Working Life

    Yours truly is headed to Bali on Wednesday as part of an international labor delegation to the United Nations climate change summit. The delegation hopes to articulate labor’s position about the threat to the planet. I can’t publish here–yet–the draft version of the statement.  But, will do so when I can and hope to […]

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    Yours truly is headed to Bali on Wednesday as part of an international labor delegation to the United Nations climate change summit. The delegation hopes to articulate labor’s position about the threat to the planet. I can’t publish here–yet–the draft version of the statement.  But, will do so when I can and hope to […]

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    From afar, meaning I’m traveling, I don’t know the exact details of the deal, but the stagehands strike is over in NYC. The New York Times reports with this lead paragraph: The league representing Broadway’s theater owners and producers and the union representing its stagehands announced a settlement last night, bringing to an end […]

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    From afar, meaning I’m traveling, I don’t know the exact details of the deal, but the stagehands strike is over in NYC. The New York Times reports with this lead paragraph: The league representing Broadway’s theater owners and producers and the union representing its stagehands announced a settlement last night, bringing to an end […]

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    I don’t know that one should trust The Wall Street Journal’s take on the vibe inside any union. I’m not familiar with the reporter who wrote today’s story describing stronger dissent inside the UAW to the negotiated deal with Chrysler, as well as a relatively strong minority "no" vote on the GM deal. But, […]

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    I’m trying to keep election news t a minimum so we can focus on labor and workers’ issues that get less discussion but, let’s face it, people want to know and politics will dominate even more in 2008. So…though he didn’t get the national union’s endorsement, John Edwards did pretty well yesterday as nine  […]

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  (This is the fourth installment of an occasional update on where the labor movement is ending up in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination)   At this point, this is really not a surprise: the Service Employees International Union has chosen not to endorse, at the national level, any one candidate, freeing up […]

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    Some random things. A number of people kept asking me, "so, what is a VEBA beyond the basic name?" Here’s an excerpt from today’s Wall Street Journal–interesting note that VEBAs are not that rare at large companies: A. VEBAs are similar to pension funds. They have assets intended to pay for retiree health care, […]

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    I’m not surprised that the strike against GM was a relatively short one. We’ll see what the details are as they emerge over the next few days. Obviously, the key was the establishment of the Voluntary Employee Benefit Association, or VEBA. Here’s what The Wall Street Journal has to say this morning: Mr. Gettelfinger […]

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    It’s happening. From The New York Times: Members of the United Automobile Workers union walked off the job today at General Motors plants across the country after union leaders and company officials failed to reach an agreement in contentious talks on a new contract. It is the first national strike by the union against […]

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