People Before Profit blog

Today in black history: First black quarterback inducted into NFL Hall of Fame

Tue, 04 Feb 2014 11:40:00 +0000

On Feb. 4, 2006, Harold Warren Moon became the first black quarterback to be inducted into the National Football League Hall of Fame. He first played for the Canadian Football League's Edmonton Eskimos before playing for the NFL's Houston Oilers, Minnesota Vikings, Seattle Seahawks, and Kansas City Chiefs.

He was born in 1956 in Los Angeles, California. He held the record for most passing yardage in professional football until surpassed by Damon Allen on Sept. 4, 2006; held the record for most passing touchdowns until surpassed by Brett Favre on Nov. 22, 2007; held the record for most pass completions until surpassed by Favre on Dec. 23 that same year; and held the record for most pass attempts until surpassed by Favre on Dec. 14, 2008.

He won five Grey Cups, and is notable for helping to erase the prejudice within the world of sports that black quarterbacks could not succeed in professional football.

He currently works as a broadcaster for the Seattle Seahawks on radio and television.

Photo: Warren Moon. Wikipedia (CC)

NNU: Big hospital chain retaliates vs. nurses who led patient safety campaign

Mon, 03 Feb 2014 14:40:00 +0000

OAKLAND, Calif. (PAI) - Just weeks after nurses at Community Health Systems, a 206-hospital chain, exposed patient safety problems, the chain retaliated by firing two of the nurses' leaders, the National Nurses United reported on Jan. 28.

That illegal action forced NNU to file complaints with the National Labor Relations Board's regional offices in California, defending Veronica Poss, an RN with the chain's Fallbrook, Calif., hospital, and Tim Thomas, an RN leader at the chain's Watsonville, Calif., hospital. No date has been set for hearings on the complaints.

Poss first angered her bosses with a December TV interview about their plans to close a cardiac rehab unit, which is vital to area senior citizens. Thomas has been campaigning about lack of patient safety at Watsonville for months.

"These disgraceful firings are being carried out in direct retaliation for the public advocacy of these courageous nurses, and in an attempt to silence any nurses who will speak out about rampant patient care problems in their facilities," said NNU co-president Jean Ross, also an RN. "Many in our community have no idea our hospital is owned and operated by a for-profit Wall Street corporation," Thomas told the union. "All across the country nurses like me are losing their careers for speaking on behalf of our patients, and our profession."

Photo: CHS - National Day of Action- Dec. 3, 2013. National Nurses United Facebook page.

Unions: Senate postal overhaul would axe 100,000 workers

Mon, 03 Feb 2014 14:34:00 +0000

WASHINGTON (PAI) - The latest Postal Service overhaul bill, which stalled after the relevant Senate committee started work on it on Jan. 29, would axe 100,000 jobs, weaken workers' comp and create "a two-tiered workforce," postal unions say.

And that's why they oppose the revised measure, S1486, the presidents of the Letter Carriers, Mail Handlers/Laborers, Rural Letter Carriers and Postal Workers added in their letter to the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee.

Senators started work on Jan. 29 on the measure, written by panel chairman Thomas Carper, D-Del., and top Republican Tom Coburn, R-Okla.

"We regret a more-limited, less-damaging bill is not being considered," Letter Carriers President Fredric Rolando, Mail Handlers President John Hegarty, NRLCA President Jeannette Dwyer and Postal Workers President Mark Dimondstein wrote.

"The committee should focus on addressing the principal causes of the Postal Service's fiscal problems, not reducing service and targeting postal employees' benefits. But we pledge to work with all of you for postal reform that will strengthen the national treasure that is the U.S. Postal Service," they added. Rolando drafted the letter.

They first rejected an amendment to let the USPS cut back to 5-day delivery, eliminating Saturday.

"At a time when demand for date-specific marketing and for same-day and next-day delivery service is growing, and at a time when we are introducing Sunday service, legislated service cuts that would eliminate Saturday delivery, slow delivery times and reduce the demand for mail make no sense," the union leaders told the senators.

S1486 foundered over two other moves: Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kent., wants to let post office clients carry concealed guns inside post offices, and Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., wants to curb USPS' unfettered control over rate hikes. The panel adjourned without finishing work on S1486. An anti-worker House GOP postal bill is marooned.

Lawmakers are writing postal bills at USPS request because the Postmaster General says he needs changes - including firing workers, cutting days and eliminating door-to-door service - to stem billions of dollars in red ink. The red ink is lessening as the U.S. recovers from the Great Recession, with USPS showing a $600 million profit on services last year, and projecting a $1.1 billion profit this year.

The unions respond the main cause of the red ink is the yearly requirement that USPS pay $5.5 billion to fund future retiree health care benefits. That wipes out the profits. S1486 stretches those payments out, but does not eliminate them. Its latest version would also pre-fund workers' comp, the unions said, adding a $1 billion burden.

The unions reminded lawmakers they proposed their own reform package to help increase USPS revenue and better its books. That measure included reforms to reduce retiree health care costs and eliminate the Bush-era prefunding mandate.

Their plan also enrolls current and future postal retirees in Medicare and refunds pension account surpluses to USPS so it could pay down past debts and invest in upgrading its fleet and infrastructure. It also imposes "a moratorium on service standard changes to prevent a 'death spiral,' and has provisions to give USPS limited authority to offer non-postal products through its networks to generate new revenues, and pricing reforms to adopt a fair and more reasonable, yet predictable, price cap system."

Lawmakers adopted a few of those ideas, but rejected most, the letter says.

Photo: From National Association of Letter Carriers Facebook page.

Today in labor history: Deadly chemical plant explosion in 1971

Mon, 03 Feb 2014 13:31:00 +0000

On Feb. 3, 1971 there was a major explosion at the Thiokol Chemical Plant located near Woodbine, Georgia. The dead numbered 29 but, in addition, 50 other workers were seriously wounded. Among the numerous types of vehicles used to evacuate workers and bring them to hospitals and morgues were Navy helicopters.

Subsequent investigations found that the company was entirely to blame for the deaths and injuries. Chemicals were mislabeled and improperly stored. There were no adequate fire safety procedures in place. Today the Occupational Safety and Health Administration works, despite inadequate funding and staffing, to prevent tragedies like the one that happened at Thiokol. Nevertheless, industrial accidents continue to take the lives of workers.

Back in 1941, also on Feb. 3, the Supreme Court came down on the side of workers when it upheld the Wages and Hours Act banning child labor and establishing a 40-hour work week.

On Feb. 3 back in 1918, however, the Court came out against workers. It ruled that the United Hatters Union violated the Sherman Antitrust Act by organizing a national boycott of Danbury Hatters of Connecticut.

Photo: Location of Thiokol plant and Woodbine in Camden County, Georgia. Wikipedia (CC)

Today in labor history: 13th Amendment abolishes slavery

Fri, 31 Jan 2014 15:26:00 +0000

On this day in 1865, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery in the United States. The amendment said, "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude ... shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction."

The amendment had previously passed in the Senate. It was ratified by the states in December 1865, becoming part of the Constitution, and the law of the land.

Ratification of the 13th Amendment was the nail in the coffin of legal slavery in the U.S. and a victory for the principle of free labor. Yet struggles continued over de facto wage slavery, practiced by former slaveholders in the exploitation of former slaves as sharecroppers, by industrial giants in their treatment of workers, and in agribusiness exploitation of immigrant workers. Coal mining companies' "company stores" and child labor practices are examples.

Today, in the struggle for immigration reform, many say that "guest worker" programs amount to modern day wage slavery. And a growing movement is calling for an end to exploitation of prisoners as cheap labor, calling it a form of slavery.

Photo: The official medallion of the British Anti-Slavery Society, designed by Josiah Wedgewood, 1795. Wikipedia

Today in labor history: The International Labor Organization founded

Thu, 30 Jan 2014 13:33:00 +0000

On January 30, 1919, the Paris Peace Conference established the Commission on International Labour Legislation to draft the constitution of a permanent international labor organization, founding the International Labour Organization (ILO).

In the wake of the devastation of a destructive world war, the Conference established the Commission to pursue a vision based on the premise that universal, lasting peace can be established only if it is based on social justice.

The ILO became the first specialized agency of the UN in 1946. Today, as part of the UN, the ILO is charged with drafting and overseeing international labor standards. The main aims of the ILO are to promote rights at work, encourage decent employment opportunities, enhance social protection and strengthen dialogue on work-related issues.

The ILO website is available in English, Spanish and French languages. It provides a wealth of information on current issues in countries of Africa, the Americas, the Arab States, Asia and the Pacific, and Europe and Central Asia.

The ILO holds meetings and events, produces statistics and data bases, publications, labor standards and original research. It hosts a newsroom, campaigns, and covers trends in the world of work. Recent topics include a youth forum on youth employment in African countries, gender equality in Bangladesh, jobs and the World Economic Forum in Davos, and the challenges and opportunities for trade unions in 2014.

ILO has a multi media library and you can follow ILO on twitter, Facebook, RSS feeds and other social networking sites.

Photo: ILO African Youth Forum.

Northwestern University footballers file union election cards

Thu, 30 Jan 2014 10:50:00 +0000

EVANSTON, Ill. -With virtually unanimous player support, and with Steelworker backing, football players at Northwestern University filed a formal petition and signed union recognition election cards with the National Labor Relations Board's Chicago regional office on Jan. 28.

If the players win the vote - which will occur only after NLRB hearings and rulings and possible appeals to the courts, they admitted - they would set a national precedent for recognizing college athletes, in football and men's basketball at Division I schools, as "employees" under labor law and eligible to be organized.

The new College Athletic Players Association contends that scholarships actually pay for the players' services, and the players in turn earn their colleges millions of dollars. But labor law now does not cover the players, Northwestern player Kain Colter and CAPA leader Ramogi Huma told a telephone press conference.

The organizing drive grew out of contacts college players at UCLA had with the Steelworkers more than a decade ago, both the players and Steelworkers President Leo Gerard said. The union backs a non-profit group to publicize the players' plight and agitate for public pressure on colleges to change their ways. The colleges didn't listen.

So the organizing drive started, and picked up steam when leaders of the National Collegiate Athletic Association - the organization representing colleges - recently said colleges "have no legal responsibility" for taking care of players who are injured, Huma said.

That lack of responsibility and questions about college responsibility for injured players, especially football players who suffer permanent brain damage through on-field concussions, drove the organizing drive.

"We thought they had a good deal," Gerard said of college football players when the UCLA contacts began. "But we heard story after story of them struggling to pay for basics like food and rent, or how they got cut off" of scholarships "by a coach's whim."

The Northwestern players were very enthusiastic, as "they've been taught to think outside the box," Colter said. Their head coach told him "If this is what the team feels, and there's a right way, then let it play out."

Huma said the players want to unionize so they "can have a seat at the table" on issues such as injury coverage, adequacy of their scholarships, post-injury care and establishment of an educational trust fund for players to let them finish college and graduate even after their athletic eligibility, and their scholarships expire.

Photo: AP

Today in Labor history: Pancho Villa escapes capture

Wed, 29 Jan 2014 17:34:00 +0000

On January 28, 1917 the United States government gave up the search for Mexican revolutionary leader Pancho Villa. What is officially known in the United States as the "Mexican Expedition" started March 14, 1916 and involved 5,000 U.S military personnel lead by Major General John J. Pershing.

The tension with Pancho Villa started in 1915 when the U.S. sided with the Venustiano Carranza's government. As a result of this betrayal Pancho Villa and his troops started to attack U.S. targets in northern Mexico.

After a Villa-led attack on Columbus, New Mexico and defeating the U.S 13th Cavalry President Woodrow Wilson chose Major General John J. Pershing to lead a fruitless expedition into Mexico.

While the expedition didn't officially end until February 1917 the majority of U.S. troops were pulled out in January. Major General Pershing would later write the whole episode would "not be a very inspiring chapter for school children, or even grownups to contemplate. Having dashed into Mexico with the intention of eating the Mexicans raw, we turned back at the first repulse and are now sneaking home under cover, like a whipped curr with its tail between its legs."

Today in labor history: Rubber workers start huge sit-down strike

Wed, 29 Jan 2014 15:52:00 +0000

On this day in 1936, rubber workers in Akron Ohio began a sit-down strike that resulted in union recognition.

The sit-down tactic proved extremely effective. Workers literally sat in at their jobs and refused to leave. As a result, the company was unable to hire scab replacements.

In Akron, the tactic was first employed by competing union baseball teams, who protested the use of a non-union umpire.

The 1936 strike action began with truck tire workers at Firestone protesting the firing of a union committee leader. A wave of strikes at Goodrich and other plants ensued. Some 19 sit-downs in the following three months occurred.

The tactic then spread to auto workers in Michigan and was used famously in Flint.

Connecticut child care providers voting on their first union contract

Wed, 29 Jan 2014 13:24:00 +0000

Home child care workers in Connecticut are poised to win their first union contract, with a vote count scheduled for Feb. 14. The contract includes higher pay, training opportunities and a grievance system for 4,000 family child care providers who participate in Connecticut's Care 4 Kids program.

The bargaining committee of providers is urging all those eligible to join the union, vote "yes" on the contract and become active members of CSEA/SEIU Local 2001.

With their union, the providers now have a vehicle to bring about policy changes that will benefit not only the providers but the families who rely on them.

"This contract represents a shift in public policy that will help provide much needed resources for our state's low-income children and the providers who care for them," said CSEA president Patrice Peterson.

Noting that home child care is required at all hours for children of parents working low-wage jobs, Peterson called the contract "a real investment that will be instrumental to closing the achievement gap between Connecticut's low-income students and their peers."

If approved by the members and the state legislature this will be the first raise in state subsidy rates in more than 12 years. In addition to raises ranging from three to 11.25 percent for licensed providers in just the first year, there are raises for those exempt from licensing now because they care for relatives' children, along with financial incentives to get licensed.

Negotiations between CSEA/SEIU Local 2001 and the State of Connecticut began nine months ago.

The providers had voted 1,603-88 to join the union In December 2011 after Governor Malloy issued an executive order allowing home care workers to organize.

"This is another sign of our commitment to raise the level of quality in child care settings, and increase opportunities for young children to be in safe and healthy learning environments that encourage learning," said Malloy. "By increasing wages and providing professional development opportunities for Care 4 Kids home-based family child care providers, we are investing in our children and those who care for them," he added.

Under the tentative contract Care4Kids reimbursement rates will increase by 12 percent over the four year contract for all licensed Family Child Care Providers and all age groups.

Family child care providers who attend the Office of Early Childhood's new four-hour mandatory orientation program will be paid $75. The state will allocate $750,000 over the life of the contract for professional development including college.

In addition, agreement was reached to establish a seat for the union within the Governor's Early Childhood Cabinet. As well, a work group of union and state representatives will help facilitate enrollment in the Affordable Care Act.

Photo: Joined by home-based child care providers and union officials, Governor Dannel P. Malloy announced an agreement between the State of Connecticut and CSEA/SEIU LOCAL 2001 providing for professional development and the first general wage increases in 12 years for family child care providers under Connecticut Care 4 Kids program, the state's program to provide better opportunities for quality child care and subsidize child care costs for low income families. CSEA/SEIU Local 2001.

Justices: Collective bargaining determines pay for putting on protective gear

Wed, 29 Jan 2014 12:46:00 +0000

WASHINGTON (PAI) - If Clifton Sandifer and his co-workers want to get paid for the time they take putting on steel-toed boots, protective jackets, hard hats and other gear before starting their shifts at their U.S. Steel mill in Northwest Indiana, their union - the Steelworkers - will have to successfully bargain for it for them, the U.S. Supreme Court says. And that same rule applies, the court adds, in cases where union workers take time to put on or take off protective gear. Otherwise, it's "changing clothes."

That's because, in a 9-0 decision on Jan. 27, the justices said time used in taking off and putting on the gear is a bargainable subject under labor law, even though another federal law, the Portal to Portal Act, says workers should get paid for the time they need to put on and take off protective gear. In Sandifer's case, the Steelworkers and U.S. Steel had agreed the workers would not be paid for the time involved.

The court's decision could potentially affect tens of thousands of workers covered by union contracts, who must take time to put on and take off protective gear such as hard hats, steel aprons, work gloves and steel-toed boots. That's not just steel workers, but also food plant workers, utility workers - indeed, workers in many occupations.

That time is a bargaining subject, Associate Justice Antonin Scalia's ruling said.

Because the contract said the workers could not get paid, Sandifer and his allies sued, saying the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act - the law that enacted the minimum wage and overtime pay - governed their time. Had they won, U.S. Steel and other firms would have had to pay tens of thousands of dollars each for lost time. But the workers lost in the lower courts, and they lost at the High Court, too.

"U.S. Steel does not dispute" the lower courts' conclusion that "had the clothes-changing time in this case not been rendered non-compensable" - unpaid for - under a labor law section that let the union and the firm bargain on the issue, "it would have been a principal (job) activity," and thus the workers would have been paid, Scalia said.

Instead, U.S. Steel argued that, thanks to the contract, the workers were just "changing clothes," and labor law does not order firms to pay them for that. It won.

The object of the relevant section of labor law "is to permit collective bargaining over the compensability of clothes-changing time and to promote the predictability achieved through mutually beneficial negotiation. There can be little predictability, and hence little meaningful negotiation, if 'changing' means only 'substituting,'" Scalia added. "If the vast majority of the time is spent in donning and doffing 'clothes' as we have defined that term, the entire period qualifies, and the time spent putting on and off other items need not be subtracted."

Photo: Marvin Nauman/Wikipedia (CC)

Thousands jam Pennsylvania's capital to protest union-killing bill

Tue, 28 Jan 2014 15:26:00 +0000

HARRISBURG, Pa.-- Thousands jammed the streets around the State Capitol building here today to protest the latest in a sting of attempts by state Republicans to kill union rights for public workers and eventually all workers in Pennsylvania.

Busload after busload of workers arrived from around the state, filled the streets and marched into the Capitol building itself where, reminiscent of the historic Wisconsin protests, they packed the rotunda in the center of the building.

They protested House Bill 1507, what the right wing American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and the Koch brothers call a "Paycheck Protection" bill. They have already been targeting direct mail into the state to spread lies in support of this bill, claiming that taxpayers are paying for union dues collection for public employees, and that teachers and state workers are forced to contribute to political and legislative activism.

The facts are clear, the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO says, even though you won't hear them in the commercials that the Koch brothers are financing. Automatic payroll deduction of dues is not mandated by any law, rather it is bargained for during contract negotiations. This deduction does not cost taxpayers money. Unions already agreed to reimburse the state for costs associated with deductions of PAC funds, but according to the State of Pennsylvania, there is no measurable cost to be reimbursed.

The Republican goal is obvious, unions say. The legislation would force unions to spend resources to collect union dues, and make it nearly impossible to collect the fair share fees that non-members must pay to cover their union representation. At the end of the day that means unions will be weakened, and have less ability to advocate for employees in the workplace and in the legislature. This would open the floodgates for a wide range of anti-worker legislation that would be sure to follow.

"There is no doubt that the passage of HB 1507 would mean that Pennsylvania would become the next right to work state" the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO said in a statement it issued. " Don't be silent on this issue. We expect this bill to move very quickly, with significant resources flooding into Pennsylvania to back this latest attack on the middle class."

Photo: Frank Snyder, Pennsylvania AFL-CIO

Our daughters deserve better than 77 percent of a man’s pay

Mon, 27 Jan 2014 16:17:00 +0000

MANCHESTER, N.H. - As a father of two amazing girls, there is one thing I hope they will never have to deal with, and we can make that happen today.

There is no denying that in spite of our best efforts, women continue to be discriminated against in the workplace. The proof is in the paycheck. Women on average are paid 77 cents for every dollar a similarly qualified man makes. This is outrageous and should be stopped immediately.

Legislators in the past have tried to correct this atrocity by passing the Equal Pay Act of 1963. The Equal Pay Act was a good start, however it is obvious that the problem did no go away.

A 2004 Census Bureau study compared the earnings of men and women in over 500 occupations and found that women earn less in jobs from business executive to dishwasher.

The problem is the Equal Pay Act has loopholes that continue to allow female workers to be paid unequal wages.

Many of these loopholes revolve around the fact the women do not know what their male counterpart actually makes. In some companies the employer has actually prohibited workers from discussing their pay. How is a woman, or a man for that matter, supposed to know if they are being paid differently if they are not free to discuss their wages with co-workers?

In a 2010 study we learned that 1-in-4 private sector workers are employed in companies that have punitive policies against employees who disclose their personal pay rates. The same study found that another 38 percent said their managers actively discourage workers from talking about their wage with other workers. Over 60 percent of the workers surveyed are being told not to discuss their wages.

This is why we must pass the Paycheck Fairness Act in New Hampshire. This new legislation would continue to strengthen the Equal Pay Act and add new prohibitions against employment policies that punish workers for discussing their wages with others.

Some people say that we do not need this type of legislation. They say that this just does not happen. I say then pass the bill and prove that it does not happen. Pass the bill and see if anyone challenges his or her employer for wrongdoing under this new law. If an employer is not doing anything wrong, paying their employees equally, then this law will have zero effect on them.

It is the employers that know they are violating the rules, and have policies set up to punish workers for discussing their pay that are fighting the passage of this bill.

The next time someone tells you they oppose this ask them two simple questions:

1. What are you hiding?

2. Do you have any daughters? How do you feel knowing that they will be making 1/3 less than a man solely because they are female?

I teach my girls that nothing should ever hold them back, and I hope by the time they reach "working age" that the wage gap will be ancient history.

This article was originally published at NH Labor News.

Photo: WhiteHouse.gov

Housing is key to solving jobs crisis

Mon, 27 Jan 2014 14:44:00 +0000

Our country is plagued by a severe jobs crisis. The crisis is on-going and the longer it lasts, the larger the number of permanently unemployed. Failure to maintain and rebuild the country's infrastructure and housing stock has contributed heavily to the length and number of long-term unemployed. It has been a major factor in the declining quality of life in our country.

In his 1937 second inaugural address President Franklin D. Roosevelt said: "I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished." He was pointing to the need for a massive national housing program that would both build housing and create jobs to help end the Great Depression. That idea was set aside because of the outbreak of World War II, but there was a promise of post-war housing. To this day, there has never been a meaningful mass affordable housing program. Some public housing was built in such cities as New York, Cleveland, Newark, Chicago, but not nearly enough to meet the housing crisis. The promise of a post-war mass housing program was betrayed.

There is an urgent need to rehouse America. The current housing stock is old, decrepit and dilapidated. The number of housing units lost through fire, flood, neglect, age and landlord greed far outpaces the construction of mass affordable housing. In large measure the crisis is a product of capitalist control of the land and housing stock of our country. Thus, it will be a difficult struggle to launch a massive and inclusive housing program.

Housing is a basic human right, as well as a survival necessity. Homelessness continues to grow, including among military veterans. Much of the homelessness is invisible - you don't see the doubling and tripling up of families. The cruelty of homelessness is so severe that one of the main activities of Pope Francis is working among the homeless.

Adding to the anguish is the mortgage swindle perpetrated by the Wall Street banking houses through which they stole homes of millions of homeowners. Adding to the homelessness and overcrowding is the unbridled escalation of rents. This is not only among the poor; it includes higher paid workers as well. A large percentage of homeless people work one and two jobs, but still cannot afford rent.

The housing crisis is both urban and rural.

What is a mass housing program? What do we need?

Here's a case in point:

In New York City there is a real estate boom. It was fostered by former Mayor Michael Bloomberg. He campaigned for more rich people to move to New York. The real estate boom is in the condominium market. The price range for these condos is $9 million to $30 million. This is not a real estate boom for the people. It is more of the current process of the rich enjoying the spoils.

In contrast, in Richmond, Calif., Mayor Gayle McLaugllin is using the power of eminent domain to use city funds to buy up houses with mortgages that are "under water" (where the mortgage that the owner owes is more than the current value of the house). McLaughlin's policy would prevent banks from foreclosing on these homes. The city would then restructure individual mortgages and keep the homeowners in their homes.

A national housing program to meet the housing needs of the urban, suburban and rural sectors of our country is in fact a foundation of building economic and social prosperity. A massive housing program meeting particular needs of each sector requires full participation of all skills and crafts, of architecture and engineering, of unions, community groups and organizations, and of new non-monopoly banking sources. Every housing unit that is built also requires the production of home furnishings, streets, gas and electric supply, sewers, schools, health care facilities, parks, stores, etc. In other words, you can't do it alone - it takes a whole community to build a new community.

What kind of housing does our country need? We need all kinds of housing - we need quality, affordable high-rise housing; we need low-profile garden developments; we need affordable single-family houses; we need housing in rural communities.

Clearly President Obama's American Jobs Act can be an integral part of this program. We are not starting from scratch. All over the country, struggles are being waged by people's organizations for new housing. But every local area and state needs to develop a concrete program to meet today's housing needs and also plans for the future.

How do we pay for this? The ultra-right says the government is broke. Is this true? The truth is, the government has been pumping $85 billion a month to bail out Wall Street since 2008. That's a trillion dollars a year. There is always money for Wall Street.

The banking system is so bloated that the government just recently cut Wall Street's welfare check to $75 billion a month. Clearly that $10 billion per month can begin to finance a national housing recovery program. This money can be handled by a national reconstruction bank as proposed in a bill filed by Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., and discussed by President Obama in his 2013 State of the Union message.

Can we achieve a national housing program? After Hitler's dive bombers leveled the cities and towns of Europe in World War II, they were all rebuilt after the war. We can rebuild our cities. But to achieve this we need a massive movement. The money is there - the Wall Street welfare, closing the tax loopholes for corporations that allow the major corporations to pay little or no taxes, realizing the peace dividend by transferring military spending to housing and jobs programs, and increased revenues through job recovery.

Photo: Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick visits construction of the new Washington-Beech housing development in Roslindale, a Boston neighborhood, in 2010. Deval Patrick CC 2.0

Today in labor history: 109 coal miners die in explosion

Mon, 27 Jan 2014 10:35:00 +0000

On this day in 1891, the explosion of Mammoth Mine No. 1, near Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, left 109 coal miners dead.

The coal miners were underpaid Eastern Europeans (mostly Polish and Slavic) who were told not to complain about their substandard and dangerous working conditons, frequently informed that "other foreigners with strong backs" could quickly replace them.

After their deaths, the Mount Pleasant journal published an article that remarked, "Of the 109 who went to work that day, no one escaped the awful tale of how death came. It was about 9 o'clock when the explosion occurred, and soon a black vapor poured out of the top of the 107-foot shaft, telling those above ground plainer than words could do that death lurked in the depths."

Of the deceased miners, 31 left families behind. Some of the others were younger boys.

The Mammoth disaster prompted the state to pass legislation that strengthened mine safety inspections.

Photo: Mammoth Coke Works, near Mammoth Mines No. 1 and 2. Coal and Coke Heritage Center/Penn State University

Pennsylvania unions cheer blocking of new voter ID law

Mon, 27 Jan 2014 10:19:00 +0000

HARRISBURG, Pa. - The Pennsylvania AFL-CIO is cheering a judge's ruling bouncing the state's GOP-passed "voter ID" law, but the story isn't over yet.

That's because the Republican-run state government may well appeal Commonwealth Court Judge Bernard McGinley's ruling to the state Supreme Court.

The Pennsylvania law, enacted in mid-2012, is one of many voter ID laws that GOP-run state governments pushed through after 2010. A Pennsylvania Republican legislative leader boasted the voter ID law would help GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney carry the state in 2012. Romney lost Pennsylvania, as well as the election.

All the voter ID laws make it tougher for minorities, women, students, the elderly and unionists to vote, by imposing rigorous and often expensive "voter identification" requirements, restricting voting hours and days, curbing voter registration or all of the above. Doing that violates the Pennsylvania constitution, McGinley ruled.

"It is no surprise this law has been ruled unconstitutional," said state AFL-CIO president Rick Bloomingdale. His federation filed a friend-of-the-court brief urging McGinley to toss the law. The NAACP and civil liberties groups had sued to overturn it.

"Our voting laws are supposed to protect our rights and assure free and fair elections. The Voter ID law, on the other hand, was a thinly veiled attempt by the extreme right-wing groups to disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of voters who don't agree with their unpopular agenda. This ruling is another important step in protecting the right to vote for all citizens," Bloomingdale added.

"It is unfortunate that so many voters have already been disenfranchised due to the confusion caused by this unconstitutional attack on voting rights. This law was always a solution in search of a problem that doesn't exist," added AFL-CIO secretary-treasurer Frank Snyder. "We urge the Commonwealth to abandon any appeals."

Pennsylvania judges stalled the 2012 law that year, so it didn't apply then, but did not toss it out. They said state officials did not give voters enough time or methods to obey it. This time, McGinley bounced it on state constitutional grounds, even though his ruling did not say the voter ID law discriminates against particular groups.

"The burdens the Voter ID law entails are unnecessary and not narrowly tailored to serve a compelling governmental interest. And the record is rife with testimony from numerous Pennsylvania voters whose right to vote will be - and indeed already has been - denied or substantially and unnecessarily burdened by the Voter ID law," McGinley ruled. The judge said the law violates a state constitutional ban on any interference "to prevent the free exercise of the right to suffrage."

Photo: Pennsylvanians protest the Voter ID law. AP

Low wage workers at Pentagon walk out

Mon, 27 Jan 2014 09:32:00 +0000

ARLINGTON, Va. - Low-wage workers at the focus of the nation's defense machine, the Pentagon, joined the lengthening list of ill-paid fed-up workers who have walked off their jobs for a day, demanding living wages and the right to organize.

The group gathered Jan. 22 outside the Pentagon's Metro subway entrance, just above the underground mall of fast food eateries and shops, to make their voices heard.

Good Jobs Nation organized the Pentagon worker walkout, following their fast-food colleagues who work at eateries at the Smithsonian Institution and other D.C.-area buildings. Contractors, hired by the federal government, employ the workers. Workers demand Democratic President Barack Obama sign an executive order mandating contractors pay the workers a living wage as a condition of running the eateries.

The fast food workers at the Pentagon and elsewhere, including D.C., New York, Chicago, Detroit and L.A., are part of a larger movement of low-paid workers - Walmart workers, warehouse workers, etc. - demanding living wages and worker rights.

"I haven't received a raise in the nine years I've worked at the Pentagon," Jerome Hardy, who earns $9 an hour as a server at the Courtyard Cafe in the Pentagon, told Good Jobs Nation. "I serve heroes, but my raises amount to zeros."

A National Employment Law Project study found 77 percent of fast-food workers in D.C., including those at federal eateries, earn under $10 an hour. Four out of every ten rely on public assistance, such as food stamps, rent subsidies and Medicaid, to survive.

"To add insult to injury, not only do these taxpayer-supported companies pay poverty wages but they also rank among the worst labor law violators in the country, according to a recent Senate report," Good Jobs Nation adds.

Whether Obama is listening and will issue the order to relieve the plight of the fast food workers and the 2.2 million other low-paid contract workers at federal sites is another matter. Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., directly raised the issue with the president months ago. Obama said he would "look into it," in the congressman's words.

When Ellison publically confronted the head of Obama's Council of Economic Advisers with the same demand earlier in January, the official ducked Ellison's question.

Meanwhile, a new Economic Policy Institute study shows the demographic profile of low-wage workers, including fast food workers, has drastically changed. In 1968, 48 percent of low-wage workers had a high school degree, but 79 percent did in 2012, and another 12 percent had a GED diploma. One of every six low-wage workers had college experience - up to and including graduation - in 1968. In 2012, 45.7 percent did.

Photo: AP

Union membership rises by 162k, workforce share unchanged

Fri, 24 Jan 2014 14:59:00 +0000

WASHINGTON (PAI)-Union membership in the U.S. rose by 162,000 in 2013, to 14.528 million, the Bureau of Labor Statistics calculated, but the union share of the nation's workers stayed unchanged at 11.3 percent.

African-Americans were more unionized than whites or Hispanics, and the oldest workers - aged 45-64 - were more unionized (14.5 percent) than other age groups, BLS said. Almost eight million men were unionized, compared to 6.58 million women.

Public workers were more than five times as likely to be unionized - 35.3 percent -- as private-sector workers. Unionists' share of the private sector workforce was 6.7 percent last year, a ratio unseen since the pre-labor law era of the Roaring 20s. The private sector employed 7.31 million unionists last year, 100,000 more than in the public sector. In 2012, the public sector had edged ahead.

But the declining share of unionized private sector workers is important because when one private workplace is unionized - and its workers get better wages and benefits - its competitors often must match it.

And there's a big wage gap: The median weekly wage for union workers last year was precisely $200 more than that for non-union workers, BLS said: $950 vs. $750. The median is the point where half the workforce is above it and half below it.

There's still a wage gap between union men and union women, but it's narrowing - and it's a lot less than for non-union men and women. The median wage for a male unionist was $991 last year, compared to $898 for a female unionist, or 90.6 percent of the median male. Non-union men earned $831 weekly, while women earned $676 (81.3 percent).

Once again, unionists were concentrated in the Northeast, the Midwest and the Pacific Coast. New York (24.4 percent), Alaska (23.1 percent), and Hawaii (22.1 percent) led in union density. California again led in absolute numbers with 2.43 million union members, 16.4 percent of its workers. Next were New York, (1.99 million, 24.4 percent), Illinois (851,000; 15.8 percent), Pennsylvania (701,000, 12.7 percent), Michigan (633,000, 16.3 percent), New Jersey (611,000, 16 percent) and Ohio (605,000, 12.6 percent).

In those big states, New York and Illinois jumped both union numbers and density. New York added 145,000 unionists and Illinois added 50,000. Density rose by 1.2 percentage points in both states. California and Pennsylvania lost both numbers and density, New Jersey stayed the same, and Michigan and Ohio gained slightly.

Despite Right Wing GOP Gov. Scott Walker's law trashing public unions, Wisconsin union numbers (+24,000, to 317,000) and density (+0.3 percent, to 12.3 percent) both rose last year. There was no public-private breakdown by state. Other big jumps in union numbers were in Alabama (+37,000), where density rose from 9.2 percent to 10.7 percent. Maryland (+28,000) and Virginia (+21,000).

The anti-union South had the lowest union density, except that right wing-dominated Utah replaced Texas on the list of least-unionized states. North Carolina (3 percent) was last, trailed by Arkansas, Mississippi, South Carolina and Utah, in that order.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka had no immediate comment on the numbers, but Larry Mishel, director of the Economic Policy Institute, did. He noted that private-sector unionists rose in construction and manufacturing, two of the more-unionized sectors of the workforce, accounting for the entire increase in union numbers.

But the share of public sector workers whom contracts cover dropped, he pointed out. That includes the 1.5 million "free riders" who get benefits of contracts but who don't pay union dues, just fair share fees. A U.S. Supreme Court case earlier in the week challenged even those fair share fees from the free riders as a violation of the free riders' free speech rights.

"More than 35 percent of net new jobs" in factories and construction "were covered by collective bargaining agreements," Mishel said. "Union coverage has increased in some states that may be unexpected. For instance, private sector union coverage increased in each of the last two years in Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Kentucky and Tennessee.

"Improvements in the private sector have been offset, however, by erosion in the public sector. Between 2012 and 2013 union coverage in the public sector fell from 39.6 percent to 38.7 percent. The starkest change was in Wisconsin, where union coverage in the public sector fell from 53.4 percent in 2011 to just 37.6 percent in 2013. This suggests that the erosion of public sector union coverage reflects the new anti-collective bargaining policies implemented in several states," Mishel added.

Wisconsin's Walker jammed his law, written by the secretive American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) corporate lobby, through the GOP-run state legislature in 2011. He overcame massive protests and strong labor lobbying. The law has been challenged, and most of it has been upheld, in court.

Photo: Flickr

GE closing upstate NY plant, betraying workers, community

Thu, 23 Jan 2014 16:22:00 +0000

FORT EDWARD, N.Y. - Despite 17 bargaining sessions over a 60-day period, General Electric has decided to shutter its 75-year-old plant here, saying it will move the work to another plant in Clearwater, Fla. Union negotiators had attempted to save the plant, its nearly 200 jobs, and the community whose survival the closing has put at risk. Apparently, the company was just going through the motions at the bargaining table and never really considered any proposal to save the factory, according to union officials.

As reported in the Tampa Bay Times on Jan. 6, "GE demanded an hourly wage cut of $17.88 for 163 workers, effectively reducing the wage to $11.12." Clearly with the company seeking such steep wage cuts, keeping the plant in upstate NY was never seriously considered by GE.

A bulletin released by the union at the plant, United Electrical Workers Local 332, states: "Unfortunately, Governor Cuomo's office was nowhere to be found. Despite repeated efforts on our part to engage him, Mr. Cuomo's office never even granted us the opportunity to meet with him or his staff to listen to our concerns and work with us on a plan to save the Fort Edward plant." During one brief conversation with the union, a Cuomo staffer reportedly said, "They want to move to Florida, I can't stop them." Such a statement is unfortunate since the loss of annual tax revenue of $35 million per year will devastate an already struggling region. This is an area already suffering from factory closures, job losses, gridlock in Washington, D.C., and the seemingly permanent expiration of the Emergency Extended Unemployment Program.

The Tampa Bay Times article did hit one nail on the head. The now doomed Fort Edward plant was "built in the World War II heydays of New York State manufacturing, where GE plants in Schenectady were deemed cutting edge." Yes, it's true that the World War II era of upstate New York manufacturing was cutting edge. It's equally true that those very same plants in Schenectady and Fort Edward, and in Pittsfield, Mass., for that matter, were integral in the war supply effort to defeat Hitler and the fascists. However, yours truly sees these facts not as an etching on the tombstone of upstate manufacturing but rather as great achievements, and certainly not as a third-rate excuse to betray the same working class who built that legacy.

Tony Long is a freelance writer who lives and works in the Hudson Valley region of New York State.

Photo: Teachers and others turn out to support UE Local 332 in the fight to keep the GE Fort Edward plant open, at an Oct. 21, 2013, rally. United Electrical Workers Facebook page.

Today in labor history: Striking and saving lives

Thu, 23 Jan 2014 16:16:00 +0000

January 23 is, like most days, a day to remember in labor history.

In 1913 on this date some 10,000 clothing workers went on strike in Rochester, N.Y., for the eight-hour day, a 10-percent wage increase, union recognition, and extra pay for overtime and holidays. Parades were held all day throughout the clothing district and there was at least one instance of mounted police charging the crowd of strikers and arresting 25 picketers.

Six people were wounded and one worker, 18-year-old Ida Breiman, was shot to death by a sweatshop contractor. The strike was called off in April after manufacturers agreed not to discriminate against workers for joining a union.

With the back side of the polar vortex plunging the northern half of the U.S. into bitter arctic cold it is particularly appropriate this Jan. 23 to remember the heroism of 20 workers in snowbound Maryland on Jan. 23, 1936.

In Allegany County, Md. workers with the Civilian Conservation Corps, a New Deal era public works program, were snowbound at Fifteen Mile Creek Camp, S-53, when they received a distress call about a woman in labor who needed to get to a hospital.

Proving the value of public service workers, some 20 courageous CCC workers volunteered to dig through miles of snow drifts until the woman was successfully able to be transported to the hospital where her baby was safely brought into the world.

Photo: 1913 Rochester garment workers strike. Wikimedia (CC)