Surging bankruptcy filings are the most recent sign of an expanding mortgage crisis. On Wednesday, the American Bankruptcy Institute issued a report that showed household bankruptcy filings increasing by 28 percent over November of 2006. Tennessee leads the country in bankruptcies, followed by Georgia and Alabama.
Surging bankruptcy filings are the most recent sign of an expanding mortgage crisis. On Wednesday the American Bankruptcy Institute issued a report that showed household bankruptcy filings increasing by 28 percent over November 0f 2006. Tennessee leads the country in bankruptcies followed by Georgia and Alabama.
Teamsters General President James Hoffa had strong words for President George W. Bush on Friday. The union leader chastised Bush for signing a free trade agreement with Peru while not signing a bill that would provide health care for children. Hoffa said the trade deal is about exploiting cheap labor and protecting the investments of multinational corporations more than it’s about reducing trade barriers. Hoffa added that the time has come to crack down on Chinese currency manipulation and to start keeping jobs in the United States.
Teamsters General President James Hoffa had strong words on President George W. Bush Friday. The union leader chastised Bush for signing a free trade agreement with Peru while not signing a bill that would provide health care for children. Hoffa said the trade deal is about exploiting cheap labor and protecting the investments of multinational corporations more than reducing trade barriers. Hoffa added that the time has come to crackdown on Chinese currency manipulation and to start keeping jobs in the United States.
With the writer’s strike doing little more than slogging forward a handful of talk show hosts are seeking to take matters into their own hands so they can get back into the air. David Letterman and John Stewart have both started discussions with the Writers Guild to come up with interim agreements while the strike against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers continues. David Letterman’s production company Worldwide Pants owns the rights to his late night show as well as that of the Late, Late Show with David Ferguson. John Stewart’s Daily Show is owned by the network. Both the Writers Guild East and West issued letters to members saying that they will begin demanding that individual employers bargain directly with them individually instead of through the Alliance. The Guilds have expressed frustration with the unwillingness of the Alliance to meet their terms concerning the right to unionize reality television show writers.
Lede: A New York retail workers’ union organized a weekend march through Brooklyn to support exploited workers. Doug Cunningham has more on the story.
By Doug Cunningham
In Brooklyn over the weekend members of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store union joined the Make The Road New York group for a holiday march through the Bushwick section. The march supported retail workers being abused by retail employers in Bushwick. Many of the workers are immigrants who are being denied legal and fair wages by their employers. This year’s march called for justice for retail workers and also celebrated the role of the men and women who work in the stores and their contribution to the economic vitality of the area. Organizers of the weekend march distributed leaflets informing workers of their right to be paid at least the $7.15 minimum wage as well as their right to be paid time and a half when they work over 40 hours a week. New York state’s Department of Labor recently launched an investigation into wage and hour violation in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn, finding thousands of violations of labor law by retailers there.
Lede: A New York retail worker’s union organized a weekend march through Brooklyn to support exploited workers. Doug Cunningham has more on the story.
By Doug Cunningham
In Brooklyn over the weekend members of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store union joined the Make The Road New York group for a holiday march through the Bushwick section. The march supported retail workers being abused by retail employers in Bushwick. Many of the workers are immigrants who are being denied legal and fair wages by their employers. This year’s march called for justice for retail workers and also celebrated the role of the men and women who work in the stores and their contribution to the economic vitality of the area. Organizers of the weekend march distributed leaflets informing workers of their right to be paid at least the $7.15 minimum wage as well as their right to be paid time and a half when they work over 40 hours a week. New York state’s Department of Labor recently launched an investigation into wage and hour violation in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn, finding thousands of violations of labor law by retailers there.
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More than 10,000 delegates and observers from around the world traveled to Bali, Indonesia, for the U.N. Climate Change Conference from Dec. 3-14. Of the 90 union delegates, more than 20 were from North America, including Roger Toussaint, president of Transport Workers (TWU) Local 100 in New York, who sent us the following post. Delegates sent us a series of posts from the conference: here, here, here, here, here, here and here.
Asthma rates in many urban areas are up sharply. Health care costs associated with other upper respiratory and cardiopulmonary diseases also are on the rise. Wildfires in California. Hurricane Katrina. Everywhere we see the impact of environmental hazards and climate change on our population and our lives.
Science tells us that the window is rapidly closing for us to act to stop the increase in the release of greenhouse gas emissions that are responsible for these problems. We will then need to begin to reduce these emissions. If we do not act to do so immediately and going forward, we will reach a level of climate instability that could end life as we know it. This is not a test. Global warming is real and climate change is happening.
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