Working Life

Sort of an interesting article in today’s Wall Street Journal about the alliances developing among various players opposed to the obscene CEO pay packages. These activists sometimes form loose networks to share strategies and lobby for each others’ causes. A few are uncomfortable with the “activist” label. John A. Hill, chairman of the board of […]

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I was sputtering last night (do you ever yell at your television?) and I still am this morning about the “60 Minutes” piece last night about the death and injuries to American mine workers. Not once in the entire program did correspondent Bob Simon utter the word “union”–not once–in explaining why unusually high numbers of […]

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You may have heard in the last few days that the AFL-CIO issued a statement at the executive council meeting threatening to demand that the Democratic Party move its 2008 nominating convention from Denver because of the veto cast last month by DEMOCRATIC Governor Bill Ritter that torpedoed legislation that would have made union organizing […]

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Here’s an interesting development. The California Nurses Association, and its national arm, the National Nurses Organizing Committee, joined the AFL-CIO on Thursday. CNA represents 75,000 nurses throughout the country. It isn’t so much the affiliation that I find interesting–it’s one of the reasons given: the Federation’s endorsement of single-payer health care as the solution to […]

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Part of the reason the president is off to South America (maybe it’s to see if he can find a country where support among the people is stronger for him than in the U.S.) is to bolster support for so-called “free trade” agreements pending with Colombia and Peru, among other trade deals. He’s not going […]

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The other day I wrote about the criteria I thought should be used by labor in choosing who to support for president (commenters provided useful additions, including where the candidate stands on immigration). Today, The Wall Street Journal has a piece on the topic, written out of Las Vegas where the AFL-CIO is holding its […]

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Well, here’s a good example of the difference a Democratic Senate makes. Yesterday, the Senate voted, essentially on party lines (Arlen Specter was the only Republican to join with the Democrats), to give airport screeners the right to unionize. It was completely absurd to argue, as Republicans did, that allowing the workers to unionize would […]

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Wily and experienced negotiator that he is, I have to think that Charlie Rangel believes that sometimes no deal is better than a bad deal. I hope he keeps that mind as he plunges into talks over a compromise over so-called “free trade” agreements. Charlie, there is no deal to be made here, within the […]

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To end the suspense right away, I am not going to say which candidate I think labor should support. I have a favorite candidate who I think would be the strongest pro-labor candidate—and would remember labor once elected. But, here, I simply want to suggest what the criteria might be for labor to choose a […]

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From my friends at the Center for Economic and Policy Research comes this troubling study: African-American workers have been particularly hard hit by the decline in U.S. manufacturing, according to a study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research. Chrysler’s recent buyouts signal the continuing decline of the U.S. auto industry, which has had […]

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