Working Life

I’ve been on a kick, for many weeks, about the evils of the bankruptcy code–how can it be that companies are allowed to use the bankruptcy laws to destroy pensions (money that workers put away for future years) and attack union contracts…at the same time, by the way, that corporate CEOs continue to receive generous […]

Read the full story

Worth reading. For the past year, the Global Policy Network (GPN) has been working closely with the Hemispheric Labour Organization (ORIT) to create Labour’s Platform for the Americas. The Platform was presented to presidents of the Americas when they met in Mar del Plata, Argentina in November 2005. It has been produced in four languages […]

Read the full story

The Administration is trying to blame rising health care costs for the stagnation of wages. Hmmmm…well, yes, in some case, companies are socked with higher heath care costs and, therefore, aren’t raising wages…okay, this point is very narrow because it avoids the debate, just for the moment, on the huge hauls that CEOs are making […]

Read the full story

This was rumored for some time–yesterday, Assemblyman Roger Green tossed his hat into the ring, declaring that he would challenge Rep. Ed Towns, one of the two CAFTA 15 members who hail from New York City (yes, this is quite sad that 2 of the 15 come from one of the more progressive cities in […]

Read the full story

Earlier in the week, I reported that a number of unions, including SEIU, were helping an independent candidate, Bill Scheurer, who is running against Melissa Bean, one of the CAFTA 15. The Government Affairs folks at SEIU say the union isn’t doing anything to assist Scheurer but because of my post, the union was getting […]

Read the full story

I have been optimistic since last summer that the two federations would find some way to work with each other. And when John Sweeney rolled out the general concept of Solidarity Charters, even though the initial proposal had some serious weaknesses that needed to be fought over, it looked like they would provide a good […]

Read the full story

There was an amusing little exchange on CNN yesterday that I wonder whether people caught. The anchor (I’m not recalling his name) was speaking with CNN’s reporter in Paris about the decision by the French government to rescind the change in labor laws that had generated widespread protests. Almost beside himself, the anchor said something […]

Read the full story

People have short memories. Last September, there was a strong rumor floating around that House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi was miffed at Rep. Ed Towns (NY) for his vote in favor of CAFTA. Well, maybe that was all for show because Pelosi is one of the headliners for Towns at a fundraiser for his re-election. […]

Read the full story

The Democratic Party machine is going into overdrive to save Melissa Bean, one of the CAFTA 15. I wrote about this a bit last week but the intensity of the Save Melissa effort picked up: Last week, there was a flurry of calls from Sen. Dick Durbin, the senior senator from Illinois, to key labor […]

Read the full story

I’ve been arguing for these many years–going back more than a decade, actually, to my book on the economy–that the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is misused as a barometer for how the economy is doing. When the GDP is up, talking heads, the press and politicians try to convince us that everything is all rosy […]

Read the full story