I have a strong feeling that I will never regret feeling positive about Maria Elena Durazo:

As the head of the hotel workers’ union here in the 1990s, Maria Elena Durazo negotiated a contract with provisions rarely seen by labor unions: The jobs of workers who were deported or lost authorization to work in the United States would be held open for two years, with the same pay.

It was remarkable protection for the immigrant workers who made up the bulk of the union’s membership — and it implicitly acknowledged that many of those immigrants were working without legal papers.

In the years since, Ms. Durazo, 60, has become one of the most prominent labor leaders advocating an overhaul of the country’s immigration policies. As the executive secretary-treasurer of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, she presides over what is widely perceived as the most successful group of unions in the country. While union membership is declining nationally, it is growing  in California, and much of that growth can be attributed to Latino immigrants.

]]> http://www.workinglife.org/2013/05/17/durazos-drive/feed/ 0 http://www.workinglife.org/2013/05/16/prtizkers-pennies-hidden/ http://www.workinglife.org/2013/05/16/prtizkers-pennies-hidden/#comments Thu, 16 May 2013 23:44:15 +0000 Jonathan Tasini http://www.workinglife.org/?p=8611 If you want change, you have to be consistent. And consistency means you have to call out people no matter what political stripe the person might carry. So, it’s just a fact that Penny Pritzker, the president’s nominee for Commerce Secretary, has been the beneficiary of an off-shore tax dodge.

Honestly, this isn’t a shocker. Pritzker is a solid member of the corporate elite of the country, solidified in particular by her close relationship to the president — as many will recall, she really helped open the door to major corporate and elite donors for the then-Senator Barack Obama going back long before he actually announced he was running for president.

Citizens for Tax Justice gives us the 411:

While many wealthy families go to great lengths to avoid taxes, the Pritzker family (most famous for it’s ownership of the Hyatt hotel chain) is unique in its role as “pioneers” in the use of offshore tax shelters. Many of its existing offshore trusts were set up as long as five decades ago ago, and some have allowed the family to continue benefitting from tax loopholes that have long since been closed…

…When the  New York Times asked Penny Pritzker for her thoughts on the ethical implications of her family’s use of offshore trusts, she remarked that the trust was set up when she was only a child, after all, and that she does not control how the offshore trusts are administered. Her continued vagueness on these issues makes it likely that she will face more questions about her views of offshore tax avoidance more generally next week when she goes before the Senate for her confirmation hearing.

While Pritzker’s personal involvement with her family’s most infamous tax avoidance legacy is unclear, it is clear that she has actively used tax avoidance strategies in her own professional and private life. For example, a family member in this Bloomberg News profile from 2008 recounts one of her very first assignments working for Hyatt, which was to set up a like-kind property exchange to help avoid taxes on a property owned by Hyatt.

It turned out Penny was a natural at this particular tax avoidance scheme, in which a company takes deductions for the purported depreciation of their property and then sells the property at an appreciated price, but avoids paying capital gains tax by swapping the property for another like-kind property.

Those are the facts. Not surprising but real.

Someone should run a website just to track these nuggets…

Lobbyists for the nation’s biggest banks have persuaded federal regulators to soften a proposed rule under the Dodd-Frank Act, the financial overhaul law passed after the crisis of 2008. The rule, which regulators plan to approve on Thursday, could protect Wall Street’s control over the $700 trillion derivatives market, a lucrative business that helped cause the financial crisis…

…But the compromise, coming on the heels of other Wall Street lobbying victories, still illustrates the financial industry’s continued influence in Washington.

“It’s really on the edge of returning to the old, opaque way of doing business,” said Marcus Stanley, the policy director of Americans for Financial Reform, a group that supports new rules for Wall Street.

…So, one day we can have an accounting of how it all happened again…

A compromise for them is a royal screwing for the people down the road.

News via The Wall Street Journal:

Wal-Mart hasn’t signed on to the five-year Building and Fire Safety accord, which was negotiated with worker-safety groups and labor unions and signed this week by retailers including Hennes & Mauritz AB, Zara parent Inditex and France’s Carrefour SA…

Wal-Mart said it would pay for safety inspections at 279 Bangladesh factories and publish results on its website by June 1. When fire and building safety issues are found, Wal-Mart will require factory owners to make necessary renovations or risk being removed from its list of authorized factories.

Wal-Mart won’t pay for the renovations but will “expect the cost of safety improvements to be reflected in the cost of goods we buy,” said Rajan Kamalanathan, Wal-Mart’s head of ethical sourcing, in an interview. “We don’t want anyone to cut corners to put workers safety in jeopardy.”

The plan also calls for setting up an independent call center for garment workers to report unsafe conditions.

The retail giant said it also will make public a list of more than 250 factories whose authorization to produce goods for Wal-Mart has already been revoked.

Worker’s rights groups dismissed Wal-Mart’s plan as a public-relations effort.

“Wal-Mart’s ruthless drive for low production costs regardless of consequences of workers has been single biggest contributor to working conditions in Bangladesh,” said Scott Nova, executive director of the Worker Rights Consortium in Washington.

Of course. Because Wal-Mart is a corrupt company, willing to bribe people.

Because Wal-Mart is a persistent violator of wage and hour laws in the U.S.

It has been viciously anti-union for its entire history–not a single Wal-Mart store has a union in the U.S.

It’s entire model is based on poverty: poverty of the people who work there and poverty of the people who shop in the stores. And poverty of the people who make goods sold at Wal-Mart, sales that make the Waltons among the richest people in the world.

So, what difference does it make if a thousand lives are snuffed out in a flash? Pshaw. Just another sleazy task on the long list of daily to-dos for the Walton family.

Let’s parse the two pieces of the steps forward (Wall St Journal, subscription):

Some of Europe’s largest retailers agreed Monday to sign a legally binding agreement designed to improve safety conditions in Bangladesh’s garment factories after a building collapse last month killed at least 1,127 workers and injured many more.

Under the five-year accord, Hennes & Mauritz AB, Inditex,  the Spanish parent company of Zara, Tesco PLC and others agreed not to hire manufacturers whose clothing factories fail to meet safety standards and committed to paying for necessary repairs and renovations. The pact was negotiated by retailers with global worker-safety advocates, and overlapped with the Bangladeshi government’s announcements that it would raise the minimum wage for garment-industry workers and make it easier for workers to unionize.

I remain quite skeptical of the agreements signed by retailers. There are a lot of details unknown about how the deal will be implemented and who will oversee it. I agree with this sentiment:

And some skeptics are waiting to see whether companies and government officials will pay more than lip service to improving standards in Bangladesh, where dozens of fires over the past decade have killed hundreds of workers. Activists have tried for years to improve factory conditions as the country grew into one of the biggest exporters of clothing in the world.

But, what could prove to be more significant is the government’s changing the rules of the game when it comes to unionization. Ultimately, having a union in place will make the factories more safe, not any goodwill shown by companies who, after all, are mostly concerned with profit not the welfare of their workers. Otherwise, this part is bullshit:

The board will oversee safety inspections of up to 5,000 factories over two years, with the results to be made public. The board also will oversee dispute resolution between retailers and union representatives, which will be subject to arbitration with decisions enforceable in a court of law in the country of the retailer.

It is not possible to inspect that many factories in that period of time in a comprehensive way AND make sure standards are kept up to par. The way it works certainly in the U.S. is a joke: companies get warnings about inspections, giving them time to quickly clean up the joint, pass inspection and, then, go back to the usual way of doing things because no one will show up again probably for ten years–if that.

So, I’m looking much more at what will happen with the unionization efforts. Without strong unions, the body counts will continue.

I want to give credit to the various people who wrote or called CBS demanding that Stahl step down from the Foundation — it is that activism that forced Stahl from the position she unethically held.

But, there are still unanswered questions — questions I asked CBS a week ago, which were never answered, either to me, to anyone else to my knowledge, or certainly not in any public statement. I’ve resubmitted the questions in an updated and slightly expanded fashion — see below.

Just a few points to make.

No,this is not the most important issue on the planet — certainly not, for example, compared to the death toll in the Bangladesh factory collapse which is now over 1,000 human beings.

But, it has some relevance to the world we do live in. CBS’ arrogant stonewalling about the incident — its covering up of an ethical violation by a visible and senior individual –speaks volumes about the corruption of the network itself. It’s a symptom of the distrust people feel towards the traditional media — that media organs like CBS demand ethical behavior and transparency from public officials but refuse to adhere to ethical standards itself and practice transparency.

And it’s a sign, as I originally wrote, of the closeness of the political, economic and media elites in the country, who, on a daily basis, mix with each other and adopt each others’ world views, echoing those views back and forth so that they turn into policy reality — from the Iraq War to the phony debt and deficit crisis.

So:

May 9th 2013

To: John Frazee Senior Vice President, CBS News Services

      Ingrid Ciprian-Matthews, Vice President, CBS News

      Frank Governale, Vice President, CBS News Operations

Re: Transparency regarding Lesley Stahl’s Service on the Peter G. Peterson Foundation Advisory Board

On May 2nd, I wrote to you regarding the service of “60 Minutes” correspondent Lesley Stahl on the advisory board of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation. As I outlined in a report on Working Life the same day, Stahl was serving on the Peter G. Peterson Foundation in direct violation of CBS’ ethical guidelines, not to mention most accepted journalistic ethical standards.

Yesterday, Stahl’s name disappeared from the list of the Peterson Foundation board of advisors. That is a testament to the activism of a number of people who I believe called CBS to ask about the unethical service. But, it certainly is no credit to CBS, which has stonewalled and refused to publicly acknowledge the gross violation of CBS’ own ethical standards. Stahlgate now joins the annals of other cover-ups in which the actual violation is far less serious than the attempt to keep the whole episode from public view.

And it is a stain on CBS — a news organization that demands, via its “journalism”, ethical behavior and transparency from public officials but will not adhere to the same standards.

I would request again answers to several questions, some of which were asked a week ago:

1. Did Ms. Stahl’s service adhere to the ethical guidelines set forth by CBS?

2. If her service violated the guidelines, did CBS management direct Ms. Stahl to resign her position on the advisory board?

3. Has any sanction been imposed on Ms. Stahl?

4. Was Ms. Stahl paid for her service on the board in any fashion, either in the form of fees and/or reimbursement for travel? If the answer is yes, were those payments disclosed to CBS?

5. Was anyone aware, at the management level of CBS news, about Ms. Stahl’s service?

6. Did Ms. Stahl explicitly request permission to serve on the advisory board? If the answer is yes, can you provide documentation for such a request?

7. If such a request was not made, is that failure grounds for any discipline on the part of CBS management if, in fact, such service is permitted with prior approval?

Any answers you provide will be posted publicly on Working Life and made available to others.

I intend sharing these questions with media reporters and/or media critics to encourage them to ask similar questions.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Tasini

Publisher-Editor

Working Life

www.workinglife.org

Twitter: @jonathantasini

So that people don’t have to click away, the summary is this: Stahl is a member of the Advisory Board of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation.  Peterson has bankrolled the campaign promoting the phony debt and deficit “crisis”–a campaign aimed primarily at attacking the social safety net and Social Security.

It is unconscionable–if not surprising–that Stahl would serve on a board of a deeply partisan organization. Yet, CBS apparently does not care.

Truthfully, the stonewalling is a function of the ability to ignore one tiny voice (MINE).

BUT THE PEOPLE CAN BE LOUD AND ACTIVE.

I’m not saying this is the most important thing on the planet right now. BUT…this is a great example of how the elites in politics and media operate without any shred of accountability or adherence to ethical standards. And, in this case, CBS’ own published ethical standards.

We can say we are not surprised.

BUT–this has consequences.

Pete Peterson is underwriting an attack against part of what remains of a decent society (and I note, with some irony, the article currently on the NYTimes website entitled, “Economists See Deficit Emphasis as Impeding Recovery”–fuck, no shit, Sherlock…except the Times has been promoting the phony crisis for months. Oh well).

PLEASE CONSIDER CALLING: Jeff Fager is the executive producer of CBS News. His telephone number is 212 975-1073. Call him.

Others to contact:

John Frazee

Senior VP, News Services

jafrazee@cbs.com

Ingrid Ciprian-Matthews

VP, News

icm@cbsnews.com

Frank Governale

VP, News Operations

fmg@cbsnews.com

Here is the letter I wrote to CBS (and apologies: I originally misspelled Stahl’s first name–dumb. I partly blame an old friend who spells it the right way…)

To: John Frazee Senior Vice President, CBS News Services      Ingrid Ciprian-Matthews, Vice President, CBS News

Frank Governale, Vice President, CBS News Operations

Re: Leslie Stahl’s Service on the Peter G. Peterson Foundation Advisory Board

I am writing to inquire about CBS’ view regarding the service of “60 Minutes” correspondent Leslie Stahl on the advisory board of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation. As I outlined in a report on Working Life, the Peter G. Peterson Foundation serves as a vehicle to promote a highly partisan public policy position. One would assume that service on such a board by a journalist would be prohibited as an obvious violation of the most basic journalistic standards. The background of the issue is explored here:

http://www.workinglife.org/2013/05/02/leslie-stahls-giant-conflict-of-interest-and-a-lesson-about-ethical-corruption/

I would request answers to several questions:

1. Does Ms. Stahl’s service adhere to the ethical guidelines set forth by CBS?

2. If her service violates the guidelines, is it the intention on the part of CBS management to direct Ms. Stahl to resign her position on the advisory board and/or impose any kind of sanction on Ms. Stahl?

3. Was anyone aware, at the management level of CBS news, about Ms. Stahl’s service?

4. Did she explicitly request permission to serve on the advisory board? If the answer is yes, can you provide documentation for such a request?

5. If such a request was not made, is that failure grounds for any discipline on the part of CBS management if, in fact, such service is permitted with prior approval?

Any answers you provide will be posted publicly on Working Life and made available to others.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Tasini

Publisher-Editor

Working Life

www.workinglife.org

From this article, I noted something very specific:

The Sustainable Apparel Coalition, which includes big names like Nike, Walmart, Gap, J. C. Penney and Target, has been testing an index called the Higg Index. It started last year with environmental goals, but the new version due this fall will include social and labor measurements.

You gotta love the spin doctor who made sure the word “sustainable” was in the name. But, here’s the point worth remembering: there has already been self-policing in this industry and monitoring, all done either by the companies themselves and/or “independent” bodies. And that is a smidgen of a good step forward.

But, nothing will change really unless those standards include a specific right to unionize and protections against an retaliation for unionizing, with heavy sanctions for any union-busting.

Right.

Want to bet whether labor standards that Wal-Mart has any hand in drafting will include the real, enforceable right to a union?

In case you missed the really important news (does my sarcasm come through?):

Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, whose long struggle with obesity has been raised as a political liability, secretly underwent weight-loss surgery three months ago, according to a statement from his office on Tuesday.

Why don’t we try to make obvious connections. Christie rose to fame because of his reputation of being a “straight talker”. But, mostly, “straight talker” translates into images of him screaming back at people whose opinions he does not like. That makes him appear genuine, in the media’s view.

But, screaming back at people, whether you are being “honest” or whether it’s a contrived act, shows a lack of self-control.

Not being able to control your weight is no different than not being able to control your emotions when dealing with voters, and other people.

Does anyone want someone leading the country — deciding on matters of war and peace, dealing with world leaders, with Congress — who is not capable of controlling himself?

I think the answer is obvious.

Here:

One of the economic mysteries of the last few years has been the bigger-than-expected slowdown in health spending, a trend that promises to bolster wages and help close the wide federal deficit over the long term — but only if it persists.

Major new studies from researchers at Harvard University, the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and elsewhere have concurred that at least some of the slowdown is unrelated to the recession, and might persist as the economy recovers. David M. Cutler, the Harvard health economist and former Obama adviser, estimate that, given the dynamics of the slowdown, economists might be overestimating public health spending over the next decade by as much as $770 billion. [emphasis added]

The truth is that a chunk of this is attributable to the collapse of the middle class: people can’t afford the rising out-of-pocket expenses or they are unemployed, either reason resulting in the dropping of health insurance by millions of people.

Some of the slowdown, though, does comes from other changes in how the industry is structured.

But, the tragedy is that the entire health care cost issue would have been a non-factor had single-payer, Medicare for All been adopted.

The toll climbs:

The death toll in the Rana Plaza disaster soared to 517 on Friday, as rescue crews spent a 10th day digging through the rubble and investigators continued to interrogate the building’s owner and others arrested in the case.

The collapse of the Rana Plaza building, which housed five clothing factories, is the deadliest disaster in the history of the garment industry, with the death toll likely to keep rising as work crews now use heavy machinery to clear debris from some of the most devastated sections of the building.

Thousands of onlookers visit the wreckage daily, including some bearing small posters with photographs of loved ones still unaccounted for. On Friday, Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir, Bangladesh’s home minister, said more arrests were possible in coming days.

“This is a case of sheer negligence and sheer arrogance,” Mr. Alamgir said in an interview. “Arrogance on the part of the owner and negligence by the engineers and the local government authorities.”

]]> http://www.workinglife.org/2013/05/03/500-and-counting/feed/ 0 http://www.workinglife.org/2013/05/02/leslie-stahls-conflict-of-interest-letter-to-cbs-news/ http://www.workinglife.org/2013/05/02/leslie-stahls-conflict-of-interest-letter-to-cbs-news/#comments Thu, 02 May 2013 22:58:55 +0000 Jonathan Tasini http://www.workinglife.org/?p=8573 Earlier today, I wrote about Lesley Stahl’s serious breach of basic journalistic standards due to her service on the advisory board of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation. I’ve followed this up with a letter to CBS’ management seeking an explanation.

Here is the letter:

May 2nd 2013

Here is the straightforward story. Stahl is a member of the Advisory Board of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation. As I wrote extensively in my book, “It’s Not Raining, We’re Getting Peed On: The Scam of the Deficit Crisis,” no person is more responsible for the hysteria around the phony debt crisis than Pete Peterson. He has bankrolled the campaign to the tune of tens of millions of dollars — a campaign that has been partly responsible for the attack against the social safety net and Social Security.

I would argue that, in as much as one person can be tagged with creating public policy reality, Pete Peterson has been singularly responsible for the continued misery of millions of Americans who can’t get work — because his maniacal promotion of the phony crisis has led to a failure on the part of the government to inject billions of dollars into an economy where the lack of jobs is the greatest threat to economic vitality. Not that Peterson gives a shit about the average worker — most of his wealth, as I wrote, was made by loading on huge debt to companies, which often resulted in the laying off of workers and the cutting of pay and benefits.

The point here is: Stahl is essentially giving her stamp of approval on an organization that has a very clear agenda. It is a hyper- partisan organization — partisan as defined as biased towards a particular cause. It is no different than the National Rifle Association or the AARP or Amnesty International. Whatever your views are on the agendas promoted by these organizations, either on the left or the right, there is a standard journalistic view that journalists do not serve on organizational boards, advisory or daily management, in order to preserve their “objectivity”.

A couple of points. First, I actually think that the whole issue of “objectivity” is nonsense. Every journalist comes to his or her job with a point of view. The New York Times reporters who regurgitate stupid facts about the phony debt and deficit crisis — as they did about the Iraq War — are driven by bias, experience and upbringing, even if they never understand how that shapes what they write. But, if there is a standard, than Stahl has to abide by it.

Second, the most important point, though, is that Stahl accepted service on this board without seeing anything wrong in agreeing to lend her name (and perhaps perspective) to a relentless attack on our basic notion of what is good about government. This organization is not the ASPCA or PTA. The Peterson Foundation is a hyper political operation with a very clear public policy agenda. But, it is the nature of the elite world: they mix with each other at cocktail parties, marry (take a bow Andrea Mitchell and Alan Greenspan), and hire each other (Wall Street did not want for voices either in the George W. Bush or Obama Administrations).

Stahl would not understand the ethical problem because she simply is blind to a world outside the elite consensus — on the phony debt crisis, and beyond. The elite’s view is simple: the debt crisis is accepted by all, its almost an academic exercise and if you aren’t with that consensus, than you are nuts or not serious — as bad as anyone who would reject the idea of treating animals kindly.

But, no matter: she is violating CBS’ ethical standards and she must resign from the Peterson Foundation.

What can be done? Jeff Fager is the executive producer of CBS News. His telephone number is 212 975-1073. Call him. If someone can supply his email…

Others to contact:

John Frazee

Senior VP, News Services

jafrazee@cbs.com

Ingrid Ciprian-Matthews

VP, News

icm@cbsnews.com

Frank Governale

VP, News Operations

fmg@cbsnews.com

[note: the original post misspelled Stahl's first name...I blame an old friend's proper spelling of Leslie...and my own carelessness!]

The rumblings:

As workers around the world observed the international Labor Day holiday with demonstrations and rallies, thousands of Greeks walked off their jobs on Wednesday in the second general strike against government austerity measures this year, shutting down tax offices, leaving state hospitals to operate with emergency employees and disrupting public transportation.

The Greek protest came as workers in Asia, including Bangladeshis infuriated by the lethal collapse of a garment factory, demonstrated in cities including the capitals of Cambodia, Indonesia and the Philippines. In Istanbul, riot police officers sprayed throngs of people with water and tear gas as they gathered for a rally, defying an official ban.

More needed.

An investigation:

The International Labour Organization (ILO) will send a high-level mission to Bangladesh in the coming days to offer its support and expedite action by all parties following the collapse of the Rana Plaza Building in Savar, which left at least 380 people dead.

The high-level mission will be led by ILO Deputy Director-General for Field Operations, Gilbert Houngbo.

ILO Director-General Guy Ryder said he was writing to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, urging immediate action to prevent a recurrence of the latest in a series of entirely avoidable workplace tragedies.

“Horror and regret must translate into urgent firm action,” said Ryder. “Action now can prevent further tragedy. Inaction would mean that the next tragedy is simply a matter of time. The ILO urges the Government of Bangladesh and its employers and trade unions to make use of its support and ensure that the Rana Plaza tragedy is the last of its kind.”

First, reconnecting job quality to economic growth will likely require big steps. The policies simulated in this paper would all qualify as major policy initiatives, yet none would create a sufficient number of good jobs to employ even half of the U.S. workforce.

 Second, eliminating bad jobs appears to be easier than creating good jobs Most of the proposals examined especially universal programs such as universal health care or a universal retirement plan do more to reduce the share of bad jobs than they do to increase the share of good jobs. (Our

classification system divides jobs into three categories: good jobs, bad jobs, and jobs that fall in between.)

 Third, a combination of complementary policies appears to be significantly more effective than if any one of the policies is enacted on its own. Separate implementation of a universal retirement plan or health insurance would both greatly boost the share of workers in good jobs, but the

simultaneous implementation of both policies woul d raise the good jobs share by more than the sum of the two distinct policies.

Fourth, gender pay equity would go a substantial way towards eliminating the large good jobs gap between men and women. By our calculations, a policy of pay equity for women and men with the same educational qualifications would reduce the gender good jobs gap by about 90 percent.

 Finally, increasing unionization appears to be substantially more effective than a comparable expansion of college attainment. Given that increasing college attainment is a long and expensive process, these findings suggest the importance of emphasizing unionization as much or more than college attainment as a key path to improving job quality.