I was on “The Union Edge” on WFRN Talk Radio talking about my In These Times report on the Walmart-backed benefit promoting this month’s upcoming anti-union ed reform movie, “Won’t Back Down.” You can hear the segment here, starting about 1:33:00 in.
On Tuesday, Republican delegates approved a platform The Washington Times had called the most conservative in party history. “It’s an indictment, it’s a blueprint, and it’s a declaration of values,” Virginia Governor and Platform Committee Chair Bob McDonnell told the assembled delegates. It’s also a full-on embrace of the same anti-union agenda that helped earn Scott Walker and Nikki Haley their Tuesday night speaking slots. The new platform reflects a Republican Party even more hostile to organized labor than the one that nominated John McCain four years ago.
Perhaps the most dramatic shift in the platform’s language is on “Right to Work,” legislation that makes it illegal for unions and companies to sign contracts requiring that everyone represented by a union help pay the costs of negotiating and enforcing contracts. Twenty-three states have passed such laws, effectively making it harder for unions to maintain and grow their strength, and easier for companies to pick on union supporters, or suspend union recognition entirely.
After a dispute that the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) called a threat to the future of the Houston janitors’ union, workers have ended their month-long strike with a deal for a new four-year union contract. The agreement, which includes concessions from both sides, calls for annual 25-cent hourly wage increases and the maintenance of workers’ current healthcare plan. It will tweak, but not transform, the stark reality that SEIU highlighted in its campaign: In the “Millionaire City,” cleaning the offices of the nation’s top banks and oil companies is a poverty-wage job.
“It’s a start in the right direction,” said Alice McAfee, a janitor of 30 years, of the deal.
In two weeks, Democrats will gather in Charlotte, N.C., and pledge once more to strengthen the right of workers to join unions and negotiate with their bosses. But the convention’s success depends on the work of the city’s sanitation workers, who are banned by law from exercising that right. As the party readies its platform pronouncements, those workers are asking for more concrete help.
Wednesday, leaders of a North Carolina union released a letter appealing to President Obama and the Democratic National Committee for support in their efforts to win union rights. “Despite the added work and dangers for Charlotte City workers in preparation for and in the aftermath of the DNC, and the fact that $50 million in federal funding has been allotted to the City of Charlotte to host the DNC,” the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) Local 150 wrote, “the City of Charlotte refuses to address the needs and rights of the City workers.”
“The workers are working like dogs,” said garbage driver Al Locklear, the president of Local 150’s Charlotte chapter. “They want to run us to death.”
company have teamed up to sponsor a fundraiser called “Teachers Rock.” Backed by Walmart and Anschutz Film Group, the August 14 event will feature live performances from musicians like Josh Groban and appearances from actresses like Viola Davis; it will be broadcast August 17 as a CBS special with messages from actresses like Meryl Streep. And it will promote the upcoming feature film Won’t Back Down, Anschutz’s entry in the “education reform” wars.
Won’t Back Down is reportedly a highly sympathetic fictional portrayal of “parent trigger” laws, a major flashpoint in debates over education and collective bargaining. Under such laws, the submission of signatures from a majority of parents in a school triggers a “turnaround option,” which can mean the replacement of a unionized school with a non-union charter. Such laws have been passed in several states, but due to court challenges, the “trigger” process has never been fully implemented.
“It’s another Waiting for Superman,” says Jose Vilson, a New York City math teacher and board member of the Center for Teacher Quality. “You have these popular actors, who as well-intentioned as they may be, they may not know all the facts, but they’re willing to back up a couple of corporate friends or people maybe they’ve become familiar with” in “trying to promote this sort of vision.”
I was back on The Big Picture With Thom Hartmann Wednesday, talking with guest host Sam Sacks about the janitors’ strike in Houston and a new study on what really ails our labor standards. Here’s the video. My segment is about 30:30 in.
On August 7, Mitt Romney did not slam Barack Obama for presiding over a welfare system which leaves the poor to sell their blood. Barack Obama did not skewer Mitt Romney for touting a post-reform status quo that drives women back to their abusers. Instead, the president and his Republican challenger accused each other of coddling the poor.
Three weeks after hundreds of Houston janitors went on strike, janitorial contractors and Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1 returned to the negotiating table on Thursday. But the bargaining concluded Friday without a settlement or an end to the strike.
As I’ve reported, negotiations over janitors’ third union contract broke down at the end of May. Following a series of June work stoppages, hundreds began walking off the job on July 10. Their cause caught fire nationwide, sparking a series of high-profile demonstrations, solidarity strikes and statements of support.
Wages are a key sticking point. SEIU proposed an increase from $8.35 to $10.00 over three years, but management’s “last, best, and final” offer in May raised wages only fifty cents over five years. “The union’s proposal makes their lives a little better, while [management’s] proposal pushes the janitors deeper into poverty,” SEIU Local 1 President Tom Balanoff wrote in a July 30 letter.
Also at issue: a clause in the janitors’ current contract that allows contractors to bid on some accounts at lower wage and benefit rates and then bring compensation up to the contract’s standard over a three year period. SEIU says that while the clear intent of the language was to apply only to bidding on non-union accounts, contractors are now claiming it applies to union accounts as well. Balanoff’s letter calls this “a blatant attempt to destroy the Houston janitors’ union.”
Wealth gives Chick-fil-A’s owners an outsize impact on our politics: As we’ve been reminded this week, the company channels millions of dollars into anti-gay organizations. But its impact on national policy is nothing compared to its influence over the lives of its employees. Comments from the company’s founder suggest that Chick-fil-A embraces its legal right to reward and punish employees’ private behavior. And a series of lawsuits allege that managers have wielded their authority over workers in ways that break the law: firing a Muslim for refusing to pray to Jesus; firing a manager so that she’d become a stay-at-home mom; and punishing workers for objecting to sexual harassment.
I was on The Big Picture last night, with postal union president Cliff Guffey and guest host Sam Sacks, talking about the Postal Service’s default and the congressional debate over the agency’s future. You can watch the segment here.
On Sunday, students and Wisconsin union members joined striking workers as they launched a national boycott of their employer, Palermo’s Pizza. The boycott is the latest escalation in the workers’ two-month strike against the frozen pizza factory. It follows the second postponement of the workers’ union election, based on alleged anti-union firings — many in the name of immigration enforcement — which union supporters say have made a fair vote impossible.
“There’s no possible way for us to have a free and fair election with the present conditions,” says Maria Somma, an organizer with the United Steelworkers (USW) union. (Full disclosure: The USW is an In These Times sponsor.) The Palermo’s Workers Union has asked the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to reinstate dozens of fired workers and to exercise a rarely-used power: to order the company to proceed directly to union negotiations.
As Wal-Mart celebrates its 50th anniversary this summer, it has faced a new wave of resistance from its “associates” — the company’s corporate-speak for employees. Last month, a delegation of Wal-Mart workers brought their grievances to the company’s shareholder meeting, including low wages and understaffing. In interviews yesterday, three workers at the forefront of the campaign told Salon the company has punished them for their activism. Critics say that the world’s largest private sector employer is playing dirty once again.
Last June, nearly 100 Wal-Mart employees announced the formation of a new membership organization called OUR Walmart, which demanded improvements on the job. Though backed by the United Food and Commercial Workers union, it hasn’t sought union recognition (UFCW also backed a previous non-union organization of Wal-Mart workers in 2005). OUR Walmart currently claims thousands of Wal-Mart workers in hundreds of stores as dues-paying members. As its efforts have escalated, OUR Walmart leaders say Wal-Mart has targeted them for punishment.
Josh Eidelson 