Labor Union Blog

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Workers Independent News Labor Radio
Internet Radio Program 05/12/10
Producers: Doug Cunningham & Jesse Russell

Labor Radio Rundown:

1) WIN Newscast

2) Organized labor and progressive groups are going to Washington D.C. with a strong message to politicians that they need to listen to the people and not just to Wall Street lobyists. WIN’s Doug Cunningham interviews James Mumm of National People’s Action about this weekend’s rally and the issues it will raise.

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By Doug Cunningham

The New York AFL-CIO has launched a statewide political education campaign targeting state senators it says are betraying the interests, trust and well-being of working men and women. Senators Jeff Klein and Craig Johnson are the first to be singled out by the AFL-CIO campaign. State AFL-CIO President Denis Hughes says these senators have attacked public employee pensions, refused to help the unemployed and failed to oppose the governor shutting down hundreds of construction jobs.

A furlough plan in New York State is headed to court. The New York state legislature approved the Governor’s furlough plan when they passed an emergency budget Monday night. The legislatures are required to pass emergency spending plans as a whole or to void it altogether. Unions representing the workers are now taking the state to court over the plan which they say violates union contracts.

By Doug Cunningham

The International Association of Machinists represents 26,000 workers at United and Continental Airlines. IAM General Vice President Robert Roach says the union will work closely ith Congress and with the Transportation and Justice departments to try to ensure that if this merger happens it won’t be at the expense of airline workers. Roach told Houston’s Voices At Work radio show that the big concern is over jobs being lost in this merger.

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Workers at a Boeing plant in Long Beach, California are on strike. Jesse Russell reports.

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The Mine Workers (UMWA) union and families of victims killed in the Upper Big Branch Mine disaster filed suit in federal court to open to the public interviews of safety officials and others now being conducted behind closed doors by the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA).

UMWA President Cecil Roberts says the union was reluctant to file the suit. But after MSHA rejected the request to open the interviews, “we have been left with no choice.”

We believe it is imperative for the families of the victims of this tragedy to be able to hear the evidence that will be gathered in these interviews for themselves. We also believe that the workers—who will have to go back to work in that mine—must be allowed to have their designated representative in the interviews, asking questions and hearing testimony firsthand.

The Massey Energy mine, where 29 miners died in an April 5 explosion, was nonunion, but several miners have designated the UMWA as their representative, as federal regulations allow. MSHA says the hearings and many other other parts of the investigation will be open and transparent. But as Roberts says:

The interview process is perhaps the most critical step in the entire investigation. That is where those with fresh, first-hand knowledge of what the conditions were in the mine will be asked to tell investigators what they know.

Roberts said he had confidence that MSHA and the federal government want to determine the cause of the disaster and identify those who bear responsibility for it.

I know President Obama, [Labor] Secretary [Hilda] Solis and Assistant Secretary [Joseph] Main all have that goal. But the process that’s going to be used to get there is flawed and may not result in meeting that goal.

The challenge was filed Monday in the U.S. District Court of the Southern District of West Virginia at Charleston.

On May 18, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka will join UMWA and other union members in a march and rally at Massey’s annual shareholders meeting in Richmond, Va. They will demand that Massey—with its long history of safety violations at Upper Big Branch and other mines—be held accountable and that Massey CEO Donald Blankenship step down.

We’ve all seen big corporations dangle the promise of jobs and economic nirvana over the heads of competing local and state governments, demanding they roll over and offer up big tax breaks, subsidies and other “incentives.” Whoever offers the best corporate welfare, wins the corporate “treat.”

But a new short film—”Show Us the Tax Breaks”—demontrates that all-too often, the jobs and economic benefits promised by corporations fall far short of promises. Sometimes, they just take the money and run, leaving communities in economic ruin.

“Show Us the Tax Breaks” premieres in Washington, D.C., Thursday, following a panel discussion with union leaders, economic and development experts and congressional members, who will explore how real economic recovery strategies must address the creation of good jobs and the role of corporate subsidies in our current economic climate.

Panelists include AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, Boilermakers (IBB) President Newton B. Jones and UNITEHERE! President John Wilhelm. The panel discussion starts at 6 p.m. EDT at the Teamsters (IBT) building, 25 Louisiana Ave., N.W., Washington, D.C.

“Show Us the Tax Breaks” spotlights how the ironically named Union Tank Car Co. abused economic development incentives to enrich its owners while destroying good middle-class American jobs—and without creating any tangible benefit to the national economy.

The film focuses on the Union Tank Car’s East Chicago, Ind., plant that once employed 600 IBB members. After enjoying millions of dollars in tax breaks, Union Tank Car aggressively solicited both Texas and Louisiana with promises of a brand new plant, 850 new jobs and economic development—for the right tax breaks and incentives.

Louisiana won the bidding war. The 600 IBB jobs were destroyed when the East Chicago plant was shuttered in 2008. But by May 2009, Union Tank Car’s new Alexandria plant employed only about 325 workers and the economic growth promised for central Louisiana hadn’t materialized.

This provocative film argues that pitting states against one another as Union Tank Car did violates the spirit of public development subsidies and undermines working families.

Fewer U.S. families have time for family dinners as workers put in longer hours on the job.

While the United States claims to support family values, the reality is that the American workplace is not family-friendly. The challenge is to move from the best practices of a few companies to decent working conditions for all, says author and scholar Jody Heymann.

Writing at Huffington Post, Heymann points out that providing good working conditions has clear advantages. For example, 

working lengthy hours without leave has been shown to lead to declining productivity per hour. In contrast, providing parental leave improves the next generation’s health and education outcomes and workers’ outcomes, health status, and loyalty to employers.

Now that health care reform is law, government and business leaders should work next on providing a paid leave policy, Heymann says. Congress is considering legislation to guarantee workers seven paid sick days.

The seven days of paid sick leave it would provide is readily affordable; 98 countries guarantee six months or more if necessary. While American business and government leaders working together to guarantee seven paid sick days would be one small step for humankind, it would be a giant leap for the United States.

Click here to read the full post, “If Companies Really Mean Business.”

Lady Gaga recently made an unexpected appearance at the Westin Saint Francis hotel in San Francisco—in the form of a flash mob singing a pro-worker version of lyrics to her “Bad Romance.” Replete with tuba, trombone, snare drum and a couple dozen dancing activists, the group materialized in the hotel’s lobby to denounce the chain’s poor treatment of its employees and urge people to “Boycott, boycott,” this “bad, bad hotel.”

Sponsored by the San Francisco chapter of Pride At Work, an AFL-CIO constituency group for LGBTQ workers, the action demonstrated support for the more than 9,000 workers in the area who have been working without a contract since August 2009 at several Hyatt, Hilton, Starwood and InterContinental Hotels (the Westin is owned by Starwood). The activists created the song and dance routine to tell the hundreds of thousands of LGBTQ people from across the country coming to San Francisco in June for Pride Week to honor the worker-called boycott.

After repeated attempts at negotiations, hotel management is trying to deny the workers, members of UNITEHERE! Local 2, affordable, quality health care. As San Francisco Pride At Work notes:

This is despite soaring profits at these multinational corporations. The Starwood Corporation made $180 million in profit in the first nine months of 2009. The Hyatt Corporation generated $950 million for its majority owner—the Pritzker family, and Hilton Hotels recently announced that they have $12.6 billion in available capital to invest in new high-asset ventures over the next several years.

The musical show of solidarity didn’t stop at the Westin. The group snake-danced their way out of the lobby and went on to perform the same skit at the Grand Hyatt down the block.

After all:

Boycott, boycott!

Workers’ rights are hot!