Working Life

It’s kind of a natural thing for union people to stick up for the less powerful and weak. But, I think we shouldn’t extend our kindness to small and increasingly weak or irrelevant national unions. I say this today because a number of people (including AFL-CIO staffers) have written to me or posted comments expressing […]

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A thought to consider for people wringing their hands over the “split” in the labor movement: maybe this will be a really good thing. I’ve been ruminating over this for many weeks, sometimes writing pieces of it here and there. A definition first: reasonable people may disagree but I do not see the creation of […]

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So, folks, the crews have broken down their cameras and the clean-up crews are here at the Laborers International building on 16th Street in Washington, D.C. As I said earlier this morning, the launching of the Change to Win coalition may be a critical moment for the labor movement–or just a modest improvement. At least, […]

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Today may be remembered as a momentous day in labor history–or simply a modest advance in labor organizing. The insurgents will unveil the principles and program for the new coalition at a 12:30 press conference in Washington, D.C, at the Laborers building (conveniently located just across the street from the AFL-CIO…”hey, you, with the lipstick […]

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It wasn’t Las Vegas but yesterday’s Executive *Committee* meeting sure had the same feeling as the Federation’s March Executive Council meeting. The Executive Committee (which is a subset of the full Council and includes the largest unions but not just the largest unions…which has been a bit of a bone of contention, but that’s another […]

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Well, there should be a little flurry of interesting stuff this week in the AFL-CIO back-and-forth. Today, the AFL-CIO Executive Committee meets–the members will get to hear first-hand from Andy Stern what his board decided this past Friday on disaffiliating from the Federation. Then, Wednesday, as first reported here two days ago, the insurgent unions […]

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So, John Sweeney did reply to UFCW President Joe Hansen’s June 3rd letter. Sweeney’s letter came just three days later…can’t let any moss gather under that one. After all, Hansen’s letter did hint that the UFCW was considering leaving the Federation–and his board, as I reported yesterday, will consider that very subject this coming week. […]

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Not a surprise but yesterday the Service Employees Executive Board unanimously approved a resolution taking SEIU one step closer to leaving the AFL-CIO. Without any conditions, the resolution empowered the officers of the union to decide when to leave the Federation. As important, the resolution authorizes allocating additional money–SEIU has already kicked in $100,000–to seed […]

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It never ceases to amaze me how the promoters of so-called “free trade” just keep shoveling out lies and half-truths to keep promoting an ideology that has clearly failed–if you assess failure, as I do so naively, based on how much trade agreements help people. And the bullshit generation is in full tilt as the […]

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My busy fax machine spit out this June 3rd letter from Joe Hansen to John Sweeney. It’s an interesting contrast at least in perception to the AFL-CIO’s comparison of the two competing visions of what needs to be changed in the labor movement. The AFL-CIO comparison states pretty clearly that there is not a lot […]

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