Labor Union Blog

Economic Report:

If you buy a Chrysler you could receive a gas subsidy. The automaker is offering to cap the price of gasoline at $2.99 per gallon for three years for individuals who purchase a Chrylser, Dodge, or Jeep between today and June 2. Customers receive a special card that when used will bill the charge as $2.99 per gallon. Will other carmakers follow suit? Not GM or Ford. Spokespeople for those two companies said they plan to focus on developing fuel efficient vehicles.

Letter carriers are once again helping to fill the nation’s food banks, pantries and shelters. May 10 has been proclaimed National Association of Letter Carriers Food Drive Day and postal carriers and volunteers will be collecting nonperishable food items left by mailboxes in all 50 states. In New York City, where mailbox pickups of nonperishable food items is logistically difficult, residents are invited to drop off donations all this week at local post offices or through a online donation to a local food bank.

A union representing 60,000 workers is planning a big move. Jesse Russell reports:

The International Union of Electronic Workers has been based out of Washington, DC for more than half a decade. On Tuesday the union representing 60,000 workers at companies like General Electric and Delphi announced it would be moving it’s base to somewhere in or around Dayton, Ohio so it can be closer to the majority of it’s workers. The IUE is part of the Communications Workers of America and the CWA will continue to be headquartered in DC.

By Doug Cunningham

Barack Obama maintained his delegate and popular vote lead in the Democratic presidential primaries with a resounding victory in North Carolina Tuesday night. As he told of his grandparents and parents’ hard work in an America that once offered real opportunity and hope for working people, he offered his vision of America’s future.

[Obama]: “It was an America that didn’t just reward wealth, but it rearded work and the workers who created it. That’s the America I love. That’s the America you love. That’s the America we’re fighting for in this election!”

In the aftermath of the cyclone, Burmese residents seek fresh water.

With more than 22,000 people reported dead and as many as 1 million homeless after a tropical cyclone that struck Burma over the weekend, the Federation of Trade Unions of Burma (FTUB) has issued an urgent plea to the global union movement for aid in launching rescue, relief and rehabilitation work for victims of the storm.

The cyclone was the worst to hit Asia in almost 20 years, according to weather experts.

FTUB, a partner of the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center, plans to use relief fund contributions to distribute clothing, medicine, and non-perishable food for displaced workers and their families, build temporary shelters and assist in providing needed counseling and health clinics. Click here to contribute to help Burmese workers.

Tobacco farm workers, joined by supporters, rallied in North Carolina last year for justice on the job.

Hundreds of members of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC), religious leaders and community and union supporters from across the nation traveled to Winston-Salem, N.C., where they rallied today outside the Reynolds American Inc. (RAI) shareholders’ meeting.

Carrying displays of mock tobacco leaves and placards depicting life in the tobacco fields, the marchers demanded that RAI CEO Susan Ivey meet with workers to discuss the unsafe and harsh work conditions, something Ivey has refused to do for more than a year. Reynolds American is the parent of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.

For the past seven years, Bush administration appointees have carried out a war on workers, pursuing a corporate agenda that favored the wealthy over working people.

Some of the most egregious actions came from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), which is supposed to protect workers’ freedom to join unions and bargain for a better life. But the Republican-dominated NLRB in recent years took away the rights of millions of workers to be represented by unions, made it harder to form unions through majority sign-up, limited the ability of illegally fired workers to recover back pay and allowed employers to discriminate against union supporters in the hiring process.

Somewhere along the road from the 2000 presidential campaign to this year’s elections, Sen. John McCain transformed from a lawmaker willing to challenge extremist Republicans like George W. Bush to just another politician begging to kiss the ring of the Great Leader and win Bush’s blessing as inheritor of the White House mantle.

This description of the McCain metamorphosis is not idle speculation from afar. It’s based on the personal experience of political analyst Arianna Huffington, who supported McCain a few years ago to the point of throwing a fundraiser for him. Now, she devotes a large section of her new book to show how McCain has abandoned any modicum of moderation and has fully embraced the extremist agenda of Bush and his clones.