Labor Union Blog

Economic Report:

By Doug Cunningham

Consumer confidence – a key factor in the U.S. economy – is at the lowest level since 1992. The official Consumer Confidence index is dow nto 62.8. And no wonder. Oil prices are still climbing, food prices continue their rise, wages aren’t growing fast enough to pay for those increases. When it comes to how much confidence consumers have in the economy, it always depend on how they feel about their jobs. Right now Americans are more pessimistic about about their jobs and about the economy in general.

By Doug Cunningham

When overtime is forced on nurses, patients suffer. That picture emerges from a survey of nurses done by the Wisconsin Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals in Milwaukee. Forty-two percent fo the nurses surveyed were forced to work overtime at least twice a month and 12 percent says overtime is forced on them at least once a week. The Wisconsin Federation of Nurses & Health Professional say mandatory overtime increases nurse fatigue, which contributes to errors made in patient care.

By Doug Cunningham

For the first time ever, a school voucher bill has made it out of a New Jersey state legislative committee. New Jersey Education Association President Joyce Powell says the voucher plan would strip $360 million from the state’s already strained budget and open the door to wholesale privatization of public education in New Jersey. The teachers union says taking money out of the public education system to support a few private and religious schools undermines the public system.

By Doug Cunningham

More than 3,000 worker, government and employer leaders are meeting in Geneva today through June 13th for the annual International Labor Organization conference. High-level discussions are being held on the world hunger crisis, labor rights, child labor and how to enhance social and employment protections and fundamental labor rights.

By Doug Cunningham

The AFL-CIO and Working America are launching ‘Ask A Working Woman”, an election-year survey letting women speak directly to politicians about working women’s issues. Women workers still earn on average just 77 cents for every dollar a man makes. The on-line survey asks working women how much time they have for themselves, what their work lives are like and whether men they work with make more money for the same jobs. The Ask A Working Woman survey also asks women directly what they need on a range of issues from health care to pension benefits to flex-time at work.Survey results will out June 24th.

By Doug Cunningham

There’s a leadership change for the Change To Win labor federation as a new Executive Director takes over replacing Greg Tarpinian. Change To Win’s Chair Anna Burger says former UNITE-HERE Chief of Staff Chris Chafe is Change To Win’s new Executive Director. Tarpinian will stay on as an advisor to the labor federation. Chafe served as political director for the textile union UNITE and was a senior adviser to Senator John Edwards’ presidential campaign.

New legislation would toughen penalties and crack down on employers who take away workers’ benefits and rights by misclassifying them as “independent contractors” instead of regular employees.

When workers are misclassified as independent contractors, they pay higher taxes and lose important rights, such as workers’ compensation coverage, minimum wage and overtime protections, family and medical leave and the right to organize and collectively bargain.

Last week, the U.S. Senate passed a groundbreaking update to the G.I. Bill, which would cover the cost of college education for all returning veterans.

By ensuring our nation’s veterans have access to education, this bill would honor their service and give them the opportunity to have good jobs and economic security.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) didn’t show up to vote, but, this weekend, he left no doubt as to how he felt about the bill.

McCain chose to put an attack on the new G.I. Bill at the center of his Memorial Day speech, claiming it would hurt retention. (According to a Time magazine analysis, the bill would help recruitment as much as it would reduce retention. The U.S. Department of Defense reports that our military met its recruitment and retention goals in April.)

Rush-hour drivers navigating a major rotary (that’s “traffic circle” for those of us outside the New England crowd) in Falmouth, Mass., were laying on their horns and waving last week. But not in anger. They were showing their support for the two dozen union members rallying at the rotary—and out of traffic—for health care reform.

The union members and leaders carried signs reading “Healthcare: It costs too much! It covers too little! It excludes too many! And it’s getting worse!” and “It’s Time to Turn Around America.”