Category Archives: labor unions

As Starbucks Workers Seek a Union, Company Officials Converge on Stores

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From today’s New York Times:

During her decade-plus at Starbucks, Michelle Eisen says she has endured her share of workplace stress. She points to the company’s increased use of productivity goals, inadequate attention to training and periods of understaffing or high turnover.

But she had never encountered a change that the company made after workers at her store and two other Buffalo-area locations filed for a union election in late August: two additional “support managers” from out of state, who often work on the floor with the baristas and who, according to Ms. Eisen, have created unease.

“For a lot of newer baristas, it’s an imposing force,” Ms. Eisen said. “It is not an easy job. It should not be complicated further by feeling like you’re having everything you’re doing or saying watched and listened to.”

Workers and organizers involved in the unionization effort say the imported managers are part of a counteroffensive by the company intended to intimidate workers, disrupt normal operations and undermine support for the union.

Starbucks says the additional managers, along with an increase in the number of workers in stores and the arrival of a top corporate executive from out of town, are standard company practices. It says the changes, which also include temporarily shutting down stores in the area, are intended to help improve training and staffing — longstanding issues — and that they are a response not to the union campaign but to input the company solicited from employees.

“The listening sessions led to requests from partners that resulted in those actions,” said Reggie Borges, a Starbucks spokesman. “It’s not a decision where our leadership came in and said, ‘We’re going to do this and this.’ We listened, heard their concerns.”

None of the nearly 9,000 corporate-owned Starbucks locations in the country are unionized. The prospect that workers there could form a union appears to reflect a recent increase in labor activism nationwide, including strikes across a variety of industries.

Read the complete story here.

Unions Fighting Vax Mandates Endanger Public Health & Economic Recovery

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From today’s New York Times:

As New York pushes forward with some of the toughest and farthest-reaching vaccine mandates in the nation, thousands of health care workers in the state appear to be willing to be fired rather than get vaccinated.

So, too, do thousands of people who work in New York City’s public schools.

How sad that many of these vaccine holdouts are supported by their unions. Talk about a lack of solidarity.

For years, these unions defended the health and safety of their members. They fought for better wages and protected workers’ rights. They built the middle class. Now they are fighting state and city vaccine mandates aimed solely at keeping workers and communities safe and healthy. So much for the old union idea that an injury to one is an injury to all.

At least city and state government officials have the best interests of the public in mind, even if some in the labor movement have forgotten which side they’re on.

The state’s mandate, requiring vaccination of health care workers, went into effect at midnight on Monday. The city’s, which requires the same of all Department of Education employees, goes into effect at 5 p.m. on Friday. A court upheld the city mandate on Monday.

Some unions, like New York’s nurses’ union, took a reasonable approach, expeditiously negotiating over the vaccine mandate and fighting for other workplace safety measures related to the pandemic, like proper protective gear. Local 32BJ, a New York unit of the Service Employees International Union, which represents health care aides, janitors and many other lower-wage employees, has taken a similar approach and pushed hard to vaccinate its members.

But other New York unions have sought to stymie or delay the vaccine mandates. Some have argued that vaccination shouldn’t be a condition of employment at all.

Read the complete story here.

Pres. Biden to require federal workers and contractors to get vaccinated

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From today’s New York Times:

President Biden on Thursday will sign executive orders requiring the vast majority of federal workers and contractors who do business with the government to get vaccinated against the coronavirus. They are part of an aggressive new plan that will also put pressure on private businesses, states and schools to enact stricter vaccination and testing policies as the Delta variant continues its spread across the United States.

The mandate will apply to employees of the executive branch, including the White House and all federal agencies and members of the armed services — a work force that numbers more than four million — but not to those who work for Congress or the federal court system, according to a person familiar with the plan.

The spread of the highly infectious variant had pushed the country’s daily average caseload over 150,000 for the first time since late January, overwhelming hospitals in hard-hit areas and killing roughly 1,500 people a day. The surge has alarmed Mr. Biden and his top health advisers, who see mass vaccination as the only way to bring the pandemic under control.

Mr. Biden, who was briefed by his team of coronavirus advisers on Wednesday afternoon, is set to deliver a speech at 5 p.m. Eastern that will address about six areas where his administration can encourage — or, at this point, push — more eligible Americans to receive vaccines.

Mr. Biden had already pushed federal workers to get vaccinated by announcing that those who refused would have to undergo regular coronavirus testing. But the surge, coupled with last month’s decision by the Food and Drug Administration to grant full approval to the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine to those 16 and older, has made him decide to take more aggressive steps, eliminating the option of testing, the officials said.

At least one federal workers’ union has already indicated that the new requirements should be subject to the bargaining process. On Thursday, the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal-worker union, stopped short of offering full-throated support for Mr. Biden’s plan.

“Put simply, workers deserve a voice in their working conditions,” Everett Kelley, the union’s president, said in a statement. We expect to bargain over this change prior to implementation, and we urge everyone who is able to get vaccinated as soon as they can do so.”

Read the complete story here.

U.S. unions lodge first Mexico labor grievance under new NAFTA

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From today’s Reuters Online:

U.S. unions on Monday filed the first labor rights petition against Mexico under a new regional trade pact, vying to bring a complaint against an auto parts company on the border that they say has denied workers the right to independent representation.

The petition – filed by the biggest U.S. labor federation, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) – states that workers at Tridonex in Matamoros, across from Texas, were blocked from electing a union of their choice.

The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) that replaced NAFTA last year, enshrines that right as part of its aim to give more power to workers to demand better salaries. It was also meant to prevent low labor costs from leeching more U.S. jobs.

Since the 1994 NAFTA, which had few enforcement tools for labor rules, wages in Mexico have stagnated and now rank as the lowest in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), a club of 37 industrialized nations.

Reuters reported last week that hundreds of workers had sought to be represented by a new union led by activist-attorney Susana Prieto since 2019, yet state labor officials never scheduled an election. Prieto said 600 of her supporters at Tridonex last year were fired, in what some workers described as retaliation for their efforts to switch unions. read more

Tridonex’s parent is Philadelphia-based Cardone Industries, which is controlled by Canadian company Brookfield Asset Management (BAMa.TO).

Cardone said it did not agree with the AFL-CIO’s assertions, but would address any concerns that could arise in the complaint process.

“We do not believe that the allegations in the complaint are accurate and welcome a full inquiry so that the facts can be disclosed,” the company said in a statement, without detailing which elements it disputed.

Read the complete article here.

Break down employment barriers with training, education programs

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From today’s CalMatters Online:

“You can’t have just one job in America,” says a gig worker in Los Angeles County, and “you could get replaced like this. ‘Say one wrong thing to me? You’re fired …There is a line outside the door who wants your job.’”

That is one of several perspectives from struggling workers in California captured in a new report by the Institute for the Future, which interviewed a cross-section of Californians paid less than $15 an hour last fall. The report, released March 24, explores troubling trends that preceded the pandemic but now are worsening. 

And it comes on the heels of another report by the state’s Future of Work Commission that calls for a new social compact for workers based on some staggering statistics. For example, nearly one-third of all  workers in California make less than $15 per hour, and a majority are over age 30. Women and people of color also are paid, disproportionately, the lowest wages in our state.

Beyond wages, fewer than half of workers in California report having a “quality job,” which the Future of Work Commission describes as “a living wage, stable and predictable pay, control over scheduling, access to benefits, a safe and dignified work environment, and opportunities for training and career advancement.”

The commission also notes how a decrease in worker power and organizing relates to job quality, inequality and violations of workers’ rights. The percentage of Californians in a labor union has dropped from 24% in 1980 to 15% in 2018, and membership in a union reduces the likelihood of low-wage employment more so than a college degree (39% versus 33%).

The futurists at the Institute for the Future outline how COVID-19 has accelerated instability and insecurity for workers. This is now an all-hands on deck moment, requiring consensus and collaboration across sectors – government, business, labor, education, workforce development, philanthropy and community organizations. This is difficult, complicated, and even expensive work, but it is essential if we are to make the California Dream real and attainable for all.

Despite collaborative efforts, we need more employers and labor organizations at the table. Industry has a critical role, and they must be closely involved every step of the way, not as an afterthought.     

The good news is that some promising efforts are underway. If passed, Assembly Bill 628, introduced by Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia, a Democrat from Coachella, will build upon the Breaking Barriers to Employment Initiative by assisting individuals in obtaining the skills necessary to prepare for jobs in high-demand industries. The program would support individuals who face systemic barriers to employment with training and education programs aligned with regional labor market needs.

Read the complete article here.

Unionization Efforts by Amazon Workers Dealt a Blow After Alabama Vote

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From today’s Los Angeles Times:

Amazon workers at a giant Alabama warehouse have voted against unionizing, a significant blow to a months-long campaign that pitted union activists against one of the nation’s most powerful employers and briefly appeared poised to reenergize the American labor movement.

Workers cast 1,798 votes against joining the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which led the effort to unionize employees at the facility in Bessemer, Ala., while 738 workers voted to join the union, according to a vote result Friday overseen by the National Labor Relations Board.

Some 5,876 warehouse workers were eligible to cast ballots by mail-in vote starting in February.

The result came after a days-long count that was announced online via livestream, and after nearly a week in which the labor board reviewed and certified, behind closed doors, all cast ballots. There were 505 contested ballots set aside during this process and not included in the final tally. The union said the majority were contested by Amazon. The labor board determined there weren’t enough contested ballots to affect the election result.

It was the closest Amazon workers anywhere in the U.S. had come to a union, unusually in a right-to-work state with enduring Deep South history. In Bessemer, worker concerns over the company’s handling of COVID-19 workplace safety converged with the racial equity movement to set in motion one of the most closely watched American union drives in recent history.

The RWDSU said it intended to challenge the result, which it characterized as the result of intimidation and unfair practices by Amazon during the campaign. Amazon on Friday disputed union messaging that it had unfairly influenced the vote, and thanked the Bessemer workers for participating in the vote.

The chasm reflected the dual reality that many Amazon workers say they navigate: On the one hand, earning higher than minimum wage, with benefits, at one of the world’s most influential companies at a precarious time for the economy and jobs. And on the other hand, enduring the exacting control and pace of work in warehouses that Amazon has come to be known for, to meet the quick delivery goals customers have come to expect — all as consumer demand boomed during the pandemic.

Read the complete article here.

Unions at The Ringer and Gimlet Media announce their first contracts

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From today’s New York Times:

Unions representing employees at two prominent podcasting companies owned by Spotify, the audiostreaming giant, announced Wednesday that they had ratified their first labor contracts.

The larger of the two unions, with 65 employees, is at The Ringer, a sports and pop culture website with a podcasting network. The second union, at the podcast production company Gimlet Media, has just under 50 employees. The two groups were among the first in the podcasting industry to unionize, and both are represented by the Writers Guild of America, East.

Lowell Peterson, the guild’s executive director, said the contracts showed that the companies’ writers, producers and editors “bring enormous value to the major platforms for whom they create content.”

The contracts establish minimum base pay of $57,000 for union members at The Ringer and $73,000 at Gimlet Media, annual pay increases of at least 2 percent, and a minimum of 11 weeks of severance pay.

The agreements include provisions that limit the use of contractors and allow workers to receive titles that reflect their seniority.

The two companies will create diversity committees that include managers and union members, and will require that at least half the candidates seriously considered for union positions open to outsiders come from underrepresented groups, such as racial minorities or people with disabilities.

Read the complete article here.

With a Huge Victory, UK Uber Driver Moves on to Next Gig Worker Battlefront

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From today’s Inequality.org:

In recent weeks, courts in multiple countries have delivered huge victories for gig workers by establishing the principle that these workers are, in fact, employed by digital platforms and are thus entitled to basic worker rights and protections.

The most stunning win was the UK Supreme Court’s recent scathing judgement against Uber. While lower courts had ruled again and again that UK-based drivers are in fact workers, the company had refused to comply with this classification until this final ruling.

James Farrar, a former Uber driver and a lead plaintiff in the case, is celebrating this huge victory, which means that gig workers will have the right to wage protections, holiday pay, and other basic benefits. But during six years of litigation against Uber, Farrar and his colleagues realized that gig workers would need to fight on additional fronts. Right now, these employees lack access to the data that their app-based employers gather about them.

To take on this critical battlefront for worker rights in the 21st Century, Farrar has founded Worker Info Exchange. I asked Farrar to explain why he started this new nonprofit organization and what it hopes to achieve.

How did you come to realize the need for a data rights strategy?

When we brought the employment case, Uber challenged me with my own data and they came to the tribunal with sheaves of paper that detailed every hour I worked, every job I did, how much I earned, whether I accepted or rejected jobs. And they tried to use all this against me. And I said we cannot survive and cannot sustain worker rights in a gig economy without some way to control our own data.

So I used Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to try to extract my data from Uber. And it began by asking questions, what data do you have and what can you give me? And I began to understand that Uber was unwilling or unable or both to give it to me. And I needed an entity behind me to get that to happen.

How will access to their data help workers?

Gig workers need access to data to see how they are being managed and paid. Right now companies are using automated decision making. This means allocation of work, performance management, and dismissals are decided based on data that the app gathers and feeds into algorithms. We need to understand the code behind those because sometimes those decisions are unfair. When decisions are unfair we can’t just let company executives say it wasn’t intentional. We need to expose and challenge the logic fed into the algorithm. Very few people are doing this right now.

GDPR is useful because it doesn’t just give you the right to data, it’s access to logic of processing. I have a right to fairness of processing under GDPR. So data rights are more comprehensive than just simple access to raw information. What we have done so far is challenge Uber to disclosure — what data the app collects, things like GPS trace. But what we really want are inference data. What decisions has it made about me? How has it profiled me? How does that affect my earnings? This is what Uber has not given us.

Read the complete article here.

Tesla and Elon Musk Appeal NLRB Ruling about Union Activities

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From today’s Detroit Bureau:

Tesla CEO Elon Musk wants his day in court, and the EV maker’s filed a petition to get it, appealing a recent ruling by the U.S. National Labor Relations Board that he’s violated U.S. labor law.

As part of the NLRB’s ruling, Tesla and Musk were required to perform several actions, not the least of which is a mandate that Musk take down a now nearly three-old tweet suggesting that if Tesla employees joined a union they could lose stock compensation.

The electric car maker filed a petition on April 2 with the New Orleans-based U.S. Court of Appeals to review the NLRB’s decision and order issued on March 25.

The NLRB ruling stated that Tesla violated federal labor law when it fired a union supporter and moved to block a union organizing drive at its plant in Fremont, California.

In addition, the NLRB found Tesla and the company’s freewheeling CEO, Elon Musk, violated the law and ordered them to stop interfering with workers seeking to organize a union at the Fremont plant, handing a victory to the United Auto Workers (UAW). The ruling on union activity by employees also extends to any other installation operated by Tesla in the U.S.

The dispute between Tesla and the UAW has been ongoing. The union began an organizing effort at Tesla more than five years ago and filed the unfair labor charges against the company in 2017 after security guards seized union literature and one of the leaders of the UAW effort inside Tesla was dismissed.

Tesla is disputing the NLRB’s ruling and asked the court to review the order and grant Tesla “any further relief which the Court deems just and equitable.” Tesla’s Musk has long disputed that his company is against union organizing.

In a 2018 tweet, Musk wrote: “Nothing stopping Tesla team at our car plant from voting union. Could do so tmrw if they wanted. But why pay union dues & give up stock options for nothing? Our safety record is 2X better than when plant was UAW & everybody already gets healthcare.”

The NLRB ruling ordered Musk to delete that three-year-old tweet warning employees they could lose their stock options if they opted to join the United Auto Workers, which had begun an organizing drive in Fremont. Compensation, including stock options, are subjects of contract negotiations under federal labor law.

The NLRB ordered Tesla to offer one of the former employees reinstatement. The company was also directed to rescind rules established in 2017 that prohibit the distribution of union literature in its parking lot on non-work time.

Read the complete article here.

California pays homage today to another American hero with a complex legacy

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From today’s Los Angeles Times:

Let me tell you about an American hero whom the San Francisco Unified School District Board of Education might find, um, troublesome.

Cesar Chavez stands surrounded by reporters.

He opposed undocumented immigrants to the point of urging his followers to report them to la migra. He accepted an all-expenses-paid trip from a repressive government and gladly received an award from its ruthless dictator despite pleas from activists not to do so.

He paid his staff next to nothing. Undercut his organization with an authoritarian style that pushed away dozens of talented staffers and contrasted sharply with the people-power principles he publicly espoused. And left behind a conflicted legacy nowhere near pure enough for today’s woke warriors.

A long-dead white man? A titan of the business world? Perhaps a local politician?

Try Cesar Chavez. The United Farm Workers founder is the first person I always think about whenever there’s talk about canceling people from the past. He’s on my mind again, and not just because this Wednesday is his birthday, an official California holiday.

On Jan. 27, the San Francisco school board voted to rename 44 schools that it felt honored people who didn’t deserve the homage. Some of the condemned make sense — Father Junipero Serra, for instance, or Commodore John Sloat, the Navy officer who conquered California in the name of Manifest Destiny. Others are worthy of debate. Should we really champion Thomas Jefferson, the writer of the Declaration of Independence who also fathered multiple children with his slave, Sally Hemings? Or John Muir, the beloved naturalist who didn’t think much of Black and Indigenous people?

The board’s move was rightfully met with disbelief and derision. In a year when parents are clamoring for schools to reopen, this is what board members spent their time on? And are kids really harmed if they attend a school named after Robert Louis Stevenson or Paul Revere?

Which brings us back to Chavez, the revered labor leader whose bust President Biden recently put on prominent display behind his desk in the Oval Office. On Wednesday, First Lady Jill Biden will travel to Delano, Calif., to celebrate the state holiday with the Cesar Chavez and United Farm Workers foundations, her office announced over the weekend.

Read the complete article here.