By BILL ONASCH The United Auto Workers’ organizing drive at the giant Nissan plant in Canton, Miss., once showed promise of becoming the biggest union victory in the Deep South since the United Food & Commercial Workers won bargaining rights—and a contract—at Smithfield’s huge hog plant in Tar Heel, N.C., in 2008. A win at…
By ANN MONTAGUE On June 20, 691 PepsiCo workers in Buenos Aires arrived at work to see a piece of paper on the door notifying them that the plant was being relocated and they were all out of a job. In Argentina it is illegal to just close a factory and lay off workers. Companies have…
By ERNIE GOTTA — BOSTON — About 1200 nurses at the Tufts Medical Center went on strike in July. Following the strike and a four-day lock-out, they returned to work on July 17 without a new contract in place. The union says it was the largest nursing strike in Massachusetts history. Socialist Action recently interviewed…
By WAYNE DELUCA A recent study by the University of Washington announced that the second phase of Seattle’s increase in the minimum wage, moving from $11 per hour to $13 per hour, had the net effect of lowering the real wages of low-wage workers by around $125 per week. This study was immediately seized upon…
By a WORKING CARPENTER The Philadelphia city council passed a law allowing the city to secure loans for a program to renovate city parks, recreation centers and libraries called Rebuild Philadelphia. Some council members expressed skepticism about the program, asking whether any of the jobs created would go to people living the neighborhoods where the…
By BILL ONASCH A Bundle Including DirecTV—After mass informational picketing, the Communications Workers of America won a renewed contract for 17,000 AT&T workers in California and Nevada that includes modest wage and benefit improvements and, for the first time, covers employees of the satellite television competitor with cable the carrier acquired in 2015. Follow the…
By BILL ONASCH Off the Job Training—Of the 700,000 members of the Communications Workers of America, 150,000 work for AT&T—making them second only to UPS as the biggest unionized private sector employer in the U.S. But since deregulation “broke up” the virtual telephone monopoly of Ma Bell in the 1980s, a single national contract has…
By ANN MONTAGUE This is the fifth year that Fight For 15 made the trek to Chicago and then to suburban Oak Brook, Ill., where the annual McDonald’s shareholders meeting was taking place. The first day, May 22, started with showcasing the leading role of women of color. A panel of activists expressed their message…
By BILL ONASCH Movers Become Shakers In D.C.—The motto of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689 is We Move This City. Their 9000 members keep the second biggest (in mileage) subway system in the USA running—as best they can with the Metro’s austerity budget—in addition to dozens of usually standing-room-only bus lines and paratransit services. Their contract…
By MARTY GOODMAN — NEW YORK — B&H Photo, the nation’s largest non-chain photo store, announced during contract negotiations plans to shut down two warehouses in Brooklyn and move facilities 75 miles away to Florence, N.J., by the end of the year. For 330 immigrant B&H warehouse workers who belong to the United Steel Workers…
By MARK UGOLINI — CHICAGO — Nearly 10,000 workers, immigration rights activists, and supporters took to the streets on May Day to demand legalization of undocumented workers; an end to terrorizing immigrant communities with raids on homes and workplaces; and an end to criminalization, mass incarceration, and deportations. (See a full list of demands at…
By GEORGE SHRIVER — TUCSON, Ariz. — Hopes & expectations were widespread on the eve of May 1, 2017, that the spirit of 2006 might be revived this year. In 2006, as many as 3 million or more undocumented immigrants and their allies poured into the streets on May Day, and the reactionary Sensenbrenner bill,…
By ANN MONTAGUE The organizers of the International Women’s Day Strikes issued a comprehensive statement encouraging women to support the May Day actions this year. It was entitled, “No Ban, No Wall, No ICE,” and said in part, “We come together with the understanding that our exploitation as waged and unwaged workers have a common…
By MICHAEL SCHREIBER Millions of people around the world took part in demonstrations on May Day. Actions included a general strike and mass march, backed by the major unions, to protest government austerity measures in Puerto Rico. This followed a huge general strike in Brazil two days earlier. The May 1 international day of working-class…
By BILL ONASCH On the eve of the April 29 People’s Climate Mobilization in Washington and other cities, Bill Onasch describes what working people and the labor movement must do in order to avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change. The working class faces challenges on many fronts today. But one crisis is overarching.…
Sign the Petition! Stop the relentless repression against French postal worker and union representative Gaël Quirante! Gaël, departmental secretary of SUD Postal Activities in the Hauts-de-Seine region of France (more commonly known by its post code 92), faces multiple legal and disciplinary charges, which could result in dismissal from work. In the span of his…
By BILL ONASCH A Clean Win For Janitors—It took six years of strikes and demonstrations, but the tenacity of 600 Twin Cities janitors, nearly all people of color, many of them immigrants, has secured a first union contract. It was a tripartite struggle. These members of SEIU Local 26 actually clean Big Box retail stores…
By MARK UGOLINI — CHICAGO — Over 1000 trade-union women and supporters gathered at the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) Hall on Mar. 8 to celebrate International Women’s Day and declare solidarity with women everywhere struggling to protect and extend woman’s rights. Chairing the rally, Adriana Alvarez of Fight for $15 spoke of the struggle of…
By BILL ONASCH Seeing the Light In Baltimore—At the beginning of the Trump era, an important organizing victory has taken place. After a vigorous campaign that included home visits, phone banking, and twice a day plant gate rallies and leaflet distributions, an NLRB election certified the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers to represent more than…
By MARK UGOLINI The Republican Party takes primary charge of the U.S. government this month with Donald Trump sworn in as president, and both houses of Congress under Republican control by a slim majority. The new administration is taking shape with announcements of key government cabinet posts. These include a combination of professional politicians, former…
By BILL ONASCH Good News, Bad News From SEIU—In recent years, this paper has often had good news to report about the two-million member Service Employees International Union. They have played an exemplary role in championing long neglected low-wage workers. The Fight for 15 Dollars and a Union has become the most important and inspiring…
By BILL ONASCH The Other Election—There was never any doubt that the working class would lose the election of a new POTUS. That one was a contest between lesser or maximum evils. Heads they win, tails we lose. But while that face-off dominated the press and airwaves ad nauseam, little attention was given to the…
By ANN MONTAGUE Fight For 15 National Organizing Director Kendall Fells, while helping arrested protesters get out of jail in New York, stated, “We have a tone change. The change is, ‘We’re not going to back down’ and ‘We’re not going to be bullied.’” He was surrounded by signs and t-shirts that gave the same…
By MARK UGOLINI — CHICAGO — On Nov. 29, about 500 courageous low-wage workers at O’Hare airport walked off the job at 10 a.m. to demand an end to unfair labor practices. The workers also expressed their solidarity with fast-food, hospital, health-care, and other low-wage workers who were simultaneously demonstrating nationwide for a $15…
By BRUCE LESNICK On Nov. 18, the Obama administration banned oil and gas drilling in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans for the next five years, while allowing drilling projects to go forward in the Cook Inlet (southwest of Anchorage, Alaska) and in the Gulf of Mexico. The media have noted the strong possibility that when…
