the economy in the short term or build in the long term unless we have a plan that invests in what matters most: education, health care, good jobs, secure retirements and homeland security. That is what America and Americans need – and that is what the president and congress should give them.”

-----------------------------------------------

The ranks of the unemployed have grown steadily since the end of 2000, until today some 10 million workers who want jobs are unable to find them. As this table shows, African-American and women workers have been particularly hard hit.

Bad as these numbers are, they tell only part of the story. People are unemployed for longer periods today, with nearly 1.9 million being out of work for at least six months – up 66 percent since December 2001 and triple the number in December 2000. Another 1.4 million workers have been looking for work for at least three and one-half months.

Worse yet, record numbers of unemployed workers have exhausted their regular state-provided unemployment benefits and the benefits provided under the 13-week extension provided by the federal government in March 2002. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that 2.2 million unemployed workers have run out of all unemployment benefits and that one million of these workers.

The author can be reached at Fgab708@aol.com

---------------------------------------------

Figures don’t lie, but liars figure

Many people – perhaps even most – get confused when confronted with numbers and terms like “average” or “median” or “quintile” or any of the many terms used to convey economic information. And such is the case today as President Bush attempts to take advantage of this confusion to sell his tax cuts for the rich as a “Program for Jobs and Economic Growth.”

For starters, there’s his claim that 92 million taxpayers will save an average of $1,083 in 2003, despite the fact that 80 percent of taxpayers will receive less than that amount.

“How can this be?” you ask.

The answer lies in the way the numbers are put together and the difference between an average tax cut and the tax cut for the typical household. The administration gets its $1,083 figure by a little sleight of hand, combining the average tax cut for a few at the top of the heap with the average cut for those in the middle and eureka!: 92 million taxpayers will get tax cuts averaging $1,083.

Trouble is, that’s what Bush once callled “fuzzy math.” Consider a hypothetical case where one taxpayer gets a $10,500 cut and nine others receive a $500 cut. The average cut of all 10 is $1,500, but 90 percent will get cuts of only one-third that size.

According to the Brookings Institution:

* the average tax cut for taxpayers in the middle fifth of the income spectrum would be $265, one-fourth of the so-called “average.”

* almost half of all taxpayers – 49 percent – would receive cuts of less than $100.

* the average tax cut for the bottom 80 percent of tax filers would be $239, while those in the next to the top fifth of tax filers would get an average cut of only $611

* the top one percent of filers would receive an average cut of $24,000, while those with incomes over $1 million would get cuts averaging $88,900.

And there are other “facts” – like the claim that “23 million elderly taxpayers would receive an average tax cut of $1,384.” According to the Tax Policy Center (TPC) only 3.4 million elderly taxpayers would get cuts of this size or greater, while 77 percent would get less.

And what about the claim that six million single women with children would get an average tax cut of $541? The TPC says that 85 percent of such women would receive cuts of less than $500 and 49 percent would get nothing.

As has been said: “figures don’t lie, but liars figure.”

– Fred Gaboury

PDF version of 'AFL-CIO tells Bush and Congress: Get real on the economy'

Layoffs hit P&W workers

Fri, 31 Jan 2003 04:16:00 +0000

HARTFORD, Conn. – Connecticut continues to reel from layoffs, as 600 Pratt & Whitney (P&W) workers join the ranks of 2,800 state workers who received pink slips in the last week. Daily rallies by thousands of state workers and those affected by loss of essential services have received the support of International Association of Machinists (IAM) District 26, which represents workers at P&W, the largest industrial employer in the state. The Machinists Union is now preparing a contractual and legal fight against their members’ job loss, and is seeking support in return.

United Technologies, the parent company of P&W shamelessly announced the layoffs at the same time that a 54 percent increase in their fourth quarter earnings made headlines. UTC also announced that 2002 profits were up 15 percent. In 2002 UTC also bought back $700 million worth of their own stock, substantially boosting executive compensation.

The elimination of 217 hourly jobs put 189 workers at the Middletown P&W plant and 28 in East Hartford on the unemployment rolls. Of the 217 total, 19 “voluntarily” took retirement or layoff packages.

Many of the workers had a quarter-century of service to the company. One laid off inspector had been a Pratt employee for 36 years. On the other end of the spectrum, a number of relatively new jet engine mechanics also were let go, after being recruited by Pratt from across the country and urged to relocate here.

The Machinists Union succeeded in reducing the number of job cuts by about 100 people. However, union proposals to avert any lay-offs were dismissed by the company.

Senator Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) took the lead in efforts by the state’s Congressional delegation to delay or consider alternatives to these job cuts, however, when Dodd and others met with UTC representatives the company refused the proposals.

“These layoffs could not come at a worse time for our members and the people of Connecticut. Unemployment is rising and state services are being cut. It will be hard on Pratt workers who were laid off today,” said District 26 Assistant Directing Business Representative James Parent.

“The real shame is that every one of these jobs could be maintained if management felt a stronger commitment to their employees. These workers make management rich,” Parent said.

Facing lay-offs and long-term unemployment, members of many different unions here are organizing to ride on the Connecticut Peace Train to the demonstration in New York City Feb. 15 under the banner, “Money for jobs, not war!”

The author can be reached at joelle.fishman@pobox.com

PDF version of 'Layoffs hit P&W workers'

Guilty coal operator takes no action

Thu, 30 Jan 2003 11:16:00 +0000

TUSCALOOSA COUNTY, Ala. – This is the second bitter winter for 13 families in Brookwood, Ala. They are awaiting a full accounting of the worst coal mining disaster in 17 years and the “official” report from the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) released in December did not to relieve their pain nor bring justice to this tight-knit community of 1,483.

On Sept. 23, 2001, two explosions rocked the Jim Walter Industries (JWR), the coal operator, number five mine in Brookwood. At the end of the day, Gaston Adams Jr., 56, Ray Ashworth, 53, Nelson Banks, 52, Dave Blevins, 52, Clarence Boyd, 38, Wendell Johnson, 52, John Knox, 44, Dennis Mobly, 56, Charles Nail, 59, Joe Riggs, 51, Charles Smith, 44, Joe Sorah, 46, Terry Stewart, 44, were dead and Tony Kay, 49, Michael McIe, 42, and Skip Palmer, 42, were injured. All were members of United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) Local 2368. About 1,400 county residents work at the JWR mining complex.

David Lauriski – MSHA secretary appointed by President Bush in May 2001, former General Manager of Energy West Mining Company and former chairman of the Utah Mining Association – delivered the government’s findings in person in Brookwood. JWR is guilty, said Lauriski, of eight violations directly related to the disaster and 18 other violations at the mine. Although each violation carries a $55,000 fine, for a total of $1.4 million, none were levied. The only action MSHA ordered was the re-organization of the company’s emergency evacuation procedures.

On May 1, 2002, less than eight months after the fatal explosions, MSHA allowed JWR to re-open the number five mine.

Through the third quarter of 2002, ending in September, the total profits from the company’s entire natural resources division, including number five mine, skyrocketed compared to 2001, from $198 million to $406 million, according to company reports.

The federal safety report took 14 months. The agency brought in investigators from five coal-producing states outside of Alabama. MSHA found that at 5:17 p.m. on Sept. 23, a roof collapsed in one section of the mine. Rocks buried a battery charging station and damaged the ventilation system. Methane gas filled the section.

A spark from the battery station ignited the methane injuring four miners, one so badly he could not walk. Methane continued to build, now mixed with volatile coal dust. News spread through the mine of the explosion and miners came to rescue the injured miner.

The electricity was shut off, except for a traffic signal for the underground rail system. As miners approached the damaged section, the rail traffic signal ignited the methane and coal dust mixture setting off the second deadly explosion.

MSHA said that coal dust was a “critical factor in the severity of the second explosion.” Federal safety standards require coal mines to be blanketed with powdered limestone to dilute the volatile coal dust and prevent it from fueling an explosion.

The UMWA charges that the investigation does not go far enough and will issue its own findings. While MSHA’s Dec. 11 report acknowledges serious safety violations – a number of which were cited for high negligence – and supports the UMWA’s findings of pre-existing hazardous conditions, said union president Cecil Roberts, “we feel it does not represent a thorough examination of all the facts in the investigation.”

“We concur with MSHA report that management’s failed emergency plan as well as JWR’s failure to control mine roof problems, failure to properly examine the mine and failure to control explosive coal dust were clear factors in the deaths of 13 miners.”

However, the union will identify other elements, Roberts said, and miners and their families are anxiously awaiting an internal review of MSHA to explain why the agency failed to enforce the law prior to the explosions. “If those violations had been followed up on and rectified, could lives have been saved?” he concluded.

In 1999, MSHA records show that all three mines, including number five, in the JWR Brookwood complex were cited a total 600 times. MSHA cited mine number five 10 times for “significant and substantial safety violations” in the two months preceeding the explosions.

Contributing to company’s soaring profits for 2002, is their methane gas business, Black Warrior. It employs 12 workers and is an integral part of the Brookwood complex. Even the “Birmingham Business Journal” ironically commented on Oct. 8, 2001, less than month following the fatal explosions, “Meanwhile, the deadly methane gas blamed for the two mine explosions continues to be a big money maker for the company.”

The three mines comprising the Brookwood complex are the deepest in North America and number five, at a half mile, is the deepest. Methane gas is plentiful at these depths and a constant companion for miners.

The UMWA has established a relief fund for the families: UMWA 2368, P.O. Box 99, Brookwood, AL 35444.

PDF version of 'Guilty coal operator takes no action'

Sugar workers win strike victory

Thu, 30 Jan 2003 10:54:00 +0000

BALTIMORE – Domino Sugar workers voted overwhelmingly, Jan. 11 to ratify a new three-year contract, crowning with victory their 35-day strike at the refinery in the inner harbor here.

It was the first strike at the plant since 1949 and the 330 members of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 392 voiced pride at their militant unity, braving icy winds and snow and going without paychecks during the Christmas season.

“Not one worker crossed the picketline,” said Al “Gramps” Schanfort. He was standing with dozens of other Domino workers outside the Knights of Columbus hall in South Baltimore where they had gathered for the ratification vote.

It was a victory that the workers forced the new owners of Domino, Cuban expatriates, Alfonzo and Pepe Fanjul, of Palm Beach, Florida, to drop their plan to consolidate the pensions and health benefits of sugar workers here with sugar workers at refineries in Florida, New York, and Louisiana. “We got back another $3 in our pensions,” Schanfert told the World. “It went from $42 to $45 per month for each year service. That’s still far below industry standards of $65. We got nationwide support because of the retirement issue. Workers all across the country are losing their pensions. The Fanjuls were trying to walk on guys like me who are about to retire.”

The agreement maintains current benefits and preserves the independence of Local 392’s pension plan. The workers also won back two paid holidays, Veterans Day and New Year’s Eve that the company wanted to eliminate. It provides a 2 percent wage increase for all workers and improves the health care plan.

Local 392 President Alex Hamilton said, “I want to thank everyone who supported us in this struggle for a fair contract. Without the generous donations of the good people of Baltimore and our UFCW brothers and sisters, our fight would have been more difficult, our spirits lower.”

Local 392 sent busloads of workers, called “Truth Squads” to New York, Florida and Georgia to meet with fellow sugar workers, winning strong solidarity. The Baltimore community honored Local 392’s request for a boycott of Domino Sugar and also contributed to their strike fund. (Readers of the People’s Weekly World collected several hundred dollars in donations).

Matthew Cardwell told the World, “I had just finished my 90-day probationary period when we went on strike. I was attracted to this job by the benefits and wages good enough to support my wife and two kids. After the Fanjuls took over and tried to take away our benefits, I had second thoughts about staying at Domino. But we all stood together and fought for each others jobs. I think I’m going to stay.”

The author can be reached at greenerpastures21212@yahoo.com

Martin Luther King, Jr. day in Jackson, Miss.

Fri, 24 Jan 2003 09:18:00 +0000

JACKSON, Miss. – The annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Day march here received an infusion of energy when more than 100 participants from the AFL-CIO Martin Luther King Holiday Conference joined the parade. Linda Chavez-Thompson, AFL-CIO executive vice president, served as one of the parade’s grand marshals.

The unusually cold weather did not prevent hundreds of families from lining both sides of Martin Luther King Jr .Drive in order to see and hear the 30 marching bands and drill teams, one of them from as far away as Chicago.

Marching under the banner, “Dr. King’s Dream: What the World Needs Today,” local businesses, churches, clubs and service organizations also participated. Members of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees (UNITE!) carried large signs saying, “Stop the Injustice. Don’t Shop At Fred’s.”

Fred’s is an anti-union distribution company that owns a variety low-price stores in towns throughout the South and uses intimidation to keep its employees from joining the union. Along the way UNITE members answered questions from the people who then promised their support.

Contingents from the Transportation Union, Federation of Government Employees and the Machinists Union marched with steelworkers, autoworkers, teamsters as well as with members of the United Food and Commercial Workers.

Whenever the march stopped, union members sang and soon everyone was singing, “We are the Union, The mighty, mighty union!” and joined in a call and response chant of “Power, power, who has the power?” “The Union Has The Power – Union Power!”

One union participant, Tom Allen, carried a large sign saying, “No war with Iraq” on one side with King’s call to “find an alternative to war and bloodshed” on the other. Loudspeakers stationed along the route carried Dr. King’s speech at Riverside Church in which he announced his opposition to the Vietnam War.

The aroma of hot dogs and burgers cooking on grills filled the air. Young vendors sold soda pop and snacks. Participants in the March threw mini candy bars to the children along the way. Bea Reed, a member of the Mississippi Alliance of State Employees, waved to her 82-year-old father who has never missed the King Day March.

Chavez-Thompson said unionists had joined the march because, “We wanted to join in with the workers in Jackson, Mississippi, to continue to advocate the fulfillment of Dr. King’s dream of economic and social justice for all. It’s the most exciting and historical parade I’ve ever seen for a small city. It was just wonderful.”

The author can be reached at phillyrose1@hotmail.com

AFL-CIO King holiday observance: Rep. challenges Lott to stand for affirmative action

Fri, 24 Jan 2003 09:10:00 +0000

JACKSON, Miss. – Gathered here for the AFL-CIO’s Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Observance, over 200 union leaders and members heard Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson condemn George Bush’s most recent attack on affirmative action. The Bush administration’s “friend of the court brief,” filed in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court, challenges the pro-diversity admissions policies of the University of Michigan.

Recalling that, “Just a few weeks ago millions heard [Mississippi Republican Senator] Trent Lott on BET-TV declare his support for affirmative action and social and economic justice,” Rep. Thompson announced, “Tomorrow I will ask Senator Lott to file a friend of the court brief in favor of affirmative action” in the University of Michigan case.

The annual AFL-CIO King Observance, held Jan. 16 through 20 to commemorate Dr. King’s civil rights legacy, reached out to the community and to joined with Mississippi workers in demonstrations at the State Capitol and at the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

The rally in front of the Medical Center was in support of several employees fired unjustly and to protest racial discrimination at the hospital. Rally participants lined up along the street in front of the Medical Center chanting, “AFL-CIO says racism must go!” as drivers in passing traffic honked their horns in support.

On the final day of the four-day observance, supporters joined members of the Mississippi Alliance of State Employees/CWA (MASE/CWA) on the steps of the State Capitol to demand adequate pay and the establishment of a Department of Labor for their state. State Rep. James Evans of Jackson said that Mississippi is the only state in the country without a Department of Labor, which is, he says, “needed to protect the rights and interests of workers.”

Brenda Scott, president of MASE/CWA Local 3570, pointed out the challenges faced by the 29,000 state employees in Mississippi, a “right to work” state. “The average salary for a state employee is $24,000, but 61 percent earn less than that,” Scott said. Scott, who led the organizing effort that has brought 3,100 members into Local 3570, said that before state workers had a union their pay was the lowest in the nation and now it is 44th.

Speakers at the Town Hall Meeting, which kicked off the Commemoration weekend, linked the crisis of today with King’s struggles.

Central Mississippi, the birthplace of civil rights heroes Fannie Lou Hamer and James Meredith, is “hallowed ground,” said State Representative Jim Evans. “This is where the Freedom Rides came.”

Bill Lucy, president of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, reminded the crowd that King talked about peace and the elimination of poverty as he fought for and organized the powerless. Lucy cautioned labor activists to focus on the problem at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and not to allow themselves to be diverted.

Harvey Johnson, first African-American mayor of Jackson, greeted the opening plenary, followed by Robert Shaffer, president of the Mississippi AFL-CIO, and AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Linda Chavez-Thompson. Shaffer and Chavez-Thompson both related their early childhood of poverty and the hard work of picking cotton.

Chavez-Thompson went on to say, “We have a big job on our hands. We are up against a president who is against affirmative action, social security, quality education and Medicare. Lott was pushed out because he didn’t know how to keep his mouth shut, not because of his beliefs. Pickering [one of Bush’s latest judicial nominees] has the same beliefs and now he’s being pushed on us again.”

Noel Beasley, international vice president of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees, linked the civil rights and peace activist histories of state universities at Kent, Ohio, and Jackson, Mississippi, connecting the anti-Vietnam war movement to the civil rights movement and then relating it to what is going on presently. In 1970, Beasley said, “Few people knew that the police fired into the Jackson State dormitories killing two [African-American] students. The two movements were not united against a common enemy. It was Dr. King who was bringing people together, black and white, for the Poor People’s March and against the Vietnam War.”

Hollywood actor, director and activist Mario Van Peebles paid tribute to the struggles of organized labor noting, “While the civil rights movement enabled African Americans to ride anywhere on the bus, it was the Black labor movement that gave us the money to ride on the bus.”

The author can be reached at phillyrose1@hotmail.com

Police car hits and kills GE striker

Fri, 24 Jan 2003 09:06:00 +0000

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (PAI) – Kjeston M. Rogers, a working single mother of three teenagers and activist for International Union of Electronic Workers/CWA Local 761 at General Electric’s Louisville appliance park, was hit and killed by a police car while crossing the road from an IUE/CWA picket line on Jan. 14. She was 40.

Rogers and other Local 761 members, along with 17,500 of their IUE and United Electrical Workers colleagues, were walking picket lines in a two-day strike against GE over company-imposed health care cost increases.

Union leaders saluted Rogers, continued the strike through its scheduled end at midnight Jan. 15, and pledged to continue fighting GE’s health care cost hikes. They also lowered flags to half-staff at the Local 761 union hall.

Rogers, who helped assemble GE dishwashers, was a committed unionist. One co-worker said Rogers was angry and scared about rising health care costs. “I’d like her to be remembered for doing something just and for the right cause,” said Local 761 President Randy Payton. Shaken unionists donned black armbands.

“The entire IUE/CWA family shares in the sorrow of this sad, tragic event,” union President Ed Fire said. “We are attempting to learn the facts, and IUE-CWA’s general counsel has been assigned to work with local counsel to investigate.”

AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney said unionists “will remember with great pride the courage of this woman who fought to improve the future for all working families trying to afford decent health care.”

The driver, Hollow Creek, Ky., police officer Roy Truax, was uninjured. Witnesses told news media Truax was not speeding. His car hit Rogers at 5 a.m.

Rogers was the first striker to die in years. One recent serious injury on a picket line occurred in 1995: A company-hired private security guard beat Teamsters Local 22 member Vito Sciuto into a coma during the Detroit newspaper lockout.

GE stayed adamant about its health care cost shifting. It imposed huge increases on workers on Jan. 1 in co-pays and premiums despite a record $16 billion profit, and said it would seek more givebacks in bargaining this spring on a new contract.

“If they are so foolish as to come back in (talks in) May and make more demands of our employees and retirees, they know they’ll be risking another strike,” Fire responded.

Longshore union wins victory for all labor

Thu, 23 Jan 2003 09:37:00 +0000

Commentary

The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) membership approved this week their contract by a vote of nearly 90 percent. This culminated a life and death battle into one of the most significant labor victories of our times.

The 2002 battle on the west coast waterfront was a class war fought new millennium style. The Bush administration colluded with the global maritime industry in an unprecedented crusade to bust the ILWU.

Using the tragedy of Sept. 11, with a “national and economic security” cover, the Bush/maritime industry plan was to render the ILWU powerless without the right to strike, and eventually without a union at all. They employed the courts, Congress and the media. For the first time in history, the Taft-Hartley Act was used against labor in response to an employer lockout. Bush even threatened military intervention.

What was achieved by the union in the face of the Bush/corporate gang-up is phenomenal. The ILWU valiantly took on employers, the White House, Republicans in Congress, the world’s most powerful retailers, and the pro-corporate media. There is no doubt that this is a Harry Bridges union.

The leaders and members lived up to their union’s left legacy. The union fought smart with incredible rank and file discipline in the face of unconscionable employer maneuvering and provocation.

Most important is that the ILWU showed the power of solidarity by forming a strategic global, national labor-community coalition front, which included support from elected officials at every level of government.

The national AFL-CIO prioritized the ILWU battle with 20 of their staff assigned, weekly joint strategy sessions, and AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka helped at the contract table, in the Congress and against retailers.

Dockers and transport workers around the world including Brazil, Japan, Sweden, France, Canada and Spain remained on alert to employ their muscle to aid their ILWU brothers and sisters.

Not only did the ILWU save the union but it also has won big on the three issues that the membership instructed the negotiating committee to prioritize. The union has won the best pension plan in the history of the labor movement, the cost to the employers of providing the same benefits will more than double over the six years, and won on all the basic union jurisdiction issues.

While new technology will remove future clerks’ jobs over time, the agreement is in keeping with the Mechanization and Modernization Agreement signed by Harry Bridges which called for members benefiting with the introduction of technology. All currently working clerks are guaranteed five days work at full pay for the rest of their careers, whether or not there is work. The union jurisdiction victory, which includes bringing back outsourced work to the docks, and the projected growth in the industry are expected to offset the number of jobs lost.

The union accepted a six-year contract, which is generally not considered favorable for labor, but the fact that the historic pension and health package will be in place for six years is a positive for dockers. The ILWU points out that the Republican union busting agenda put tremendous pressure on the union to establish a visible stability in the industry as a means to fend off further legislative attacks.

In view of the Bush agenda, the agreement is a stunning victory. This was Bush’s first big hit in his new “bust the labor movement campaign” and ILWU leaders are proudly saying that he did not succeed with them.

While the Republican agenda in the new Congress may still try to challenge gains made by the ILWU, it is undeniable that the west coast dockers have waged a battle that will benefit the entire labor movement and U.S. people.

The ILWU proved that fighting smart, with unity and discipline in the ranks, along with building the broadest solidarity, is the way to stop the Bush/corporate campaign to destroy the labor movement in our nation. The ILWU is standing tall for us all.

The author is a vice chair of the Communist Party USA and can be reached at evnalarcon@aol.com

Wal-Mart the nations worst workplace bully

Thu, 23 Jan 2003 09:09:00 +0000

With $7 billion in profits squeezed from the labor of one million workers at 3,250 stores across the country last year, Wal-Mart deserves its reputation as the nation’s worst “workplace bully.” But the grievances against the huge discount chain, the largest private employer in the U.S. are not limited to its workers. A vast coalition of grassroots organizations is rising up in rage against Wal-Mart on issues ranging from its importation of sweatshop garments, its predatory underselling of independent retailers in towns and cities across the nation, as well as the starvation wages it pays its workers.

It’s also being challenged for its Scrooge-like practices. Just before Christmas, managers of a Wal-Mart store in Sterling Colorado agreed to permit a local charity group to place a big box outside the store for customers to donate toys for needy tots.

Susan Kraich who had organized the project said she had been elated one day to find the box nearly full. She returned a few hours later to find it empty.

When she confronted the manager, he admitted that he had ordered the toys put back on the shelves on grounds that customers may have stolen them. He told her he would replace the toys only if she produced receipts proving they had been bought in the first place. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to prove what was in there,” Kraich told the press. “I thought since Wal-Mart agreed to place the box, they were agreeing to keep an eye on it.”

Then there’s Wal-Mart’s “dead peasants insurance.”

Wal-Mart takes out life insurance policies on their employees, coyly referred to as “associates.” Wal-Mart names itself as the beneficiary. John Antonich, business agent of United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 88, a meat cutters’ local in St. Louis told the World he had a phone call from a man who told him his wife died after working for Wal-Mart for many years. “He told me he got a check for $10,000 from the life insurance company but Wal-Mart got $40,000,” Antonich said.

In a similar case, he said, a man who had worked decades for Wal-Mart and was near retirement was forced by the company to transfer 18 times from one store to another, a clear attempt to force him to quit. “He died of a heart attack and his widow got $16,000 but Wal-Mart got $50,000,” said Antonich. In Plainview, Tx., Jane Sims lost her husband, Doug, a Wal-Mart worker, from a heart attack after 23 years of marriage. Wal-Mart collected $64,000 but his widow did not get a penny from the life insurance policy. She has sued Wal-Mart for their ghoulish preying on the dead. The practice is illegal in 29 states.

“Wal-Mart puts out all this crap about how benevolent they are. But this dead peasants insurance shows us how heartless they really are,” Antonich said. “This is not just an issue of union rights. It is an issue of the survival of hundreds of small retailers across the country who are being wiped out by Wal-Mart. This company is literally destroying small towns in the Midwest.”

Wal-Mart workers

are fighting back with a blizzard of lawsuits as well as a nationwide struggle to unionize the giant. A federal jury in Portland, Oregon, ruled last Dec. 19 in favor of 400 Wal-Mart workers who filed a lawsuit accusing Wal-Mart of forcing them to work overtime without pay or face being fired.

However, it was not a class action lawsuit so only the 400 workers who joined in the lawsuit will be compensated.

Former Wal-Mart workers Carolyn Thiebes and Betty Alderson, both of whom worked in managerial positions at a Wal-Mart in Salem, filed the lawsuit. Wal-Mart managers, they testified, forced employees to clean up the store after they had clocked out. Wal-Mart managers, they said, reprimanded employees who demanded compensation for this overtime.

“I saw associates do work for the benefit of the company that they weren’t compensated for,” Thiebes testified. Thiebes, who oversaw payroll between 1992 and 1998, said managers instructed her to delete overtime and holiday pay of employees on a weekly basis. When she complained about this wage chiseling, she was transferred from the Salem store to Dallas, about 15 miles away. She was so fed up she found another job. “Morally, it wasn’t the right thing to do. I couldn’t stand it anymore.” Another hearing is scheduled to determine the award for the 400 employees.

At least 39 class action lawsuits in 30 states have been filed against Wal-Mart, making it the second biggest target of civil litigation after the federal government. The company reportedly paid $50 million two years ago to settle an off-the-clock lawsuit covering 69,000 workers in Colorado, and it recently paid $500,000 to 120 workers in Gallup, N.M., to settle an overtime lawsuit.

Two former Wal-Mart workers in Michigan sued Wal-Mart. Lindsay Ann Armantrout, one of the plaintiffs, told the World by telephone that if the court accepts their plea, current Wal-Mart workers in Michigan could benefit from a favorable class action ruling against the company’s bully tactics. Armantrout was hired by the Wal-Mart store in Grandville, Mich. and assigned to the store’s snack bar at $6.75 an hour. “I was pregnant, it was a job and they were hiring,” Armantrout said in a deposition. Armantrout charged that she often worked straight through her shift because she was not allowed to leave the grill unattended and management regularly brushed aside her requests for someone to spell her.

“Sometimes it would be, ‘We don’t have anyone to cover for you’ or ‘I’ll find somebody,’ but they didn’t.” Sometimes she was so tired she would sit at a booth when there were no customers, she said in her deposition. Management reprimanded her for taking these breaks even though they are promised by management.

Armantrout said her wages were shorted in other ways. After she punched out at night, managers demanded that she clean up the store. Even if they didn’t want to stay late, employees were stuck in the store because the doors were locked and they had to wait for a manager to agree to let them leave, she charged.

Armantrout said she demanded to be paid overtime and her bosses promised to “take care of it.” But when she checked her pay stub, the money was not there. “I’d just get tired of asking,” she said.

Martha Lair, the lead attorney in the Michigan lawsuit, told the World in a phone interview from her office in Denver, that if the Michigan court accepts their lawsuit as a class action, it would cover not only former but also 92,000 current employees of Wal-Mart in Michigan. “Our case is similar to the Oregon lawsuit in that Wal-Mart workers in Michigan were also required to work off the clock,” said Lair. “Wal-Mart is reporting billions in income each year and four of the ten richest people in the world are Wal-Mart heirs. They are getting that way because their employees are earning minimal wages and working off the clock. This is a company that has ridden the backs of their hourly employees to extreme profitability.”

Last Nov. 21, tens of thousands joined in a “People’s Campaign – Justice@Wal-Mart” at 125 Wal-Marts in 49 states. The slogan was, “America Can’t Live on a Wal-Mart Paycheck.” It was co-sponsored by the UFCW, the AFL-CIO, National Organization for Women (NOW) and more than 300 other grassroots organizations. “This Day of Action is not about protesting Wal-Mart,” said UFCW President Doug Dority. “We’re here to demonstrate our support for the Wal-Mart workers, our communities and American values.”

On an average, Wal-Mart workers earn $8.50 an hour for 28- to 32-hour workweeks. Over 700,000 Wal-Mart workers are without health insurance and 500,000 walk away from Wal-Mart jobs every year.

Dority pointed out that Wal-Mart faces dozens of lawsuits including the “largest sex discrimination lawsuit in history” and has been found guilty by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) of “illegal surveillance, threats and intimidation” at stores in Denver, Orlando and Paris, Tex., where the UFCW is trying to organize the workers.

“Wal Mart’s claims that its ‘associates’ don’t want union representation rings hollow as the NLRB issues three new complaints against the retail giant,” charged a press release by the UFCW. “Workers in Denver are organizing with the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7 and have suffered from Wal-Mart’s big bully tactics.” Wal-Mart goes on trial Feb. 10 for illegal surveillance of union supporters.

Antonich faxed to the World an internal Wal-Mart manual titled “Wal-Mart: A Manager’s Tool Box to Remaining Union Free.” It is marked “confidential” and lays out in painstaking detail the dirty tricks Wal-Mart managers are expected to use to deny their workers the right of union representation.

“As a member of Wal-Mart’s management team, you are our first line of defense against unionization,” it states. “It is important you be … constantly alert for efforts by a union to organize your associates and constantly alert to any signs your associates are interested in a union.”

The manual proclaims that Wal-Mart’s “open door” policy makes “third party representation” unnecessary. “It is our position every associate can speak for him/herself without having to pay his/her hard-earned money to a union …”

Managers are instructed to instantly telephone the Wal-Mart “union hotline,” at the first sign of union activity. The booklet also warns them to be on the alert for danger signs of worker discontent.

One chapter, “Union Authorization Cards” declares, “In the event you find a union authorization card in your facility or hear associates are attending union meetings and signing authorization cards, it is imperative you contact the Union Hotline at (501) 273-8300 immediately. Wal-Mart must respond to this type of union activity immediately in an effort to stop card signing before the required 30 percent signature have been obtained.”

Several chapters are devoted to ferreting out “salts,” union organizers who are sent into a Wal-Mart store to organize from the inside.

One Wal-Mart program featured in the booklet is “TIPS” for “Threaten, Interrogate, Promise, Spy.” It states, “Know your TIPS. As long as you do not threaten, interrogate, promise or spy on your associates, Wal-Mart, through your efforts, will be able to share its views on unionization in an open, honest and legal manner.” Yet all the practices exposed by the lawsuits and by the NLRB reveal that threats, interrogation, spying and broken promises are Wal-Mart’s stock-in-trade and the way it keeps its employees powerless wage slaves.

Wal-Mart is one of the biggest contributors to the campaign coffers of George W. Bush and the Republican ultra-right, which helps explain why the Bush administration has been so slow to enforce labor rights and anti-discrimination laws against the Arkansas-based firm.

Two years ago, Wal-Mart poured $100,000 into the successful campaign to railroad a “Right-to-Work (for less)” unionbusting referendum, in Oklahoma. They hope to put similar anti-union laws on the books in Colorado, Indiana, Kentucky, Montana, New Hampshire and New Mexico.

“Union members across the country should take note of Wal-Mart’s support of measures like ‘right-to-work’ before they spend any of their union wages at Wal-Mart stores,” said Edwin Hill, president of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

The author can be reached at greenerpastures21212@yahoo.com

PDF version of 'Wal-Mart – the nation’s worst workplace bully'

GE strike hits health care costs

Fri, 17 Jan 2003 04:00:00 +0000

SCHENECTADY, NY – As part of the first national strike against the General Electric Company in over 30 years, members of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) Local 301 walked out of the GE Power Systems factory here, at 11 p.m. on Monday, Jan. 13.

The 2,000-member local went out with 15,500 other union members at 48 GE plants scattered across 23 states to protest an increase in co-payments for health care. The increase, imposed by GE on January 1, will cost each GE worker an estimated $400 per year and affect the families of nearly 145,000 active and retired union members.

Even with wind chill temperatures of

-15, hundreds of UE members set up picket lines at 5 a.m. Tuesday morning and braved the cold all day Tuesday and Wednesday. A giant rat was inflated in front of the plant’s main entrance. As one GE worker explained, “These rats want all the cheese. But, we’re gonna make them share it.”

More than 17,500 members of UE and the International Union of Electrical-Communications Workers of America (IUE-CWA) went on strike against GE Jan. 14-15. But, tragically a IUE-CWA picketer was killed in the early morning hours of Jan. 14 when hit by a police car. The victim, a woman in her mid-forties, was walking from one gate to another at the huge GE appliance factory in Louisville, KY.

Brian, a Local 301 member, who preferred that his last name not be used, said, “GE is expected to make record profits this year. To ask us to pay for higher health care costs is a kick in the teeth.”

“My drug prescription co-pay has tripled from $12 to $36 dollars,” he said, adding that the out-of-pocket expense will be even more difficult for the families of some 24,000 retirees living on a fixed income.

Tom Rexford, who has worked at GE’s Schenectady factory for 25 years, said, “They’ve (GE) got lots of money and they are not willing to share.” He said his health costs aren’t “that bad right now, but you never know.”

The unilateral increase in health care costs are seen by many union members as a sign of things to come. “I’m thinking down the road. If we let GE keep chopping away at our health care what will be next?” asked Rexford.

According to Edward Fire, IUE-CWA president, “GE has provoked a strike through its greed. A company that sets record profits each year – $14.1 billion in 2001 – can afford to maintain health benefits without forcing workers and retirees to pay more.”

Recently GE won the Jobs with Justice (JWJ) “Grinch of the Year” award, outpolling George W. Bush and Wal-Mart. JWJ, a national grassroots coalition that brings together community, student, religious and labor organizations, said “This award is given to those who have done the most damage to working families during the past year.”

According to the UE website, former General Electric CEO Jack Welch has a $9 million a year pension, $22 million in GE stock and an “unconditional and irrevocable” perks and payments contract with GE.

Many union members think Welch’s GE retirement parachute would be a much fairer way to pay the health care cost increases.

The current working agreement expires June 15 and GE has announced its intention to seek “substantial” increases in health care costs when negotiations begin in May. Union members hope that the two-day strike sends a message to GE that they won’t take concessions of any kind sitting down.

The author can be reached at tonypec@pww.org

AFL-CIO joins fight for economic stimulus

Fri, 10 Jan 2003 06:02:00 +0000

The AFL-CIO jumped into the battle for a meaningful stimulus program on Jan. 6 when it issued its “Agenda to Create Jobs and Lift the Economy.” The program calls for putting more money into the hands of those who will spend it and combining it with more investment in schools, roads, bridges, financial aid to states, tax rebates targeted to low and middle-income families, extended unemployment compensation and an increase in the minimum wage.

The AFL-CIO said the program would cost about $260 billion, far less than the $300 billion that will go to the richest taxpayers if President Bush’s plan to eliminate taxes on dividends becomes law.

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney said that instead of jump starting the economy, the president’s recommendations for tax cuts will “choke off resources needed to meet the needs of American families, saddle our children with crippling debt in the future and worsen income inequalities between the very rich and the rest of us.”

Major elements of the “Agenda to Create Jobs and Lift the Economy” include:

* A 26-week retroactive extension of emergency unemployment benefits and provision of health care coverage for the unemployed.

* More financial aid to help states with health care, homeland security, education and to maintain services vital to working families.

* Creation of jobs with accelerated federal investment in schools, roads, bridges, transportation, transit, clean water and rebuilding the nation’s industrial base.

* Tax rebates for all workers, with benefits concentrated toward low – and moderate-income taxpayers.

* An increase in the federal minimum wage to correct gross the underpayment of low-wage workers, many of who work full-time, but remain poor.

The AFL-CIO proposes to pay for its plan by modifying President Bush’s 2001 tax cuts, saying, “Saving some of the resources currently slated to be spent in the future on tax cuts for the wealthy and investing them now in ways that help all Americans is the most responsible and affordable way to spur economic growth.” The labor federation says it opposes cutting taxes on dividends, making the Bush tax cuts permanent, or adding new tax breaks for business.

According to the AFL-CIO the solution is, instead, to create more demand. The Agenda approvingly quotes the chief economist for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce who said, “Two-thirds of the economy is consumption, and that’s what we’re betting on to improve growth next year.”

The AFL-CIO adds that, with some 60 percent of CEOs telling the Business Roundtable they are going to cut payrolls in 2003, government action is needed to jumpstart an economy where the unemployment is 6 percent, and 10 million unemployed workers want jobs and can’t find them and where the number of workers unemployed for more than six months continues to grow.

The labor federation plan concludes, “The fairest and most effective way to reverse 22 months of layoffs and decline and restore vitality to the American economy is with an economic recovery program designed to help those hit hardest by the downturn, create good jobs and improve wages and benefits for all working families.”

– Fred Gaboury

Solidarity and the force of culture

Thu, 09 Jan 2003 11:01:00 +0000

Recently, I was considering the impact of cultural workers, musicians in particular, on the labor movement in light of the Dec. 16 Solidarity Rally in support of Transport Workers Union (TWU) Local 100, in New York City. It is sad that nearly no one in media focused on the larger point of solidarity, unity en masse, when describing the event; they instead chose to focus on the fact that a strike had been averted.

As one who was not only present that night, but also a musical performer on stage, I’d like to officially declare that this was indeed a solidarity rally. So many of New York’s unions were involved in every aspect of this event that TWU rally organizers needed to update the flyer several times by not only adding more endorsers, but also listing those endorsing unions’ issues alongside their own. TWU officials worked on a broad steering committee, and speakers came from many unions, including the Patrolman’s Benevolent Association, the latter being almost unprecedented in NYC labor history.

The feeling in the air was electric! It seemed to all that this was surely a historic moment and one that will not be fleeting. An intermingling, multi-generational body of men and women, collars blue, gray and white, marching, chanting and singing as one. There was no room for the petty rivalries we sometimes feel; all not only seemed supportive of the other, but also became a cheering squad for all – better still, for the cause.

I worked out updated versions of established workers’ songs with my colleague Kirk Kelly, also a topical musician and activist. Together we perform as The Wildcat Singers. It was wonderfully exciting to take the stage in the frozen evening air to open the rally. Neither of us could feel our fingers on our instruments’ fret-boards, but no matter that; to warm up the growing mass of unionists with songs by Woody Guthrie, Joe Hill and many cultural workers who’ve come before us was an honor. Especially at such a large-scale rally.

This, to me, is the final piece in the puzzle of solidarity: song, the arts. Where our earlier union counterparts used choruses, bands and solo performers, theater and dance troupes, poetry recitals and art installations as integral parts of events for labor and other progressive struggles, in recent years too many have allowed this important asset to dwindle.

It is odd that the effects of McCarthyism could have held on so long, but apparently they have. The great expanse of cultural programming, always laced with a powerful political and social science ingredient, eroded during the 1950s. Though several unions have built up a degree of cultural programming (most notably 1199’s Bread and Roses program), these tend to stand apart from other union functions. All too often, they are not enmeshed in rallies and actions as they should be. Need to be.

The Dec. 16 rally was exemplary of how powerful an impact cultural workers can have. While I have performed the classic “Solidarity Forever” at many events, never has its call for workers’ unity seemed so clear. Though it was late by the time we were called back on stage to close the evening, and by then absolutely freezing, and though more than a few were beginning to leave, suddenly nearly everyone stopped and moved toward the stage. Kirk and I sang the familiar lyrics and a new verse I wrote specific to the Local 100 workers, then still unsure of the negotiations’ outcome. Upon hearing the opening chords on our banjo and guitar – performed in a somewhat rocking style – those folks who’d been rushing home to a hot meal or stiff drink suddenly began singing, many marching in time as they did so. As quickly as our hands began to again freeze up, our hearts were warmed by the response we received. Indeed, no matter who was singing there that evening, there could be no better way to end a rally, particularly one built of solidarity.

It was a moment to behold for me and a point that I trust will not soon be forgotten by those present: cultural workers from within and without our unions need to be allowed to do their thing and work as agitators, educators and organizers for all actions and for the politics of today’s labor movement.

Here is that new verse I wrote in honor of the Transport Workers:

It is we who lead the masses through the darkened maze below

and it’s we who drive the people, carry them to and fro.

It is we who stand with thousands, solidarity we show!

and this UNION keeps us strong.

John Pietaro is a NYC protest singer/songwriter and Co-Chair of the Cultural Workers’ Consort. He works as a staff representative for District Council 1707 American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. He can be reached at leftmus@aol.com

Steelworkers win contract

Thu, 09 Jan 2003 08:55:00 +0000

CLEVELAND – The United Steelworkers of America and International Steel Group Inc. (the company that bought bankrupt LTV) reached a tentative agreement for a new labor contract after months of negotiations.

The agreement was announced Dec. 23. USWA Ohio District Director Dave McCall said the agreement was good for the workers. ISG Chief Executive Rodney Mott called it a “great Christmas present.”

McCall says the workers will receive higher wages than they did under the LTV contract, plus an incentive plan based on hourly wage rates, and cost of living bonus payments.

Health care will be as good or better than under the LTV contract, seniority earned with LTV, vacations, holidays, premium pay and other benefits from the LTV contract will be preserved.

The agreement also sets up a trust fund based on a profit-sharing arrangement with ISG that will be used to help pay some health care costs for tens of thousands of retirees cut off when LTV terminated their health care plan.

Mott and ISG Chairman Wilbur Ross say they can increase wages and benefits for steelworkers by cutting the workforce in the former LTV plants from 7,500 to 3,000, by eliminating 70 percent of salaried employes, and by increasing productivity. ISG is also saving $50 per ton on production costs for retiree benefits that older steel companies are paying.

Workers at ISG have established a productivity level of 1.5 man-hours to make a ton of steel, far below the industry standard of 2.5 man-hours. Industry analysts claim the ISG productivity level is unheard of in steelmaking worldwide.

McCall said he expects the ISG contract to become the standard in the steel industry. Members will vote on it after the union sends out the contract and holds information meetings.

ISG’s possible acquisition of the bankrupt Bethlehem Steel Co. may move forward upon the completion of this agreement, although the cost of Bethlehem’s retiree benefits are not likely to be picked up by ISG or any other company. Bethlehem’s CEO says he is looking at the ISG agreement.

Some pressure is being exerted on the federal government to take over pension and health care costs in the private sector of the economy. Government regulations, or lack thereof, have utterly failed to monitor these funds and force compliance for keeping the pension plans fully funded. Hundreds of thousands have already lost pension benefits. This dovetails with the national health care crisis.

The General Motors pension fund is reported to be $61 billion underfunded. Ford has recently admitted to being billions of dollars underfunded and pledged to “make some payments.” Add billions owed by other corporations, large and small, and a crises of monumentsl proportions is building. This is workers’ money to begin with, taken from wage increases during contract negotiations.

Instead of President Bush’s call for enforced savings plans, financed by additional deductions for worker paychecks, many are calling for federal legislation on strict regulation of pensions in the private sector, forcing corporations to pay what they are legally bound to pay under contracts signed with unions. Corporations have freely plundered the pension funds, using workers’ money for company operations, speculative investments and personal enrichment for owners and managers.

The author can be reached at wallyk@ncweb.com

Union fights to keep City Cinema jobs

Tue, 07 Jan 2003 10:19:00 +0000

NEW YORK – Just blocks from Times Square and minutes from half a dozen theaters, the members of the International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employees (IATSE) Local 306 are at a cross-roads with City Cinemas Theaters, a cinema chain here.

According to Joel Deitch, Local 306 business representative, “City Cinemas no longer deserves our respect.” City Cinemas is attempting to eliminate city-licensed union projectionists jobs and replace the union members with in-house personnel like house managers, ushers and candy attendants.

This comes after a long round of cutbacks by the union. In September 2001, in an attempt to help City Cinemas recuperate from financial losses, the union agreed to lower its presence in certain theaters and shorten the hours of work by union members.

And again in August 2002, IATSE agreed to provide even more reductions of union operating hours. While dialog continued in good faith for awhile, City Cinemas has now “changed the tone of negotiations,” said Deitch.

“They went into a phase of regressive bargaining. And basically told the union, ‘we are gonna do it different from now on,’” said Deitch. “No other company has pushed us into this position and City Cinemas isn’t gonna be the first.”

City Cinemas wants the union to accept pay cuts, shorter hours and less union presence. They are also trying to eliminate holidays and shorten vacation packages.

While, according to Deitch, “they’ve been claiming poverty” in negotiations with the union, City Cinemas has sought to purchase Clearview theaters for an estimated $50-$60 million.

Local 306 also questions where City Cinemas concerns lie. “The projectionists’ job hasn’t disappeared,” said Deitch. “What City Cinemas wants to do is give that work to non-union people.”

Local 306 is also concerned that non-union projectionists would be unable to look after the safety of the theater patrons, in case of fire or other emergencies. “The projectionists’ job is a craft and a profession. Projectionists are trained to protect viewers in the event of an evacuation,” said Deitch.

The union represents 1,500 division ushers, doormen, ticket takers and projectionists. “This is about families and saving jobs,” said Deitch.

Moviegoers are being asked to boycott Angelika Sixplex, Cinema 1,2,3, Eastside Playhouse, 86 Street East Quad, Sutton Twin and Village East, and to contact City Cinemas Vice President of Business Affairs Ellen Cotter at 212-871-6828.

The author can be reached at tonypec@pww.org

The Grinch who stole the dial tone

Tue, 07 Jan 2003 10:11:00 +0000

CHICAGO – The Grinch who stole Christmas may be making off with your dial tone, according to telephone workers protesting layoffs at a lively demonstration here, Dec. 15. Santa Claus, backed up by 1,000 phone technicians, installers, service reps and their families, confronted the Grinch (aka SBC Ameritech) in front of corporate headquarters.

SBC cut 11,000 jobs nationwide during the Christmas season, including over 600 in Illinois and Northwest Indiana.

SBC Ameritech workers, members of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 21, were furious at the job cuts while their workload increases, outside non-union contractors are hired and customer service declines.

Rick Mobley, a union steward from the Schaumburg, Ill., garage dismissed management’s claims of economic necessity for the layoffs. “They have taken in $3.4 billion in profits while laying off 629 fully qualified technicians,” Mobley said. “There’s plenty of work. People are being laid off because of corporate greed.”

Louise Ebel, a dispatcher from the Cicero, Ill., office was concerned about the speed up resulting from the job elimination. “We can see what’s happening in the field. They’re piling the work on – making one worker do the work of two guys, trying to get us – the dispatchers – to hound them to do more work. They don’t care about safety. And the customer isn’t getting quality service. How can they when they expect every job to be done in less than an hour?”

IBEW Local 21, with 12,500 members, has a rich history of rank-and-file activism. It is a strong supporter of Chicago Jobs with Justice, ongoing organizing campaigns in the telecom industry and has a steward system with 500 on-the-job representatives. It was the initiative of these stewards that gave the impetus for today’s rally, explained steward Ben Alvarez.

“We wanted to protest the layoffs and show solidarity for the laid off brothers and sisters,” Alvarez said. “When the local leadership endorsed the activity it was announced at the stewards’ meeting Wednesday, and by Thursday morning the word was out to all the garages, with people being encouraged to bring their families.” Most of the laid off workers are in their early 20s and supporting young families. Protesters collected a mountain of toys to be distributed to the affected families.

At the rally, Local 21 President-Business Manager Ron Kastner declared that the company’s continued use of hundreds of contract laborers would violate the laid-off workers contractual right to be recalled. He also warned that the massive layoffs would have dire effects on customer service.

“These are front line workers, highly-skilled techs whose job is to install and repair local phone service,” he said, including 27 central office techs, who are responsible for providing dial tone. “Our members are working hard now,” he continued, “but no amount of overtime will replace those 600 skilled techs, especially when winter sets in. This is insane.”

The author can be reached at robertawood@ameritech.net

Protesters demand equal opportunity

Tue, 07 Jan 2003 09:52:00 +0000

PHILADELPHIA – Nearly 40 angry protesters attended a City Council meeting here Dec. 12 to demand inclusion of African Americans, Latinos and women in public works construction projects.

Seeing that they were not going to be recognized to speak, the protesters began chanting, “We want jobs! We want jobs!” Members of Enough Is Enough were finally allowed to speak.

“We are tired of seeing workers from out of town hired for city construction jobs while people in the community are begging for jobs,” said one speaker.

Another speaker said council members would be voted out if they did not show more compassion for the people.

Two weeks ago the community advocacy group shut down a Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) worksite in West Philadelphia. SEPTA had promised to hire and train residents from the community for its $560 million Market Street Elevated Reconstruction Project. Out of 600 applicants only 32 have been hired.

Last week SEPTA obtained a court injunction requiring demonstrators to remain far away from any SEPTA construction site. But Sacaree Rhodes, one of the organizers of Enough Is Enough, said the injunction would not stop protests until SEPTA did the right thing. SEPTA said the project is only 20 percent completed and that more workers will be hired.

People in the community have also complained about the lack of provisions for them to get to the small businesses in the construction area. Many of the owners are now facing bankruptcy.

The African-American Chamber of Commerce says few African-American contractors were hired for the project. Some of the protesters complained about the small number of African Americans in the building trade unions and the history of racial discrimination in those unions. One man said he is a card-carrying union member with skills and experience but did not get hired for the SEPTA project.

Rep. Bob Brady, an officer of the carpenters’ union, explained part of the problem. Any company paying prevailing wages can bid on city construction projects. These companies bring their own workers to the project, many times they are not unionized. Said the congressman, “It is important that elected officials and unions play a role in making sure that contractors comply with guidelines that guarantee inclusion.”

Councilman Derrell Clarke introduced a resolution calling for an Equal Opportunity Task Force to provide resources and data to community groups and City Council to review minority employment opportunities on all city-funded construction projects and penalties for contractors that don’t comply with city hiring goals.

The author can be reached at phillyrose1@earthilnk.net

A New Years message from the World Federationof Trade Unions

Tue, 07 Jan 2003 07:09:00 +0000

As a New Year dawns the World Federation of Trade Unions conveys Its good wishes and solidarity greetings to working people the world over, their trade unions and all the men, women and children of our planet who aspire for a better life in peace, friendship and international cooperation for social progress.

The first decade of the new century was designated by the United Nations as an International Decade to Promote a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence. But the country which has the largest stockpiles of nuclear and other mass destruction weapons and the biggest military budgets – the United States – is now preparing for high-tech military attack on Iraq, a country where millions of children remain undernourished and hungry because of arbitrary sanctions.

Millions of people have participated in peace marches in recent months to demand that the United Nations live up to the international commitments they have solemnly undertaken [including] full employment and social development, disarmament for development and to assure food, education and health for all and human rights for all.

Trade unions and democratic forces the world over demand an immediate end to Israeli occupation of Palestinian and other Arab territories, as decided by the UN Security Council three decades ago.

The neoliberal economic policies of globalization, liberalization and privatization have only led to a further worsening of the development crisis, aggravating unemployment and underemployment, malnutrition, poverty and destitution. The popular rejection of the neoliberal policies is clearly demonstrated by the massive demonstrations of the working people all over the world and also highlighted by recent elections in Brazil and Ecuador where candidates calling for alternative policies have triumphed in general elections.

Global monopolies and their political allies are seeking to destabilize countries where popular governments opposed to neoliberal policies are in power, as in Venezuela.

The WFTU reiterates its profound conviction that the working people and their trade unions and all democratic and peace-loving forces can win their economic and social demands through their unity and united struggles for demands in the New Year.

Excerpted from www.wftu.cz