Working Life

Traveling most of the day so a little late post with this piece: Latte Laborers Take on a Latte-Liberal Business By DANIEL GROSS ON March 30, the National Labor Relations Board’s New York office delivered a stinging accusation against one of the city’s — and the nation’s — most popular retail outlets. The labor board […]

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I had written about this some months ago but now it seems to be coming up in a much more serious way. This story was in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal: FRANKFURT, April 5 — An unusual law that shapes the oversight of German companies is again being re-examined after corruption scandals at Siemens and Volkswagen, […]

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Leave it to the Norwegians to show what needs to be done with abusive corporations. The Norwegian government is dropping Wal-Mart stock from its $285 billion pension fund. Could this spark a broader dumping of Wal-Mart stock around the world because of the company’s abhorrent behavior? Norway has very strong ethical guidelines for its government […]

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There has been an on-going debate in the U.S. about how to engage the only legally sanctioned union in China, the All China Federation of Trade Union (ACFTU). Some believe it is simply a mouthpiece for the government and not a real union. Others argue that at the local and regional level, many ACFTU leaders […]

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New Jersey’s public pension system is in dire straights–or so says Mary Williams Walsh in The New York Times today in an article that argues that politicians have made some questionable moves in pension funding.: In 2005, New Jersey put either $551 million, $56 million or nothing into its pension fund for teachers. All three […]

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As I talk to workers throughout the country, whether they are in unions or not, I’m struck how much the greed of CEOs has penetrated the public consciousness. But, CEO pay is really only the tip of the financial riches that CEOs are hauling away–it is their pensions and deferred compensation that are truly staggering. […]

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You have to maintain a sense of humor when you read the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal. Though I tip my hat to the quality of the writing, the writers come up just short of self-parody. Today, the wing-nuts have two hand-wringing editorials about trade. The first deals with the tariffs slapped down […]

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Louis Uchitelle has a strong and heart-breaking story about the choices auto workers are having to make as tens of thousands of them leave the industry–the largest exodus of workers from one American industry in decades, according to the story. What caught my eye, within the wrenching stories, was this paragraph: Across America, more than […]

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This morning, The Wall Street Journal has a story about the slowing of productivity. But it misses the main point. First, here’s the main thesis: Productivity Lull Might Signal Growth Is Easing Ripples Could Confuse Interest-Rate Outlook; Fed Remains Optimistic By GREG IPMarch 31, 2007; Page A1 The U.S. productivity boom that began in the […]

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Alright, sports fans (since I’ve never done a reader poll, I have no idea how many of you even care). I’ve got my Opening Day tickets for Monday for Yankee Stadium (I like the idea that we start the season playing the Devil Rays, although they were pretty pesky two years ago). Here are my […]

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