Daily Kos: Daily Kos Labor

Tuesday Aug 29, 2017 · 3:01 PM PDT

2017/08/29 · 15:01

● A success for American steel in the new Tappan Zee Bridge.

● About those coal miners Donald Trump loves so much:

Owen Mark Jones, 51, of Pickens, was the sixth coal miner to die on the job in West Virginia so far this year. That’s twice the number of miners who died in the state’s coal industry in 2016. Nationally, Jones was the 12th coal miner to die on the job so far in 2017, compared to eight last year.

● Costco drops trucking company accused of labor violations:

Earlier this month, four prominent Democratic Senators, led by Sherrod Brown of Ohio, sent letters to 16 retailers, calling on them to root out “shameful” labor abuses first outlined by the USA TODAY Network.

Soon after, Costco Wholesale dropped Pacific 9 Transportation, one of the biggest port trucking companies in Southern California.

● Americans express support for traditional public schools in new poll, even as Trump disparages them.

● Carol Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Education, takes on a study that claims charter schools help nearby public schools.

● These dock workers just showed the labor movement how to shut down fascists.

● Workers Independent News:

Embedded Content

Daily Kos Labor digest

By Laura Clawson

Wednesday Aug 16, 2017 · 3:01 PM PDT

2017/08/16 · 15:01

● When your boss stores dead bodies in the break room, you’ll be glad you have a union to speak out.

● Silicon Valley's techno-capitalists have a low-wage worker revolt on their hands.

● That saying about not eating your seed corn seems like it would apply to this tentative deal between a Maine union and Paul LePage’s administration.

● They got hurt at work—then they got deported.

● Workers Independent News:

Embedded Content

Donald Trump's policies will mean more workers dead on the job

By Laura Clawson

Tuesday Aug 15, 2017 · 10:11 AM PDT

2017/08/15 · 10:11

NEW YORK, NY - DECEMBER 10: Construction workers carry empty caskets representing workers killed on a construction site during a rally in lower Manhattan to demand a safer workplace on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Thousands of workers, clergy, public officials and advocates attended the afternoon rally which ended at City Hall and demanded new measures to protect workers in the building trade in Manhattan. In 2015, 16 workers died while on the job at a construction site in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Donald Trump’s rollbacks of worker protections could cost lives. Kathleen Rest, executive director of the Union of Concerned Scientists and former acting director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and David Michaels, a public health professor and former assistant secretary of labor, leave no room for doubt on that front. People die from workplace injuries and work-related diseases every day:

People like 25-year-old Donovan Weber who suffocated in a trench collapse in Minnesota. Or Michael McCort, Christopher Irvin, Antonio Navarrete and Frank Lee Jones who were killed at a power plant in Florida when molten slag reaching 1,000 degrees poured down on them as they tried to unplug a tank. Or Wanda Holbrook, whose head was crushed by a malfunctioning robot as she adjusted machinery in Michigan.

Each day in the United States, 13 people are killed as a direct result of hazardous working conditions. And, more than 10 times that number die of work-related diseases that are less sudden but no less devastating.

And Trump’s policies are going to make that worse:

Since January, we’ve seen delays and rollbacks in workplace protections. For example, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has proposed weakening protections for workers exposed to cancer-causing beryllium and delayed enforcement of its silica rule, increasing the likely incidence of lung disease. It has delayed the electronic submission of injury and illness data and stopped releasing public information about enforcement actions, inhibiting public and researchers’ access to data that can inform prevention.

And Congress has permanently terminated OSHA’s ability to fine employers with a long-standing pattern of injury and illness record-keeping violations, a previously important signal to others in the industry.

Equally worrisome are proposed budget cuts for research, education and training designed to improve the health and safety of our nation’s workplaces — research that enhances knowledge on existing and future hazards; that underpins government policies and workplace practices; and that spurs innovations in workplace safety.

But Trump claims those rollbacks are going to be good for corporate profits, and that’s what he cares about. Certainly not workers’ lives.

This week in the war on workers: About those deals Trump loves to brag about ...

By Laura Clawson

Saturday Aug 12, 2017 · 3:56 PM PDT

2017/08/12 · 15:56

As Donald Trump brags about “jobs” deals like the one supposedly bringing Foxconn to Wisconsin, Bryce Covert takes a look at the reality of such deals in general ...

Incentive packages have tripled in size since 1990, as states feel increasing pressure to up the ante to attract jobs for their residents. Yet research has found that these packages rarely change companies’ behavior. One study found that companies receiving tax incentives wouldn’t have left the states that offered them anyway. On top of that, the tax breaks had no discernable impact on job creation or company expansion. [...]

Meanwhile, these packages don’t correlate with better economic performance. State tax regimes don’t have a substantial impact on economic activity. Rather, they represent a hefty giveaway from a state’s taxpayers to a large corporate entity.

… and the Foxconn deal in particular:

If Foxconn’s Wisconsin factory actually does create 13,000 jobs, the upper limit of what the company estimated, that would mean the state is spending $23,769 per job that will pay an average annual salary of $53,000. But so far the company has only actually committed to 3,000 jobs—which would mean Wisconsin shelling out a whopping $1 million per job.

Best deals ever! Winning!

Oregon passes law protecting workers from predatory scheduling by bosses

By Laura Clawson

Friday Aug 11, 2017 · 7:43 AM PDT

2017/08/11 · 07:43

Walmart checkout line; worker bagging groceries for woman with children.

Good news for Oregon workers in the retail and fast food industries. The state has become the first to pass a law protecting workers from some of the worst scheduling abuses employers love so much.

One in six Oregonians receive less than 24 hours of notice before their shifts, according to a survey the University of Oregon Labor Education and Research Center published in February.

Now, Oregon is mandating that the state's largest employers in the retail, hospitality and food service industries -- those with more than 500 workers -- give employees their schedules in writing at least a week ahead of time.

They'll also have to give workers a 10-hour break between shifts, or pay them extra.

Refinery 29 interviewed some workers about how the law would affect their jobs; according to Tia Raynor:

I worked for an international company that owns a bunch of coffee shops in airports. So while I was working there, they told me that I would have a set schedule. Within seven months, my schedule had changed eight times.

"I am a veteran with PTSD, due to being in Iraq a couple of times, and I was not able to go to my group counseling sessions because my schedule got changed."

Laws like this should be on the Democratic agenda at all levels: Democratic state legislatures could be passing scheduling protections just as Republican state legislatures pass anti-abortion and anti-union laws, and if Democrats want to campaigning to retake Congress on a good jobs agenda, this belongs right alongside minimum wage and paid leave.

Missouri activists push to raise state minimum wage after Republicans block local increases

By Laura Clawson

Friday Aug 11, 2017 · 6:42 AM PDT

2017/08/11 · 06:42

CHICAGO, IL - APRIL 14: Demonstrators demanding an increase in the minimum wage march in the streets on April 14, 2016 in Chicago, Illinois. The demonstrators marched to and protested in front of several locations, part of a day-long effort to draw attention to low-wage jobs. The demonstration was one of about 300 scheduled to take place nationwide today. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Missouri Republicans passed a pre-emption law to block St. Louis from daring to raise its minimum wage to $10. But that’s not the end of the story. Even after that state law enforcing a low minimum wage passed, Kansas City voters passed a minimum wage increase:

At the polls Tuesday, 69 percent of Kansas City voters approved a question that calls for a city wage floor of $10 an hour, effective Aug. 24, 2017, plus annual increases of $1.25 an hour, beginning Sept. 1, 2019, until the minimum reaches $15 an hour in 2022.

It passed citywide on a vote of 23,463 to 10,763, in unofficial final returns, with overwhelming support from south of the Missouri River tempered by less enthusiasm from voters in the Northland.

That Kansas City measure will be blocked unless a court challenge to the state pre-emption law succeeds. But there’s another possibility for Missouri workers statewide:

Meanwhile on Tuesday, a different group advocating higher wages stood on the City Hall steps to launch a statewide initiative petition campaign. Its goal is to raise the state’s minimum wage from $7.70 an hour to $12 by 2023 by winning a statewide public vote in 2018.

That would be an effective way to answer state Republicans and raise wages for low-wage workers at the same time.

Daily Kos Labor digest

By Laura Clawson

Wednesday Aug 09, 2017 · 3:01 PM PDT

2017/08/09 · 15:01

● Making sense of UAW's devastating loss in Mississippi.

● National Weather Service cancels its union contract.

● Trump threatens to strip away overtime pay.

● Emotion work at work:

Customer service representatives need to react calmly in the face of unreasonable rage. Department supervisors have to support new hires, sensitively correct their mistakes, and break the news when corporate announces layoffs. Pediatric intensive care nurses have to find the words to talk with the parents of dying children.

What makes some people thrive in these kinds of jobs while others burn out and leave? In part, it has to do with how they go about performing the emotional duties of their jobs. In 1983 when sociologist Arlie Hochschild coined the termemotional labor—describing jobs where workers have to adjust their own emotional affect to serve their customers—she suggested that they may use two different methods. They can simply fake the emotion, or they can use Stanislavski-style “deep acting,” making an effort to really experience the appropriate feeling.

● Workers Independent News:

Embedded Content

Trump loses his pick to oversee assault on federal workforce

By Laura Clawson

Monday Aug 07, 2017 · 6:53 AM PDT

2017/08/07 · 06:53

US President Donald Trump speaks during a Medal of Honor ceremony at the White House in Washington, DC, on July 31, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / JIM WATSON (Photo credit should read JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)

Donald Trump—like so many other Republican politicians—loves to attack the workers who keep our government running. It’s a win-win-win for Republicans: a way to attack good wages, go after unions, and break the government so they can say “see, government doesn’t work.” But to be really effective at hurting federal workers from the inside, Trump will need someone who knows how government works in charge of the Office of Personnel Management, and he doesn’t have that. As of last week, he’s a step further away from having it, because his nominee for the role withdrew.

The White House, which did not answer a request for comment, withdrew his name last Wednesday afternoon. In a letter to Trump last week, [George] Nesterczuk said he was pulling out over the partisan atmosphere and “baseless” allegations against him. “I do not wish to be a distraction for the administration while I defend my integrity,” he wrote. According to multiple sources who were tracking his nomination, the confirmation process was moving slowly, in part because he hadn’t even submitted his paperwork to the relevant committee, despite being nominated in May.

So if and when Trump tries to blame Nesterczuk’s withdrawal on Democrats blocking the confirmation process, remember that the guy hadn’t gotten his paperwork in after more than two months. Oh, and by the way, he’d worked for the same pro-Russian Ukrainian government as former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort. Interesting how that keeps popping up, no?

What agenda is Trump looking to impose on the federal workforce?

Trump has made big promises about running the government like a business, using evidence to justify policy and personnel decisions. He imposed a hiring freeze—since lifted—on his third full day in office and in March, he signed an executive order on a “comprehensive plan for reorganizing the executive branch,” requiring agencies to submit reorganization plans by September, including information on how to “maximize the performance of government workers.” In May, the Trump administration released its 2018 budget, including huge cuts to domestic spending that would require a significant reduction in the federal workforce.

What’s perfect is that these promises to run government like a business are coming from a guy whose own businesses have gone through repeated bankruptcies and who has left a massive trail of lawsuits from contractors he stiffed.

This week in the war on workers: Don't buy the Republican 'small business' tax cut hoax

By Laura Clawson

Saturday Aug 05, 2017 · 3:56 PM PDT

2017/08/05 · 15:56

These are the type of people who'd benefit from a Trump tax plan.

When Donald Trump and congressional Republicans start making a serious push to cut taxes for wealthy individuals and corporations, expect a lot of talk about “small business.” In fact, expect to hear a pitch that sounds like small businesses will be absolutely the biggest winners from a Republican tax plan. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities’ Chye-Ching Huang explains the reality Republicans are trying to hide with their “small business” talk:

A special rate cut for “pass-through” businesses would overwhelmingly benefit the wealthy and tax avoiders, not small businesses. [...] Some proponents say the tax cut would be a boon for small businesses. But most small businesses are small — despite what prominent congressional Republicans have said, very few small business owners pay the top rate of 39.6 percent. [...]

Eliminating the estate tax would be a boon to the heirs of the nation’s wealthiest estates, not to small farms and small businesses. [...]

A “territorial” corporate tax system could put small and domestic businesses at a competitive disadvantage. President Trump and House Budget Committee Chairman Diane Black have proposed a territorial tax system: U.S.-based multinational corporations wouldn’t pay U.S. corporate taxes on their foreign profits, while domestic businesses would face a 15 percent rate. That could make U.S. domestic and small businesses less competitive relative to large U.S. multinationals. [...]

Paying for the Trump and “Better Way” tax cuts for the affluent and large corporations could hurt education, infrastructure, and other federal investments critical to the economy and small businesses.

Be ready and know how to see through the sales job.

Daily Kos Labor digest

By Laura Clawson

Wednesday Aug 02, 2017 · 2:56 PM PDT

2017/08/02 · 14:56

● High pay for charter school administrators in Boston.

● The quaint Baltimore seafood business that masks shocking labor abuses overseas.

● Union strategies: organizing or politics ... or both?

● Nissan launches anti-union blitz ahead of pivotal UAW election:

At the Nissan plant, supervisors have worn “vote no” t-shirts to work in recent days, and in some cases held one-on-one talks with employees to discourage them from joining the UAW, according to workers. Videos are running on loop in the plant’s break areas, painting unions in a bad light. “It costs a lot of money to join a union!” the video asserts.

● Workers Independent News:

Embedded Content

SeaTac's $15 minimum wage isn't getting in the way of a boom in new hotels

By Laura Clawson

Wednesday Aug 02, 2017 · 1:01 PM PDT

2017/08/02 · 13:01

Next time you find yourself in an argument with someone who says raising the minimum wage will kill jobs and hurt the economy—even if that argument is really you muttering under your breath while reading an interview with a Republican politician—here’s an example to bring up. The first city in the country to pass a $15 an hour minimum wage was SeaTac, Washington, in 2013. And yes, opponents howled that it would be bad for business. But the New York Times reports that, instead, SeaTac is in the middle of a hotel-building boom, with nine new hotels coming to the city.

Michael H. Mahoney, president of the Dallas-based development company Western International, said his company had not built anything in the Seattle area for more than 10 years, but it was drawn to SeaTac because some available property there bordered a lake and the light rail system had just been built. Business travelers can stay near the airport where it is a bit less expensive than in downtown Seattle, he said, “and close to their flight home,” but they still have easy access to downtown for meetings or entertainment.

He said he considered the $15 minimum wage before deciding to go ahead with a 176-room Residence Inn by Marriott that is scheduled to open next spring, but it was not the determining factor. “We are competing for quality people seeking the best jobs, so would likely have been at that threshold anyway,” he said.

“There’s a lot of noise” about higher minimum wages, he said, but he decides whether to enter an area based on an overall favorable economic outlook. If the area is not doing well, “we’re not going in there,” he said, so wages are not generally a factor.

What do you know. Yet another piece of evidence all those Republican talking points about disappearing jobs and suffering businesses are just scare tactics.

Black Women's Equal Pay Day shows how far from equality we are and how slow progress is

By Laura Clawson

Monday Jul 31, 2017 · 1:27 PM PDT

2017/07/31 · 13:27

July 31 is Black Women’s Equal Pay Day. That means that this is the day in 2017 when black women have finally caught up with what white men were paid in 2016. Thanks, wage gap! While we often hear the (accurate as far as it goes) statistic that women are paid 80 cents on the dollar compared with white men, the gap gets a lot worse when you break it out by race, and black women are paid just 63 cents on the white man’s dollar.

Here are a few more facts from the National Women's Law Center. Education doesn’t make it go away:

Pursuing higher education does little close to the wage gap. Black women with a bachelor’s degree are typically paid $46,694—just under what white, non-Hispanic men with only a high school degree are paid ($46,729).

Black women have to earn a Master’s degree to make slightly more ($56,072) than white, non-Hispanic men with just an Associate’s degree ($54,620).

High wage jobs, low wage jobs … the gap persists.

Among workers in low wage jobs, Black women make just 60 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men. Black women who work full time, year round in these occupations are typically paid about $21,700 annually, compared to the $36,000 typically paid to white, non-Hispanic men in these occupations. This gap translates to a loss of $14,300 each year to the wage gap—more than enough to pay for an entire year’s worth of rent or more than a year and a half of childcare costs.

Among workers in high wage occupations—such as lawyers, engineers, and physicians or surgeons—Black women are paid 64 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men in the same occupations. Black women who work full time, year round in these occupations are typically paid about $70,000, compared to the $110,000 typically paid to white, non-Hispanic men in these same jobs. This amounts to a staggering annual loss of $40,000 each year, or $1.6 million dollars over a 40-year career.

Over 48 years, the entire time for which data is available, the situation has only improved by 20 cents, from black women making 43 cents for every dollar a white man made to making 63 cents in 2015, and “In Louisiana, the worst state for Black women’s wage equality, Black women typically are paid slightly less than half of what white, non-Hispanic men are paid.”

Newer
Older

RSS