People Before Profit blog

Houston church, NAACP support striking janitors

Tue, 31 Jul 2012 16:29:00 +0000

HOUSTON - Striking janitors held a large rally here yesterday at St. John's Methodist Church with 600 to 700 striking union members represented by Service Employees International Union Local 1 attending. Strike banners hung from the sanctuary walls while large photos of workers were displayed. The crowd rose to their feet, time after time, with clenched fists after each speech.

Ada Edwards, a St. John's member and former Houston city councilor, spoke along with the church's pastor. She ikened the strike to a war and urged the workers to be a winner. When you win, we all win, she said.

The strike, which started here, has now spread to eight other cities. The workers are demanding higher wages from cleaning contractors, which are hired to clean buildings that house some of the largest corporations in the world, including JP Morgan Chase, KBR and Exxon Mobil.

The cleaning companies have been forced to go back to the bargaining table this week. There are 3,200 union members. They are paid $8.35 an hour and average 30 hours a week. They are striking for $10 an hour.

The average janitor makes less than $9,000 a year. The U.S. government defines the poverty level at $22,314 for a family of four, and $11,139 for an individual. In contrast, Houston has more millionaires than any other city in the nation, along with 10,000 homeless and 870,000 families that go hungry every day.

In a blatant attempt to intimidate the workers, contractors have threatened to call immigration, speakers said. Employers have harassed union members at home, they said.

But the strike is growing both in numbers and support. The unions strike fund of $10,000 grew by another $3,200 donated by the NAACP at their national convention held here.

St. John's too answered the union's call for help. The church has 9,000 members, including 3,000 who are - or were - homeless. The church serves 7,000 hot meals each month and distributes more than 9 tons of fresh food weekly.

Photo: Last week, striking Houston janitors marched through the busy Theater District, then gathered in Tranquility Park to share words of encouragement with one another. SEIU 1 Facebook.

Today in labor history: Football players begin two-day strike

Tue, 31 Jul 2012 14:31:00 +0000

On this day in 1970, members of the National Football League Players Association began a two-day strike over pay, pensions, the right to arbitrations, and the right to have agents. This marked the first time NFL players participated in a strike.

The players' battle took its toll: After the negotiations, some player representatives were let go by their teams.

However, the strike was ultimately a victory, earning a further $11 million in pensions and benefits. Moreover, the NFLPA became the first sports union to be recognized by the National Labor Relations Board.

Photo: A game of football. Paul Keleher/Wikipedia

Biden draws cheers at AFT convention

Tue, 31 Jul 2012 14:26:00 +0000

DETROIT - "Teachers are under full blown assault," declared Vice President Joe Biden, addressing the American Federation of Teachers convention here on Sunday. Vice President Biden, his wife Dr. Jill Biden - a longtime teacher, United Auto Workers President Bob King and noted educator and author Diane Ravitch all came to the AFT convention to pledge their support for our nation's teachers.

The vice president was introduced by Jill Biden who taught for 13 years in a public high school and continues teaching full time at Northern Virginia Community College, even as she serves as the "Second Lady." She told the audience, "Being a teacher is not what I do , it 's who I am."

Vice President Biden spelled out the choices voters have in the November election.

Why does the Republican budget cut $900 million for K-12 education, cut Head Start and Pell grants, Biden asked, answering himself: "because they have to pay for their one trillion dollar, 600 million tax cut for the wealthy."

The attitude of the "new" Republican Party, Biden said, is: "Government needs to keep its hands out of education." He declared, "Don't tell me you value education but then don't invest in it."

Biden noted that the middle class has been clobbered by the economic crisis, and attacked the Republican aid-the-rich, trickle-down approach. He said, "We think you rebuild the middle class from the 'middle out,' they think from the 'top down.'" Addressing the teacher delegates, he said, "We don't see you as the problem, we see you as the solution."

A sea of 3,000 teachers and school workers, wearing AFT Obama-Biden blue T-shirts, cheered enthusiastically. Thought many disagree with some of Obama's education policies, they saw the bigger picture, as outlined by UAW President Bob King.

Addressing the convention on Saturday, King cited two priorities in the coming period. Number one is the re-election of President Obama. We may not agree with all the president does, King said, but we "cannot allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good. We will go back 50 years if Republicans win."

Second, to achieve real progress, King said labor must recommit to rebuilding a social and economic justice movement when the elections are over.

He noted that when unions were stronger, "every measure of social justice" was stronger too. "Too many of our economists do not understand the core centrality to a fair and just society is a vibrant and strong labor movement," King said. When union members advance, every worker in America benefits, he said, adding that labor is the "core of democracy" in any nation.

Educator Diane Ravitch tore apart the "big lie" of lagging test scores used by some education "reformers" to justify privatization. The American educational system is failing as the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) shows that test scores of American students are at their highest points ever, she said. She said increases have been steady and significant and they have been greatest for black and Hispanic students. "We should be thanking our nation's teachers," said Ravitch.

"Teachers need to work in a professional atmosphere where they are treated with respect and dignity," Ravitch said. "Carrots and sticks are for donkeys, not professionals."

She cited a number of reason students have difficulty in the classroom, from health issues to family stability but she said the "single biggest predictor of student progress is family income." Thus, poverty and joblessness must be addressed to improve student learning.

Retired hearing specialist and past Chicago Teachers Union President Marilyn Stewart agreed. When an economic crisis hits the country, she said, "teachers feel it first in the classroom; stress from the home is carried into the classroom."

Delegate Debbie Uribe, a 30-year early childhood educator in Los Angeles, said she feels her work with children builds the foundation for future success. She's upset her school is getting an 8.5 percent cut in state funding.

Also bringing the crowd to its feet Saturday was Detroit NAACP President, Rev. Wendell Anthony. Reverend Anthony said if you are teaching in America you're going through some kind of hell adding, "Love has got to kick in, because the money isn't." He asked what message are we sending when you can use your NRA card to vote (as in Texas) but can't use your college ID. "Insanity is running wild," he exclaimed.

The convention re-elected AFT President Randi Weingarten to another term.

Photo: Vice President Joe Biden greats teachers at the AFT Convention in Detroit, July 29. Courtesy AFT.

Governor helps force Con Ed into an agreement

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 13:32:00 +0000

NEW YORK - Pressure from Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo forced Consolidated Edison back to the bargaining table to reach a tentative new contract with Utility Workers Local 1-2, which represents the electric firm's 8,500 workers, on July 26.

The deal follows weeks during which workers have been locked out by Con Edison and massive rallies and marches in the streets. Details of the pact were unavailable, pending ratification, said Utility Workers National President Michael Langford.

"Officers and staff of Local 1-2 and the national union wish to thank all those members, both from the local and sisters and brothers from across the country, who have offered and provided support to the locked out members of the local," he added. "That support helped the local's bargaining team achieve this agreement."

Con Ed locked out the workers at the start of July as New York wilted under a record heat wave.

There were reports that Cuomo forced the utility back to the bargaining table after the union volunteered to send half of its members back in the face of powerful thunderstorms that would have endangered the electric grid for Con Ed's nine million customers. Con Ed was trying to run the system with 5,000 retirees and supervisors.

Governor Cuomo wrote a letter to Con Ed's CEO, Kevin Burke, early last week, reminding him of the possibility of major brown outs due to the hot weather and when forecasts for last Thursday warned of impending thunderstorms with high winds he decided to intervene directly.

"It wasn't about just the contract, it was about the safety of New Yorkers," Cuomo said.

After spending some five hours with local president Harry Farrell, national president Michael Langford and chief executive officer Kevin Burke, both sides seemed pleased with the outcome and thanked the governor. Farrell, president of the local, said, "Cuomo's intervention was the key to getting a deal. It was probably one of the toughest contracts that I've done in a while, but with the governor overseeing this whole process, it really helped us move the process along."

Two weeks into the lock-out, the state AFL-CIO and the New York City Central Labor Council, headed by Vincent Alvarez, sent a letter to the state's utility oversight agency, the Public Service Commission, hoping to persuade the agency to avoid the possibility of a break down of services, endangering the health and safety of the workers and the public.

Earlier in the dispute, Craig S. Ivey, President of Con Edison who was the CEO of Dominion Energy, a non-union utility company based in Virginia, attempted to bring workers to New York to do the work of the locked-out workers. They had to return to Virginia and the D.C. area, however, because of severe storms in that area.

After negotiations broke down again many of these workers were brought back to New York to work along side management and retirees.

Con Ed was pushing for give-backs in spite of big profits. Con Edison is a Fortune 500 company ranking 209 on the Fortune list. It had profits of over one billion dollars in 2011 and has managed to cut its work force by half since the 1980's due to technology and productivity.

There was talk on the picket line that the company's overall intent is to make itself more attractive for purchase by a larger utility company, continuing a decades-long consolidation trend in the industry nationwide. This is the trend in other industries as well in the era of globalization.

It was also suggested that this is an election year and the labor disputes that have not been resolved e.g., 45,000 regional Verizon Communications Workers of America members (out for one year this August), the 800 members of International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers on strike against Caterpillar in Joliet, Illinois and other battles may be part of a strategy by the corporations to try to put the brakes on the AFL-CIO and SEIU's announcement that unions will be sending 400,000 members out to canvass for the re-election of President Obama.

Photo: Con Ed workers gather in New York on July 2. Seth Wenig/AP

Today in labor and people’s history: Medicare and Medicaid established

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 10:48:00 +0000

On July 30, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed legislation establishing Medicare and Medicaid. It came after decades of struggle.

The movement for national health insurance dates back to the struggles of the Great Depression of the 1920s and '30s, and the New Deal. It was strongly opposed by the medical establishment, including the American Medical Association. A key turning point, according to historian Peter Corning, came in 1957 when the executive council of the AFL-CIO committed the labor federation to an "all-out battle for government health insurance."

"Government health insurance was pressed as labor's number-one legislative priority, and organized labor became the rallying point for all those who favored the measure," Corning wrote.

Medicare and Medicaid were signed into law in 1965 as an amendment to the Social Security Act of 1935. Medicare provided hospital and medical insurance for Americans age 65 or older. In 1972, eligibility for Medicare was extended to people under 65 with certain disabilities, and people of all ages with kidney disease requiring dialysis or transplant. Medicaid, a state and federally funded program, offers health coverage to low-income people.

Some 19 million people enrolled in Medicare when it went into effect in 1966. By 2010, Medicare provided health insurance to 48 million Americans - 40 million people age 65 and older and 8 million younger people with disabilities. Medicare and Medicaid serve a large population of seniors, sick, disabled, and low-income people, most of whom would be unable to afford health care otherwise.

Photo: President Lyndon Johnson (right), Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare John Gardner (second from left) and Social Security Administration Commissioner Bob Ball (left) received the first Medicare Part B application from a member of the general public, Tony Palcaorolla of Baltimore, Md., (next to President Johnson), Sept. 1, 1965. SSA History Archives

Trumka steps up support for locked out sugar workers

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 10:17:00 +0000

ST. PAUL, Minn. - Calling American Crystal Sugar "a poster child for corporate greed," AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka announced the labor movement will escalate the campaign to push for an end to the company's year-long lockout of 1,300 workers, members of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco, and Grain Millers.

"Generations of families worked to make American Crystal Sugar a profitable and productive producer of sugar," Trumka told a July 25 news conference in St. Paul. "This abysmal display shows total disregard for those employees and the community who made Crystal Sugar a well renowned brand and a leader" in U.S. sugar production.

For decades, members of BCTGM locals across the Red River Valley worked with the firm's farmer members and company management to help the industry prosper. But on Aug. 1, 2011, the firm locked out workers at seven facilities in Minnesota, North Dakota, and Iowa.

The lockout occurred after BCTGM members had rejected a contract offer that they said threatened the future of jobs in their communities. In a recent vote, they rejected it again.

Trumka pledged the ongoing support and coordination of efforts with the union to put a spotlight on the firm's actions. He was not specific.

Photo: Security guards block the entrance to locked out employees at American Crystal Sugar in Mason City, Iowa, Aug. 1. (Arian Schuessler/The Globe Gazette/AP)

Second heavily-Republican union backs Obama

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 10:04:00 +0000

PHILADELPHIA - In yet another move by a plurality Republican group, delegates to the International Association of Fire Fighters convention formally endorsed President Obama and Vice President Joseph Biden for re-election.

Their decision comes weeks after a similar endorsement from the board of another plurality GOP union, the American Federation of Government Employees. And the day of IAFF's move, Obama picked up the backing of a non-union police group.

In a surprise telephone call to the delegates, meeting in Philadelphia, Obama thanked them for their backing. In his call, Obama backed both public safety officers and their right to collectively bargain. Both are under fierce attack by business and the GOP.

"We are grateful for what you guys do every day, and as long as I and Vice President Biden serve we will keep fighting for what matters to fire fighters and the middle class," Obama told the delegates.

IAFF's endorsement is valuable because of its credibility, not just in the union movement but with the wider public, since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The attacks killed 343 New York fire fighters and their priest, as the NYFF members rushed in to save lives at the World Trade Center, and then it collapsed.

"If you are willing to fight alongside us, I am confident we will win in November and together we will create an economy that gives everybody who works hard a chance to get ahead," Obama continued.

"We have a big choice to make. The other guy running" - presumed GOP nominee Mitt Romney - "has a different view on the importance of what you do. He opposes your rights to bargain. He says our country cannot afford more fire fighters even though he supports huge tax cuts for people who don't need it."

As Massachusetts's governor, Romney tried, unsuccessfully, to curb collective bargaining rights for fire fighters and other public safety personnel, long before destruction of those rights became a general GOP cause.

The day before Obama's call, Biden told the delegates in person that the administration would stand with them and other workers, and that Republicans "have a different value set" regarding workers. "They look at your ranks and see an easy place to cut budgets to accommodate their priorities," Biden declared. And not just fire fighters but "cops, public workers generally" fall to the GOP ax, he added.

"They act as if you're the community's problem, not part of the community," said Biden, who has personal connections with fire fighters from both his days as a Delaware senator and because he remembers how they rescued his sons from a car crash that killed his first wife and his daughter.

IAFF President Harold Schaitberger, introducing Obama's live call to the delegates, said his union's endorsement shows fire fighters "stand with those who stand with us. Our current president has been standing with us. Now it is time for us to be with him."

Photo: A sign is posted at a residence, thanking the International Association of Fire Fighters workers for battling this year's High Park Fire. Laramie Boomerang & Andy Carpenean/AP

AFT convention: Teachers ask, “When did we become the enemy?”

Fri, 27 Jul 2012 15:39:00 +0000

DETROIT - "Some of you are thinking that the big opening today is not in Detroit but in London. But don't ever forget that behind every sprinter, marathoner, gymnast or swimmer is a teacher."

That is how American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten began her keynote address to 3,000 delegates as the AFT opened its 2012 national convention in Detroit's Cobo Center Friday morning. She drew a standing ovation.

The nation's teachers, the majority of them unionized and working in public schools, have been the bedrock for the success stories of people from all walks of life. With so much to be proud of, delegates here wondered, "When did we become the enemy?"

Weingarten said teachers have been targeted because they are in the front lines fighting to save public education.

She noted that the nature of teachers' work, tied to families and based in communities, puts them at the intersection of two important social movements - the movement for increased educational opportunity, and the movement for advancing economic dignity. Weingarten outlined the AFT's commitment to "solution-based unionism" - working to solve the challenges faced by schools and the communities they serve.

As an example she said the union has started community programs that make available to students and their families health, mental health, tutoring, counseling and other services.

Another initiative she cited is a web-based project called "Share My Lesson" that she said will be a "digital file cabinet" of the best teacher lesson plans and ideas freely available for all teachers.

Weingarten spoke of the AFT executive council's unanimous endorsement of President Obama. She said the candidates the union is endorsing in many cases aren't perfect but "they have felt the same winds of change that we have, and are attempting to deal with them in a way that honors and respects America's working families."

The two candidates for president couldn't be more different, she said, and the stakes are too high to sit this one out. She mentioned Romney's support of school vouchers and the Bush-era tax cuts for the very wealthy, his plan that would turn Medicare into a voucher system and his plan to double out-of-pocket costs for seniors, his opposition to the Obama's stimulus program that saved the jobs of 300,000 teachers and more.

"Mitt Romney says he would preserve the Department of Education only so he'd have a club to beat back unions. Should Mitt Romney be our next president?" asked Weingarten.

The delegates responding with a deafening "No."

At noon, hundreds of delegates went to rally in front of the offices of Detroit's emergency school manager, Roy Roberts. Weingarten said Roberts has used that power to gut school funding, pink-slip every teacher, and slash teacher pay. He has refused to negotiate with the teachers union to solve the deep challenges that Detroit schools face.

Weingarten told the delegates she had sent Roberts a letter Thursday, demanding that he meet with her and local AFT leaders, and within hours of receiving this letter, he agreed. This happened not just because of the letter, she said, but because the teachers made it known that they were prepared to turn out in force, she said.

The teachers rallying outside Roberts' office reinforced the message Weingarten delivered inside: "Only by working with educators, parents and the community will we be able to rebuild a strong Detroit for our children."

On a positive note, Weingarten said that despite a brutal economy and a right wing out to destroy the union, AFT membership is larger than two years ago.

Photo: American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten addresses the AFT convention in Detroit, July 27. Courtesy of Nathan Goldbaum, communications coordinator, Chicago Teachers Union.

Workers cry out for higher minimum wage

Fri, 27 Jul 2012 12:19:00 +0000

From Pittsburgh to Peoria to Portland and from Washington to Detroit, workers came out this week to demand a hike in the federal minimum wage.

The minimum wage campaign, stepped up last week by the Service Employees and Jobs With Justice - with the AFL-CIO and other unions joining in - intends to win three 85 cent increases in the current $7.25 hourly federal minimum for this year and the next two years and then regular increases indexed to inflation. There has not been any increase in the minimum wage since 2006.

Thousands of people attended the rallies July 24 at 34 locations across the country combined. Speakers included local politicians in Toledo, Ohio, and minimum wage workers in many cities. Clergy and union leaders also joined in, with particularly pointed comments coming from Bob Soutier, president of the St. Louis Central Labor Council.

After voicing labor's strong support for the increase, Soutier noted Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., backs the hike. But all three Republicans vying to oppose her this fall opposed increasing the minimum wage. The moderator in a republican primary debate asked the three GOP candidates to name the federal minimum wage figure - and they couldn't.

The four Chicago rallies, one of which was a humorous street theater in front of a Wal-Mart just west of the Loop, were later combined into one mass march that drew more than 1,000 people. The crowd descended on the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, demanding its members - many of whom employ minimum-wage workers - support the minimum wage increase.

The Chicagoans had a political angle, too: They began with a "trolley tour" of Dunkin Donuts shops, emphasizing Bain Capital's exploitation of its minimum-wage workers. Presumed GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney owned and ran Bain.

Elsewhere, including Kansas City, Mo., Peoria, Ill., and Minneapolis, advocates marched to local offices of Republican lawmakers - Sen. Roy Blunt and Reps. Bobby Schilling and John Kline, respectively -- to demand they back the minimum wage hike. Besides SEIU and Jobs With Justice, unionists at the rallies came from the UAW, the Teamsters, Workers United, the Teachers, and the Steelworkers, among others.

At Kline's office, more than 50 demonstrators appeared, some holding signs challenging the lawmaker - who chairs the House Education and the Workforce Committee - to live on the minimum wage, which works out to $290 a week.

Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., the top Democrat on Kline's GOP-run panel, and

Senate Labor Committee Chairman Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, have introduced the minimum wage hike bill, but it's expected to go nowhere in this Congress. That didn't stop the advocates.

"One hundred fifty people turned out in 106-degree heat" for the St. Louis march said Lara Granich, director of Missouri Jobs With Justice, who helped put together the demonstration there. "That's where Bob Soutier called out the GOP," she added.

That's also where minimum wage restaurant worker Joe Wicks told the crowd that earning the minimum at a chain restaurant often meant he had to "choose between

gas for my car and groceries for my family." He also pointed out that restaurant workers survive on the "tipped minimum wage." That's $2.13 an hour in almost all states - Missouri, at $3.63 is an exception - and it hasn't been raised in 20 years.

"The economy is getting worse, and people need help," said Dezirai Jones, a Savage, Minn., resident who works for minimum wage at a local restaurant. Rep. Kline "doesn't know what it's like to make minimum wage. Even if he tried he would find it hard and a real eye-opener," Workday Minnesota reported.

"Minimum wage is basically impossible to live off of," added Mallory Curran of Lakeville, Minn., a single mother who is separated from her husband but unable to afford a divorce.

In Cleveland, a minimum wage cable TV installer told how must work 20 hours a week of overtime to pay the rent and keep food on his family's table - and that's at Ohio's higher minimum of $7.70 hourly.

"We talked about how we should keep the pressure on" Congress even if it doesn't raise the minimum this year, said Cathy Kaufmann of SEIU1199Ohio Hospital and Health Care Workers, who helped organize events in Cleveland, Cincinnati and Toledo. Added Cleveland organizer Anthony Caldwell: "The speakers seemed to be relatively optimistic" about the chances of raising the minimum wage this year.

"It isn't a Democratic issue or a Republican issue. It's a non-partisan issue," he said. "It's kind of a no-brainer. The wealthiest have seen their wages go up again" ever since the official end of the Great Recession, Caldwell added. "But everybody else is stagnant. Raising the minimum wage will spur growth in our communities."

A minimum wage worker who puts in 40 hours a week barely takes home $15,000 a year, while the average CEO of a Fortune 500 company earns more than twice that in a single day.

According to the National Employment Law Project there is not a single state in the nation where a full-time minimum wage worker could afford a two-bedroom apartment.

Photo: Protesters rally for a raise in the state's minimum wage on the Great Western Staircase at the Capitol in Albany, N.Y. Mike Groll/AP

Letter carriers step up drive to save Postal Service

Fri, 27 Jul 2012 10:18:00 +0000

MINNEAPOLIS - Letter Carriers President Fredric Rolando is challenging his union to step up its crusade to save the Postal Service, saying that "if we don't, no one else will."

In a keynote address to the National Association of Letter Carriers convention the last full week of July in Minneapolis, Rolando described the threats to the Postal Service - and to workers' jobs - coming from both Congress and from agency management.

Postal service managers want to ruthlessly downsize the USPS, cutting delivery, laying off 100,000 workers, letting another 100,000 go by attrition and closing post offices. And House Republicans want to install a financial czar over the troubled agency, with the power to fire workers, rip up union contracts and cut benefits.

"But we have a secret weapon in the fight" to preserve the USPS, Rolando added: "Each other."

The future of the Postal Service, which employs the union's letter carriers plus members of the Mail Handlers and the Postal Workers, dominated convention discussions. The NALC calculates it has 270,000 members and Postmaster General Thomas Donahue wants to cut many of them to solve yearly multibillion-dollar deficits.

The Letter Carriers say the main reason for the deficit is a yearly $5.5 billion advance payment of future health care costs for future retirees, imposed by a GOP-run Congress and GOP President George Bush in 2006. Congress can solve the financial ills of the United States Postal Service by eliminating that yearly payment and by ordering the government to return billions of dollars in overfunded pension money to the USPS.

Postal "reform" legislation pending in Congress only partially solves the health care payment problem and does nothing about the pension overfunding. It also does not back ideas, which NALC has advanced, to let the Postal Service use its nationwide network for other profitable purposes, such as selling licenses and permits.

"Remember to keep your head up, and remember the power of a union. You have a way to overcome all the fear and uncertainty about the future by fighting for each

other today," Rolando told his delegates. But he warned it wouldn't be easy.

"Fasten your seat belts, brothers and sisters...We are going to face extreme turbulence. But make no mistake: Our primary task will be to determine the future of the Postal Service. That is bold, some might think arrogant, talk. But it is true."

Other players who should be concerned about the Postal Service aren't, Rolando said. He said agency management is "hopeless" and "has no business plan," that Congress is hostile or "deadlocked" and the Obama administration is "disengaged."

He was particularly irate about the management, whose solution, he said, is "cut service, cut Saturday delivery, close facilities, cut the workforce, reduce wages and benefits, contract out and shrink, shrink, shrink ourselves.

"If we do not seize the moment, show the way and demonstrate the service can be saved -- and how -- the sad fact is that no one else will do it. Period," Rolando said.

The NALC has hired Ron Bloom, who served as President Obama's manager in turning around the nation's car companies after the 2008 crash, to draft a new business plan for USPS that the union could promote. In his own speech, Bloom warned the delegates the union might have to sacrifice, too. The Auto Workers made sacrifices under Bloom's successful rescue of GM and Chrysler, using a specially structured bankruptcy process for the two big auto firms.

Bloom, who once was an SEIU organizer before going into such areas as investment banking and industrial policy, said, "We need three things to succeed: A leader with vision who wants the Postal Service to win, a Congress that sees the value of the (postal) network, and Letter Carriers who stand up for themselves and this institution.

"The Letter Carriers are there, but Obama is indifferent and much of Congress is hostile," Bloom added. "Congress created it," he said of USPS, "and whether by action or inaction, indifference or malice, many people are prepared to see it fade away."

Too many lawmakers, Bloom told the crowd, "either don't understand the situation, don't care, or understand it all too well and want USPS to fail."

Bloom said the agency's other key problem is the declining volume of first-class mail, which the union has repeatedly pointed out still makes money for the USPS. "Nothing will arrest" that drop, Bloom warned. But the Postmaster General and his team "have thrown in the towel" on reinventing the agency for the 21^st century.

USPS can use its nationwide network for other profitable purposes besides delivering the mail, he said. But there also must be shared sacrifice, Bloom said, with a hard look at collective-bargaining agreements. "Labor needs to be a part of the solution. If we don't lead this, it will not happen. If it's not part of a bigger package of shared sacrifice, it is completely in vain."

Photo: Sheila Steele // CC 2.0

Free trade pact yields few gains for Colombian workers

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 12:43:00 +0000

WASHINGTON - One year after implementation of the controversial U.S.-Colombian "free trade agreement" and its Labor Action Plan (LAP) attachment, workers' rights in the troubled Latin American nation have improved on paper, but very little on the ground, three top Colombian unionists say.

In a July 24 panel discussion at the AFL-CIO and in visits with U.S. lawmakers who insisted on writing the worker rights agreement, the three added that while the new Colombian government pushed through almost three-fourths of the promised legal reforms, a culture of impunity and non-enforcement of workers' rights has yet to change.

As a result, even since the FTA officially began, there have been 485 violent incidents against unionists in Colombia, long wracked by a civil war. They include 28 murders, bringing the death toll of unionists there to 2,921 in 26 years. The latest murder, in April, was of Daniel Aguirre, one of the union negotiators of the LAP.

"It is easier to form an armed group than to form a labor union" in Colombia, commented one of the local union leaders, Miguel Conde.

The situation in Colombia is important to U.S. workers, explained AFL-CIO panelist Celeste Drake. "What we are unable to do about labor rights" in both countries "has been because of our corporate-directed trade policies," she said. "The only way Colombian workers gain the benefits of exercising fundamental workers' rights is if the Labor Action Plan is fully implemented."

But it isn't, say Drake, Gimena Sanchez of the Washington Office on Latin America or the three union leaders. The human rights group co-hosted the session. Along with the AFL-CIO, it released reports on workers rights in Colombia.

And now that the U.S.-Colombia FTA has begun, there is little leverage for Colombia to improve its workers' rights record, unless the U.S. pushes, panelists said.

"President Obama and (Colombian President) Santos clearly delivered for the multi-nationals and commercial interests, but now they must deliver for labor and the human rights community," Sanchez said. But Colombian workers face huge problems:

Individual labor contracts, which so-called "cooperatives" signed with workers in key industries that benefit from the FTA - including bananas, palm oil and ports - were outlawed. Firms changed the names of the contracts to "benefits agreements" and

Colombian officials have not enforced the law against them. The contracts ban workers from organizing, and strip them of basic benefits, including wages and health care. As a result, according to both the Colombians and the Communications Workers - one of two U.S. unions, with the Steelworkers, that has taken the lead in the fight over Colombian labor rights - only about 4% of Colombia's workers are unionized.

· Threats against unionists and their families continue and the government has been lax about providing promised protection. Conde, general secretary of the Puerto Wilches local of the palm oil workers, said he and his colleagues must frequently move, and often they and their families fear to venture outdoors.

"There has been no government response" to worker demands, as authorized by the Colombian LAP, for protection, he said. "But the companies have responded with reprisals and firings on various (palm oil) plantations."

Companies manipulated Colombian law over decades to deprive workers of basic rights. In one outstanding case, said Jose Luciano Sanin Vasquez, director of the National Trade Union School in Medellin, Colombian law, even before 1995, barred subcontracting and deprivation of rights from workers at the national airline, Avianca.

Nonetheless, the carrier, which depends heavily on traffic with the U.S., evaded the law and has lowered union density there from 90% in that year to 20% now.

Afro-Colombians, who work primarily in sugar cane, are even more exploited than other workers, said Jhonsson Torres, a sugar cane union leader. Those workers were also treated as subcontractors. His union staged a 2-month strike of such workers several months ago, wining concessions - but not abolition of the individual contracts, even though Colombian law presumably now outlaws them.
The country's labor minister wants to enforce the law, but faces a culture of inertia in his own ministry, huge resistance from the multi-nationals and general apathy, said Sanin Vasquez. Colombia's government is more interested in reaping the benefits of the U.S.-Colombia FTA than in enforcing its worker rights conditions, he added.
Crimes against the unionists, including the murders, are not investigated, and perpetrators go unpunished, all three Colombian union leaders said. The sole exceptions are when former members of Right Wing paramilitaries, on trial for their roles in the nation's long-running civil war, confess to murders of union leaders.
Obama lost leverage and made a huge mistake when he declared, at a summit of international leaders, that the FTA could now be implemented. Instead, the three said, he should press Colombia to live up to its commitments on worker rights.

Photo: Public Citizen // CC 2.0

Federal mediator steps into fight against Verizon

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 12:22:00 +0000

WASHINGTON -The head of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, George Cohen, has stepped in to try to bring an agreement in the struggle of the Communications Workers and the Electrical Workers against Verizon.

The struggle has seen the members of the unions, which together represent 45,000 workers at the giant telecom, refuse Verizon's demands for what CWA President Larry Cohen says would be 50 years' worth of rollbacks in workers' gains.

The first session was at the FMCS offices here on July 25. George Cohen also asked both the unions and the company to put a lid on comments about the talks.

"Because of the sensitivity of these negotiations, in keeping with our past custom and practice, and the agreement between the parties, the FMCS and the parties will refrain from any public comment concerning the future schedule and/or the status of talks among the parties until further notice," George Cohen said.

The unions note Verizon's brass still refuses to move off its concessionary demands, even after a year of bargaining and a two-week strike last August that forced Verizon back to the table. Verizon also fired 23 workers for picket line "disruptions" of various types, such as alleged threats to supervisors who crossed lines.

The National Labor Relations Board has ruled the firings are illegal, and CWA President Cohen said recently that a settlement will not occur until the 23 are returned to their jobs and their discipline wiped off the books.

Verizon wants to drastically cut benefits and employment security, the unions note, though it netted more than $16.3 billion over the past four years. The $100 billion firm's board recently raised its CEO's compensation by 200 percent annually, to $23.1 million.

"This delay in reaching a fair agreement is not only bad for workers, it's bad for consumers and bad for our communities," said, CWA Vice President Chris Shelton and IBEW Council 6 Chairman Myles Calvey before FMCS entered.

"For the past year, we have been flexible and shown a willingness to negotiate, including significant proposals on healthcare and other key issues for management, but management continues to insist on proposals that would reduce jobs and cut our benefits by thousands of additional dollars per year, and fail to return thousands of jobs that the company has offshored," added CWA District 2-13 Vice President Ed Mooney, 2-13 and Bill Huber, President of IBEW Local 827.

"The company still wants givebacks that would destroy the standard of living of our workers and their families," Larry Cohen said before the FMCS session.

Photo: Tony Fischer // CC 2.0

Appeals court to review ruling that killed union election at airline

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 11:39:00 +0000

A federal appeals court will review the ruling by a Republican judge in Texas that killed a union election at American Airlines on grounds that it could cause "irreparable harm" to the company.

The federal appeals court in New Orleans agreed yesterday to take the Communication Workers' case against the airline's blockage of a union representation election for passenger service workers.

The announcement yesterday by CWA President Larry Cohen was important because the earlier ruling by the GOP-appointed judge in Fort Worth, Texas was the first ruling ever that the scheduling of a union election could cause "irreparable harm" to a company.

The election, involving 10,500 workers, had been scheduled for this summer but was called off by the GOP judge in Fort Worth earlier this month. Fort Worth is the headquarters for American Airlines.

The GOP judge had also agreed with American that the CWA had not filed enough cards for the union recognition vote.

Cohen described, in a telephone call, the details surrounding the case.

He said that after a long organizing campaign his union filed cards from more than 30 percent of the workers last December. By filing lawsuits and delaying as much as possible, Cohen said, the airline saw to it that the National Mediation Board, which runs union-management relations at airlines and railroads, could not rule on the union's petition for a vote until May.

By that time, he explained, Congress had changed the election rules. Now, rail and air unions must get cards from an absolute majority of workers they want to represent, before the NMB can schedule a vote. The GOP judge, U.S. District Judge Terry Means, said the union failed to meet that standard.

Cohen said the ruling of the District Court judge was "outrageous" for several reasons.

"Even in bankruptcy," Cohen said, "American Airlines was able to stop a union representation election by finding a judge who agreed with them that a union election would hurt company morale."

Compounding the injustice, he said, was the fact that "American filed for bankruptcy protection just after the union's Dec. 7 filing for the election." The company wanted to use bankruptcy, he said, to fire thousands of the airline's 55,000 workers and to dump pension plans.

Cohen said, in the phone call, that many lawmakers were supporting the union. He noted that on July 25 more than 100 in Congress had written American Airlines, urging the company to drop its legal maneuvers and let the election go forward.

Photo: Simon_sees // CC 2.0

Missiouri, workers, faithful fight for better minimum wage

Wed, 25 Jul 2012 14:51:00 +0000

ST. LOUIS - "The labor movement and the faith community are joined at the hip," Father Richard Creason, pastor at Most Holy Trinity Church, told over 200 trade union, student, community and faith activists as they rallied outside of a local Applebee's restaurant here July 24.

"For me the faith community and the labor community have always been intertwined," Father Creason continued. "Today we want to lift up the wages of working people"

The rally focused on a Missouri ballot initiative to raise the state minimum wage from $7.25 hourly to $8.25 an hour, and brought attention to the nationwide campaign to raise the federal minimum wage to $9.80 hourly.

Currently, full-time minimum wage workers in the Show Me state make $290 a week and $15,080 a year before taxes, which is $7,000 below the poverty line for a family of four.

Participants rallied to encourage Republican U.S. Senate candidates Todd Akin, Sarah Steelman and John Brunner to join current democratic U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill in publicly supporting an increase in the minimum wage.

"There are only a few things that get me hot," St. Louis Central Labor Council president, Bob Soutier, told the assembled activists as they braved the 106-degree summer heat to support raising the minimum wage.

"On a nice cool day like this," he added jokingly, "I get hot when I hear people talking - people like Todd Akin, Sarah Steelman and John Brunner - who don't know what the hell they're talking about."

Soutier was referring to a recent interview the Republican candidates participated in in-which they all agreed that the minimum wage was too high, but not one of them could actually say what the current minimum wage is.

Soutier added, "All of organized labor stands behind this effort." The Saint Louis Central Labor Council represents over 200,000 union members in the greater Saint Louis area.

"I've been a home care worker serving seniors and people with disabilities for 20 years now," Val Gordon, said. "And I'm still living in poverty and struggling to make ends meet."

Gordon made $6.65 an hour in 2003 and "did not get a raise until 2009, when the minimum wage went up to $7.25 an hour."

Since 2009, Gordon has only received a $.13 raise.

Jamie Moody, a tipped employee, is currently making $3.63 an-hour, roughly half the minimum wage. She said, "Nobody should have to live like this. We're not savages. We're people. We deserve better."

According to Give Missourians A Raise, the statewide coalition that collected over 120,000 registered voters signatures to put the minimum wage increase on the November ballot, the CEO of Applebee's makes $1,282 an hour, $103,700 a week and $5,392,402 a year.

Additionally, the average Applebee's employee making minimum wage would have to work almost 2 hours to buy a burger and soda (around $11.59 plus tip) at Applebee's, while Applebee's CEA, Julia Stewart only has to work 16 seconds.

According to Reverend Audrey Hollis, "Increasing the minimum wage is a crucial step in our economic recovery."

Joe Wicks, another local restaurant worker who is currently working two jobs as a server and a bartender, couldn't agree with Hollis more. He said, "People like me who work for a living put money back into the economy. We spend everything we make, which helps get the economy going again."

Wicks added, "We're nothing but a number to them. They don't even know we exist."

Photo: Tony Pecinovsky/PW

AFGE considered, then rejected neutrality in Romney vs. Obama

Wed, 25 Jul 2012 12:53:00 +0000

"There is no doubt that President Obama's heart is in the right place," said John Gage, president of the American Federation of Government Employees in a letter the union mailed to its members earlier this month. A plurality of AFGE members are registered Republicans.

"There is no doubt he occasionally disappointed and frustrated us," he said in the same letter, "but this election is not about our expectations. It is a choice between two different futures."

Gage said his union gave careful consideration to making no endorsement in the presidential race but decided to follow the advice of one of its "wise local presidents" who said, "If AFGE failed to endorse, it would bring the wrong message to members: It doesn't really matter who is president. And of course it does matter. It matters profoundly: For our job security, our pay, our retirement benefits, and the very nature of our proud work for America."

Gage said that for the first time since the 1950s, a president, Obama, "implemented an insourcing plan" to bring jobs "that should have been in the federal sector back into the federal sector. Romney would turn them over to the states, local governments or private industry - which in turn would label workers as independent contractors without Social Security, Medicare, workers comp or labor law protection."

Most unions never even considered the idea of remaining neutral in the presidential race, citing a host of major differences between Obama and Romney.

One of the biggest of these is the successful effort by the president to save GM and Chrysler. The two auto giants received federal loan guarantees and workers took cuts in pay and pension plans, keeping the companies alive. GM is again the world's largest auto company.

Counting automobiles and supplies, including everything from rubber to steel parts, saving the Detroit-based auto industry saves one out of 20 jobs in the United States.

Unions also back Obama because they see the president as committed to ending corporate outsourcing of jobs. and as committed to the idea of government-backed job creation efforts.

"If Romney believed in anything other than outsourcing, he'd support the Bring the Jobs Home Act," said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka just before Republicans in the Senate killed the bill last week.

"Companies like Bain (the firm Romney founded) are about wealth creation or insiders and job destruction for workers" said Communications Workers president Larry Cohen. In a recent letter to his members he cited 21 firms that Bain bought, cut jobs from or closed and then sold for profit during the years Romney was CEO.

"Romney's support for vouchers - taxpayer dollars for private schools - threatens the existence of public education and therefore is by far the most dangerous of all education policies," reads a New York United Federation of Teachers ad currently running in that state's newspapers.

Photo: Obama and Gage. AFGE // CC 2.0

Today in labor history: Formation of Alliance for Labor Action

Tue, 24 Jul 2012 13:19:00 +0000

On July 24, 1968, the United Autoworkers and the Teamsters formed the national trade union center, Alliance for Labor Action, which would soon be joined by several smaller unions.

The ALA supported the civil rights movement and vocally opposed the war in Vietnam, which included endorsing anti-war rallies and taking part in peace marches. The ALA also advocated fighting for universal health care.

The ALA disbanded after four years following the death of UAW President Walter Reuther.

Photo: Walter Reuther takes part in a civil rights march in Washington, circa 1963. Wikipedia

Global boycott of Hyatt hotels underway

Mon, 23 Jul 2012 14:41:00 +0000

WASHINGTON - A global boycott of Hyatt hotels was launched today at a press conference here by hotel workers, labor leaders, women's rights activists, LGBT leaders, NFL football players, students, and others.

The boycott, the groups said, is in response to the hotel company's abuse of workers and low wages. Unite Here, the hotel workers' union, also announced that it will stage, this week, demonstrations and actions at Hyatt hotels in 20 U.S. cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Baltimore, Indianapolis, and Boston.
The boycott is the highest escalation thus far in a campaign for worker rights that has been going on for years with the union now describing Hyatt as the worst employer in the hotel industry.
Particularly galling to the labor movement and its allies has been Hyatt's practice of replacing longtime employees with minimum wage temporary workers and the impositon of what workers say are dangerous and health-threatening workloads.

"In a unionized hotel the standard is to do 14 or 15 rooms a day but Hyatt has demanded in its non-union hotels that workers clean up to 26 to 32 rooms a day, doing marble floors on their hands and knees and lifting 100 pound mattresses," said John Wilhelm, the union's President. "No one can do this for long and survive so that's why they push this model of contracting out for minimum wage workers with a high turnover," he explained.

Richard Trumka, president of the nation's largest labor federation threw what he described as "the full support of the entire labor movement" behind the boycott. Unions and their allies spend many millions of dollars at hotels each year for conferences and conventions. "Hyatt will get none of our patronage," he said, "as long as they continue to abuse their workers."

Terry O'Neal, president of the National Organization of Women, noted how the majority of workers targeted for abuse by Hyatt are women. "It is a disgrace that a male CEO gets paid six and a half million dollars," she said, "and all they can do is pay these women the minimum wage. "There is no excuse for this disparity," she said and "women's organizations will stay away from Hyatt until they make a change."

Darlene Nipper, deputy executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force described her job as a hotel cook 25 years ago. "We know what it is like to be treated unfairly," said the LGBT leader, "and you can count on us to do everything in our power to make sure that our constituencies stay out of Hyatt hotels. We will be with you every step of the way."

Many thousands, as a result of the boycott, will be choosing not to eat, meet or sleep at Hyatt hotels.

The boycott follows many public actions by the hotel workers including civil disobedience demonstrations and strikes.

The company has, at times, responded in brutal fashion including last summer when it turned heat lamps on picketing workers during a brutal heart wave in Chicago.

Hyatt hs also refused to remain neutral when workers in non-union Hyatts try to affiliate with the union. "They have to be very brave," Wilhelm said, "because in one out of five cases workers trying to unionize at their workplaces get fired in this country," he said.

The boycott has been endorsed by virtually every union representing hotel workers worldwide.

Photo: The global boycott of Hyatt follows years of actions by Hyatt workers, including a 2010 sit-in in the streets of Chicago. Photo courtesy of Local 1 UNITE HERE

Report: Public sector cuts kill private jobs, too

Mon, 23 Jul 2012 14:26:00 +0000

WASHINGTON (PAI) -- Budget-slashing and job-cutting by state and local governments since the start of the current "Great Recession" have directly cost 627,000 workers their jobs and directly and indirectly cost the economy 2.3 million jobs, the Economic Policy Institute calculates.

Had those jobs all been saved or restored to the U.S. since the "Bush Crash" recession, the U.S. jobless rate would be as low as 6.7 percent, not its present 8.2 percent, the think tank adds.

EPI says the multiplier effects of the state and local job cuts during the current recovery - cuts that did not occur during or after prior slumps - "represent a serious drag that was not weighing on earlier recoveries."

EPI analysts Heidi Shierholz and Josh Bivens calculated that in addition to the actual workers whom state and local governments fired, they also did not hire 505,000 more workers since the 2009 end of the slump, just to keep up with population growth.

And the fired and un-hired state and local workers also meant reduced state and local demand for private-sector goods and services, as well as reduced consumer demand, they pointed out. That costs jobs, too.

"Firefighters need trucks and hoses, police officers need cars and radios, and teachers need books and desks," Bivens and Shierholz said. "When public-sector jobs are lost, it stands to reason that the inputs into these jobs will fall as well, and indeed research shows that for every public-sector job lost, roughly 0.43 supplier jobs are lost."

Not only that, but every dollar cut in public workers' pay and supplies takes another 24 cents out of worker buying power in the private economy, they calculated.

"Teachers and firefighters stop going to restaurants and buying cars if they're laid off, which reduces demand for wait staff and autoworkers and so on. Add the influences together - supplier jobs and jobs supported by this multiplier impact - and roughly 0.67 private sector jobs are lost for every public sector job cut."

That's two private sector jobs lost for every three public workers cut. The lost public jobs are added to the un-hired public workers, the lost private jobs and another 425,000 private jobs lost because recipients of state spending, such as on Medicaid or unemployment insurance, lack cash. The grand total job loss is 2.3 million.

But several former political and business leaders, guided by former New York Lieut. Gov. Richard Ravitch, said the fiscal travails of six big states - including New York, California and Illinois - demand more sharp cuts in state spending, particularly on state and local workers' pay and pensions.

Ravitch said the federal government is ignoring states' fiscal ills and their impact, though his solution, more cuts, was drastically different than what EPI recommends.

And EPI points out public sector job cuts are politically motivated, orchestrated by the Republicans and disproportionately hurting women and minorities.

"It's obviously nuts to maintain, as some do, that the government doesn't create jobs. It creates millions of them, and we very much need them if we're going to educate kids, drink water, put out fires, have public safety, etc." adds former White House advisor Jared Bernstein, who was EPI's chief before joining the administration. "But public sector jobs also create private sector jobs upstream and downstream. It's all connected, man."

Photo: AFSCME workers march in Madison, Wis., against attacks on public workers and collective bargaining rights. PW

Maritime unions, industry join forces to save jobs

Mon, 23 Jul 2012 14:15:00 +0000

PINEY POINT, Md. (PAI) -- Maritime unions and the U.S. industry joined forces to try to reverse a last-minute provision inserted in the new highway-mass transit law that threatens at least 2,000 U.S. seafarers' jobs while decimating the domestic cargo fleet.

The provision axes U.S. payments to U.S.-flag ships to carry Food for Peace aid abroad.

Without them, cheap non-union foreign shippers would bid and get the work.

One estimate puts the "savings" by axing the pro-U.S. law at $15 million.

Now the unions and maritime companies are meeting with bipartisan leaders from both houses of Congress to try to undo the damage, said Dan Duncan, Secretary-Treasurer of the AFL-CIO Maritime Trades Department.

"We don't know who put this in or where it came from," Duncan said of the section that dumped what's called "cargo preference," which mandates using only U.S. mariners and U.S.-flag ships to transport U.S. food aid worldwide. "But the unions and the industry are meeting with the leadership to find a way to restore it."

USA Maritime, a joint union-industry group, says that including mariners, farmers, shippers and inland transportation firms that get the food to U.S. ports, the U.S. food foreign aid shipments support 33,000 jobs and $523 million in household earnings. The AFL-CIO Maritime Trades Department also points out that keeping U.S.-flag ships afloat makes them available to transporting troops and supplies when needed for combat.

Photo: Port of Baltimore crane for loading cargo on to ships. CC BY 2.0

Today in labor history: Anarchist fails to kill steel magnate

Mon, 23 Jul 2012 13:13:00 +0000

On July 23, 1892 Alexander Berkman took a shot at and stabbed but failed to kill Henry Clay Frick, the steel magnate.

Berkman tied to kill the wealthy industrialist to avenge the Homestead, Pa. massacre that took place 18 days earlier. Nine striking workers had been killed.

The suicide bomb that Berkman had attached to himself also failed to detonate.

The Homestead strike began when the steel magnate Andrew Carnegie reduced wages at this steel mill in Homestead, Pa. and the union workers refused to accept the cut. On July 6 company the company goons he hired attacked the workers killing ten.

Photo: Berkman addresses a May Day rally in New York, circa 1914. Wikipedia/George Grantham Bain Collection