The Occupy movement forcefully injected a long-taboo topic—America’s appalling “banana republic”-level economic disparities—into the mainstream political debate.

That inequality has immense implications, from falling wages, to deteriorating healthcare coverage, the overgrown financial sector, and the decline of America's productive base. Such sweeping inequality, deeply rooted in our economic and political system of legal payoffs and policy paybacks, has been intensifed by unionbusting and globalization.

But even many of America’s most liberal mainstream politicians and pundits have narrowed the debate over inequality, perhaps out of a desire to shield President Obama from any pressure coming from his left. The issue of tax inequities has soared in importance, exposing the privileged status enjoyed by CEOs and hedge fund and private equity executives like Mitt Romney. But other crucial dimensions of inequality painfully experienced by ordinary Americans have been crowded out.

For example, the liberal and likable Lawrence O’Donnell, host of MSNBC’s The Last Word, declares in a TV ad that all the talk about “class war” amounts to a battle over a proposed 4 percent increase in tax rates for the super-rich. Really, Lawrence?

Posted by Roger Bybee  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

SACRAMENTO, CALIF.—Early Tuesday morning, buses of domestic workers and their children began arriving at the huge grassy mall in front of California's state capitol building. Dozens of Mexican, Filipina and African-American moms, kids in tow, poured out onto the steps leading into the legislature's chamber.  When the crowd grew to several hundred, they took up their placards, pushed their strollers out in front and began marching around the building.

Some of the kids had clearly done things like this before. One five-year-old raised her fist in the air as the crowd chanted, calling on members of the state Assembly and Senate to pass the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights.  Another girl, who looked about three, knew the chant by heart: “We are the children, mighty mighty children, fighting for justice and our future.” She didn't miss a beat, and as one of the organizers held the bullhorn up to her mouth she did a little militant dance to accompany it.

With balloons and even a couple of clowns, it all seemed very festive. But the happy atmosphere didn't hide a more unpleasant truth. Many of the moms there probably see less of their own children than the youngsters they care for. And in the case of those caring for the aged, sick or disabled, the conditions of that work can seem like something a century ago.

Posted by David Bacon  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

Teen employment rate of 26 percent is lowest since World War II—and much worse for African Americans

Even as the economy slowly picks up, finding a job is harder than ever for teenagers, according to a national study released on Tuesday. That’s likely because the jobs that are being “created” in recent months are being snapped up by adults—often people over age 50 who were laid off from other positions or forced out of retirement during the economic crisis. Meanwhile, funding for youth jobs has suffered because of state and local budget crises, and significant “stimulus” funding for youth jobs and training under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has now expired.

The study, by researcher Andrew Sum at the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston, looks at teen employment over time through “jobless” numbers rather than “unemployment” numbers, since unemployment figures don’t include youth who are not actively looking for work. As with adults, since it has become harder and harder to get a job many youth have given up and hence dropped from the unemployment figures.

A press release for the report says:

The teen employment rate declined by 19 percentage points, or more than 40%, nationally from 1999-2000 to 2011, falling to 26, the lowest rate since World War II… The figures are bleakest for African-American teens in the city of Chicago, of whom 90 percent are jobless, including 93 of every 100 teens from families with incomes under $40,000; upper-middle-income whites were nearly four times as likely to hold a job, the data show.

Posted by Kari Lydersen  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

Earlier this month, a company owned by Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway—Shaw Industries Group Inc.—admitted to violating Canadian law by shipping flooring made by U.S. prison labor into Canada. But a prison industry expert tells In These Times that the company may have also broken American law by not clearly labeling its goods as partly deriving from prison labor.  

American prisoners currently help Georgia-based Shaw Industries produce wood flooring that appears “time worn” and is sold under its Anderson Flooring brand. While prisoners have traditionally only produced items like state-issued license plates and equipment for governments, many states are now expanding the use of prison labor to produce goods for sale in public markets through a federal program called Prison Industries Certification Enhancement Program (PICEP). There are currently about 200 “factories” in U.S. prisons certified through PICEP that manufacture goods sold on the general market. (Multiple certified “factories” can be located in the same prison.)

The use of prison labor has grown dramatically as the prison population has expanded by 290 percent since 1980. One in 100 American adults are now in prison. According to one study by Noah Zatz at UCLA Law, “well over 600,000, and probably close to a million inmates are working full-time in jails and prisons throughout the United States” (These prisoners in some cases produce goods for as little as 23 cents an hour.

Earlier this month, Shaw Industries wrote in a letter to customers that it “recently learned that our importing into Canada of goods that are manufactured utilizing prison labor is prohibited by Canadian law.” After 15 years of selling prison-made goods in Canada, the company said it only learned of the problem recently and notified distributors of its product that it would stop sending prison-made goods into Canada.

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Big defeat for Dems and union follows weeks of walkouts, protests

“We’re living minute to minute,” Indiana AFL-CIO Communications Director Jeff Smith reported Monday night from Indianapolis. Some 10,000 union members were at the State Capitol to protest proposed right-to-work (RTW) legislation, as Democratic legislators huddled to find a new strategy for blocking its passage.

By Wednesday evening, after Indiana's House and Senate had passed RTW legislation, the state was poised to become the first industrial Midwestern state to ban closed “union shops,” in which all employees are a member of the union that bargains for wages and benefits on their behalf. It would be the 23rd in the country to do so; most are in the south.

On Monday, the State Senate passed the the RTW bill 28-22, with 9 Republicans joining the 13 Democrats in opposition. On the House side, Wednesday evening an identical measure passed 55 to 44. (On Monday, all 60 Republicans voted down an amendment—backed by all 40 Democrats—calling for a statewide referendum on the right-to-work bill, based on results of a Peter Hart poll showing 69 percent of Hoosiers  lack information on the bill’s impact and 71 percent support a referendum to settle the issues.)

All that's left is for Gov. Mitch Daniels ® to sign the bill into law, which he is likely to do before the Super Bowl in Indianapolis in early February.

Sen. Senate Minority Leader Vi Simpson stated: “Right to work is nothing more than a race to the bottom for the middle class of Indiana, and that, my friends, is not a race I care to win.”

Posted by Roger Bybee  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

An AFSCME ad being broadcast on Florida TV stations that attacks GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Without a Democratic presidential primary contest, unions this year are taking early potshots at Republican primary candidates—especially Mitt Romney—and other GOP leaders through radio and TV ads, as well as other means.

The aim seems less to influence Republican primary voters than to define Romney, who until this week following Newt Gingrich's South Carolina primary victory was the front-runner in the race, and to gain leverage on other labor issues by tying them to high-profile Republicans vulnerable to bad publicity.

AFSCME, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, leads the way with $800,000 worth of ads during the current Florida contest. The spot asks, “What kind of businessman is Mitt Romney?,” then tells how Romney made huge profits from the sale of Damon Corporation during his tenure at Bain, his private equity company (watch ad above). Romney served as director of the medical testing firm, which was heavily fined for defrauding Medicare, described by the federal prosecutor as an instance of “corporate greed run amok.”

The ad ends by morphing Romney into Republican Gov. Rick Scott, who ran a hospital chain, Columbia HCA, convicted of massive Medicare fraud, and is now quite unpopular (even though he won his office despite his defrauding a popular government program).

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WASHINGTON. D.C.—Last night, President Obama gave his State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress—but barely mentioned unions. The president did touch on a number of issues important to workers—such as increasing manufacturing in America, taxing the rich more equitably, increasing education funding and increasing enforcement of trade laws—but said nothing about increased attacks on workers’ rights around the country during the last 12 months. 

This despite 2011 being the a year in which unions (especially those representing public-sector workers) have been under unprecedented attacks in places like Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana.

The only time Obama explicitly mentioned a union was in reference to  “Master Lock's unionized plant” in Milwaukee, which he said is now running at “full capacity” because the company brought back jobs from overseas. 

At the beginning of his speech, Obama said: “At the end of World War II, when another generation of heroes returned home from combat, they built the strongest economy and middle class the world has ever known.” However, he did not mention the fundamental role that unions played in building that middle class. Unions represented nearly one-third of all workers in the decade following World War II.

Posted by Mike Elk  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

The conversation about school reform in Washington is replete with big ideas—glossy proposals for “accountability,” putting the “students first,” fixing “broken” schools, all in hopes of making America “competitive” again.

Yet our schools are poorer than ever, and in many communities, the child poverty has deepened while test scores have stagnated. The experts leading the education reform debate have failed to draw a simple equation: a system with adequate resources does better than one without.

The gap in the logic has widened as state governments press school districts to conform to new standards—or else. States are gunning for a competitive grant fund known as “Race to the Top,” which the White House dangles as an incentive to restructure school systems. This hyped-up free-market reform rhetoric seeped into President Obama’s suggestion to “offer schools a deal” in his State of the Union address.

The No Child Left Behind corporate-style reform template emphasizes tests and evaluations, purging bad teachers, and shuttering failing schools.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is pressuring teachers’ unions to agree to major reforms so the state can tap into a Race to the Top grant. At issue are efforts to impose evaluation schemes that might make teachers’ jobs contingent on potentially misleading or incomplete data. A Washington Post editorial praised Cuomo for standing up to the supposed obstructionism of unions to defend childrens' civil rights.

Posted by Michelle Chen  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

Four years ago, Cooper Tire told its workers they’d have to sacrifice to save the company. With a straight face, Cooper executives said it was essential for the corporation’s survival that workers take tens of millions in pay and benefit cuts.

The workers understood the link between their livelihoods long term and Cooper’s success. Dedicated and loyal, they accepted the cutbacks. Soon afterward, city and state officials granted Cooper millions in subsidies.

Management didn’t share in the workers’ and taxpayers’ pain, though. The top dogs rewarded themselves with millions in pay increases and a shiny new corporate jet.

Cooper punk’d the workers and taxpayers.

This isn’t an aberration. It’s a pattern. Corporate executives, the 1 percenters, slash workers’ wages, then give themselves big bonuses. CEOs tell mayors and governors their businesses are in such dire shape that they may close or move offshore. Government officials dutifully shovel truckloads of taxpayer cash into CEO hands, then the CEOs grant themselves more perks. The television show Punk’d, in which actor Ashton Kutcher humiliates famous people, took a five-year hiatus. The 1 percenters gave workers and taxpayers no such break. Punking the 99 percent for profit has only escalated.

Posted by Leo Gerard, United Steelworkers President  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

Anti-union group's website encourages workers to decertify unions, while claiming decertification is “nearly impossible.”

“I’m sick of the union taking so much of my money out of every paycheck,” Frank tells his co-worker Bob. “I don’t know why you voted them in.”  “Don’t look at me,” Bob responds. “I never even got a vote.” Bob then polls fellow auto repair shop employees, and they all say they got hired long after the union election. “Only 10 percent of people in unions today actually voted to join a union,” declares a narrator. “Everyone deserves a vote at least one time.” 

As this TV ad ends, a worker chides the one remaining employee who might have voted in the union: an old man whom we see fumbling with his equipment.

This commercial, which aired during one of this month’s presidential debates, is one of four in a new campaign from the anti-union Center for Union Facts. CUF pledged last month to spend $10 million on the campaign, which promotes a new “Employee Rights Act” introduced in Congress by Utah Senator Orrin Hatch and South Carolina Congressman Tim Scott. The ERA’s provisions are an anti-union wish list, including restricting “non-representation” spending by unions, banning any union recognition process other than an NLRB election, and requiring members to vote every three years on whether to eliminate their union. Politico reported yesterday that CUF is launching a new phase of its campaign supporting the bill this week.

Posted by Josh Eidelson  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

WASHINGTON, D.C.—When the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) cites a company for workplace safety violations, it usually tells it to fix the problems at the specific location where the violation was discovered. But in an unusual—and for safety advocates, promising—move, the Department of Labor (DOL) agency is pushing for “enterprise-wide” changes as part of a violation settlement.

Last week, for the second time in OSHA history, the Labor Department told the agency to force more than 60 locations of a New England-based grocery chain to comply with federal standards protecting workers from falls and lacerations.

On Wednesday, DOL’s regional solicitor in Boston filed a complaint against the Demoulas Super Markets grocery chain, also known as Market Basket. OSHA inspections of a handful of the company's facilities revealed company-wide “fall hazards from unguarded, open-sided work and storage areas.” Inspections of a number of facilities also found that the company “allegedly failed to protect employees in produce, deli, and bakery department against laceration hazards from knives and cutting instruments,” according to this report. Employees at two Market Basket locations sustained at least 40 hand lacerations between 2008 and 2011.

Posted by Mike Elk  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

About 780 workers at an aluminum smelter run by the mining giant Rio Tinto in Quebec are heading into the fourth week of a lockout, with many still braving the frigid weather to picket though an injunction—in place until April—that bars them from blocking the smelter entrance. Their contract had expired New Year’s Eve after weeks of fruitless negotiations. On New Year’s Day, the company locked them out.

The union, a United Steelworkers local, voted to authorize a strike and warned one was imminent, with a major point of contention being Rio Tinto’s increasing reliance on nonunion subcontracters. A Montreal paper reported that the company planned to more than double subcontracter work hours from 140,000 in 2010 to 350,000 this coming year.

Shortly after the lockout started, the Syndicat des Métallos d'Alma union accused Rio Tinto of illegally bringing in replacement workers by helicopter, and filed a complaint with the government. The company said about 200 managers were running the plant, which normally employs 1,000, and that production at the facility, which is about 150 miles north of Quebec City, was cut by a third.

Railway workers had reportedly previously refused to cross the picket line to deliver aluminum oxide raw materials, but resumed deliveries after being suspended and threatened with losing their jobs.

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Video of Tuesday in Madison, when activists staged a number of rallies and delivered more than 1 million signatures to initiate proceedings for a recall of Gov. Scott Walker.

Gov. Walker Beware

Organized labor in Wisconsin gave the state’s unpopular governor an enormous slap in the face this week. On Tuesday, activists dropped off more than 1 million signatures collected from across the state—nearly double the number needed in order to secure a recall election of Gov. Scott Walker. Large trucks transported the boxes of signatures (which weighed an astonishing 3,000 pounds) to the foot of the state capital in Madison, where they were delivered to state officials.

Labor activists, mobilized by popular anger at Gov. Walker’s union-busting agenda, greatly exceeded initial projections of signatures. There's little to no chance of legal action challenging the petition’s legitimacy, and a recall election will likely happen in late spring or early summer. Find out more about the recall effort at the website for Wisconsin United.

Maryland IKEA Workers Vote to Join the International Association of Machinists

Workers at an IKEA distribution plant in Perryville, Md., voted to join the International Association of Machinists (IAM) this week. Following the example of their peers at IKEA’s Danville, Virginia plant—who unionized last July—350 workers at the Perryville plant voted overwhelmingly to join the IAM.

According to the IAM, IKEA management stepped up its intimidation game in the closing days of the campaign to unionize. Employees were purportedly threatened with job loss, underwent heightened surveillance and were forced to endure “union-avoidance campaigns.”

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Rolf’s Patisserie in a Chicago suburb wasn’t just the place Karen Leyva worked, it was a huge part of her life. The employees were like family, greeting each other with hugs every morning, attending each other’s weddings and children’s birthday parties, getting together for barbecues and soccer games. They took great pride in the fancy, high-end cakes and other desserts made for major outlets like Whole Foods and for individual customers.

Every other weekend Leyva, 40, would treat herself with a Rolf’s cake – one of her favorites was vanilla chiffon with strawberries. A cake designer named Edgar helped give Leyva’s mother “her best birthday and Christmas ever” in December 2005, her last before passing away the next year. Leyva’s mother loved the cello, so Edgar carved a cake in the shape of the musical instrument, with a bow and details in chocolate, so life-like you almost wanted to pick it up and play it.

Part of Leyva’s job as assistant office manager, working with customers and doing hiring and a range of administrative functions, was to help customers decide what custom cakes to order. The designers and bakers came up with elaborate creations including a castle with real lights and a carousel that actually moved. Leyva would swell with pride when customers sent her personal notes of thanks.

So when Leyva and a few other employees cleaning up on Sunday December 11 went to the company’s website and saw a terse message— dated December 10—announcing that the bakery had closed, she was shocked and devastated. As I reported previously, a class-action lawsuit filed January 10 charges that Rolf’s owner Lloyd Culbertson, a former investment banker, violated the WARN Act by failing to give the 136 employees 60 days notice of the closing, or 60 days severance pay.

Posted by Kari Lydersen  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

One day in August 2007, Daniel Coleman, an administrator in the Maryland court system, decided he should stay home to recover from an illness, as his doctor had ordered. But the day after he requested time off, he suddenly had more to worry about than his health; he was unemployed, too.

In many industrialized countries around the world, taking time off from work to deal with a medical issue isn't just a benefit; it's considered an entitlement, as much as an eight-hour day. But in the world's richest nation, a worker who claims that right has had to appeal to the highest court in the land.

So the Supreme Court will now weigh the rights of public employees to seek justice under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA). The case, Coleman v. Maryland Court of Appeals, is based on Coleman’s lawsuit alleging that he was unfairly terminated following a dispute with his supervisor over leave time. Pitting Coleman, together with many civil rights advocates, against Maryland and 26 other states, the central question is whether a state can be held accountable under the law as a private employer would.

The FMLA basically allows workers to take 12 weeks of unpaid time off to deal with either a personal or family health concern. Although a worker at a private company can clearly sue for monetary damages if she is fired for taking time off for pregnancy or to care for a sick child—some courts have ruled differently for state workers' rights. A lower court found that Maryland is shielded from legal liability in this case under the Eleventh Amendment sovereign immunity clause.

Posted by Michelle Chen  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

MEDELLIN, COLOMBIA—The Santo Domingo neighborhood perched on a steep hillside in Medellin pulsed with color, commerce, music and motion on a recent afternoon. It was the last week of the Christmas holiday season, so many workers were still on vacation. That means more business for the army of people employed in the informal economy, eking out a living selling fried corn treats, coffee from backpack thermoses, calls from cell phones tethered to the seller’s belt like a spider web, packaged ice cream bars in beat-up coolers, and a myriad other goods and services.

This is known as one of Medellin’s “slum” neighborhoods, far removed experientially if not geographically from the tony areas where the well-heeled from around the region come for plastic surgery (especially breast implants) and fine dining. In recent years Santo Domingo was a hotbed of violence by right-wing paramilitary groups along with other urban gangs and drug traffickers. One of the boxy brick homes beside a steep concrete staircase still bears the “AUC“ moniker—United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, the country’s  feared paramilitary umbrella group. Newer peace murals in the park at the terminus of the city’s elevated cable car line reference the horror of systematic torture, murder and violence, allegedly tacitly or directly endorsed by the government in the course of the country’s decades-long civil war.

Now everyone from government officials, civic boosters and airline companies to regular people—including a cherubic young boy offering a guided tour of Santo Domingo—are touting Medellin’s transformation from a virtual war zone to a vibrant cultural capital. At the airport, an advertisement promises that “the only risk is that you’ll want to stay.” 

But behind the slogans of the city boosters—and news this month that Medellin officially dropped from the 4th-most violent city in the world to the 14th—is life here actually better for most people?

Posted by Kari Lydersen  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

Strong criticism comes as labor federation withholds re-election endorsement

WASHINGTON D.C.—In a sign of what could be growing political independence from the White House, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka on Tuesday strongly criticized the latest report issued by the President's Council on Jobs and Competiveness. The Council's “Roadmap to Renewal” report, released that day, recommended corporate tax cuts, deregulation and government budgets cuts.

“[R]eforming our regulatory system and reducing the statutory corporate tax rate are not not crucial elements of “competitiveness” for the United States going forward, nor does empirical evidence support the claim that significant net new job creation would result from such “reforms,” Trumka said in what he called “constructive dissent.”

He didn't attend the Council's Tuesday meeting at the White House because he was sick, according to the AFL-CIO. The other labor leader on the 25-member Council, United Food and Commercial Workers President Joe Hansen, did attend the meeting. But on this video of the meeting, Hansen appeared to be the only Council who abstained from approving the report, saying, “I certainly think there's been an awful lot of good work in the report, but I choose to abstain at this time. … My concern is with the tax reform.”

President Obama issued a laudatory statement, saying “I’m proud that we’ve taken action on a majority of the Council’s recommendations on issues ranging from insourcing to permitting to clean energy.”

Posted by Mike Elk  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

CHICAGO—The marble floor in Chicago City Hall vibrated as labor union members and other protesters stamped their feet and loudly chanted “Shame! Shame! Shame!” after the council overwhelmingly voted for two ordinances Wednesday related to police powers and protest restrictions in advance of the simultaneous G8 and NATO summits in Chicago in May.

City Council members argued that changes made to the original ordinance in the face of massive public outcry make it an acceptable alternative. Changes included the elimination of increased fines for resisting arrest, and scaling back a requirement that all sound and recording equipment, signs and banners to be used by protesters be described in a parade permit application.

But opponents—including the labor-community coalition Stand Up Chicago! and members and leaders of SEIU Local 73, Jobs with Justice and other workers and grassroots groups—say the ordinances are still a serious attack on basic civil rights. Among other things, they allow the city to deputize police officers from outside Chicago for temporary duty, change the requirements for obtaining a protest permit and allow the city to enter into no-bid security contracts without city council approval. (The ordinances can be read here and here.)

At a press conference before the vote Wednesday, representatives and advocates of unions, disability rights, community groups, veterans and mental health patients said the ordinance could mean a reprise of the infamous 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago—where police viciously attacked demonstrators—and seriously gut free speech rights.

Posted by Kari Lydersen  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

MILWAUKEE—Wisconsinites' efforts to protect democracy—in the workplace and through the ballot—are rapidly escalating on two key fronts. The state will soon witness major election and legal battles to combat Walker-supported laws limiting the rights of public workers and restricting voting booth access. Laws passed in 2011 virtually eliminate public-employee bargaining rights and restrict voting to those with approved IDs, which could potentially disenfranchise tens of thousands of state residents.

“First you take away workers’ rights, then you change the laws so that it’s hard for them to vote you out of office,” said Scot Ross, director of One Wisconsin Now, a progressive media-focused group.

On Tuesday, the United Wisconsin coalition of labor and the Democratic Party delivered petitions—signed by about 1 million Wisconsin residents, at least some of which likely voted for Walker— calling for a recall election for the governor. Only 540,208 valid signatures are required to trigger such an election.

Posted by Roger Bybee  ·   ·  0 comments  ·  + share/save

Yesterday, conservative media baron Rupert Murdoch tweeted “AFL-CIO supporting SOPA!”

The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and companion legislation in the U.S. Senate (PIPA; full name at bottom) are the controversial proposed copyright enforcement bills that have led many websites, including Wikipedia, to shut down today in protest. The co-founder of Google, Sergey Brin, says SOPA and PIPA “would put us on a par with the most oppressive nations in the world.”

However, Paul Almeida, president of the AFL-CIO Department of Professional Employees, supports the bills, saying “Protecting intellectual property is not the same as censorship; the First Amendment does not protect stealing goods off trucks.”

As many writers and people in creative industries struggle to make ends meet, some union officials say that tougher copyright enforcement could create more jobs for them.  There are currently laws that prevent copyright infringement from groups outside of the United States. But material pirated by foreign groups is hosted by sites outside of the United States, which country can't regulate—despite Americans' ability to view and download information on them. SOPA and PIPA would address this issue by barring search engines like Google or social media sites like Facebook or Twitter from linking to these sites.

Many fear that the bills could lead to censorship. “The rhetoric on both sides of the bill is wrong. There is a lot of smoke and heat going on now in the bill. It’s going to be important to figure out what the actual legislation is at the end of the day before our union supports” anything, says Lowell Peterson, executive director of the Writers Guild of America, East.

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