The Weekly Download

“Thousands of Starbucks Corp. baristas went on strike Thursday, claiming the coffee chain refuses to fairly negotiate with their union. The work stoppage is pegged to the company’s Red Cup Day, when Starbucks gives out holiday-themed reusable cups. Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union, said staff at hundreds of cafes are participating. It’s one of several tactics — along with outreach to politicians and to students on campuses where Starbucks has contracts — that the union has deployed in an effort to make the company change its behavior.”

“Artificial intelligence has the capability to reshape the ways that we work. Experts predict that AI will increase wealth, raise the GDP, improve health care and education. Generative artificial intelligence (AI, or GAI) is also a potential existential threat to labor. That’s not hyperbole, that’s the dream and prediction of OpenAI founder Sam Altman, who explains that the promise of AI’s wealth-generating capability is premised on AI reducing labor costs to zero. That outcome is not inevitable, however, and if and how it happens will be shaped and influenced by humans—and in particular by unions.”

“On November 14 and 15, American Airlines passenger service workers – members of the Communications Workers of America (CWA)-International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) Association – walked picket lines at eight airports across the country to educate travelers about their fight for a fair collective bargaining agreement that guarantees job security, worker safety, adequate pay, and better working conditions.”

“Ever since Starbucks workers in Buffalo won a landmark union election nearly two years ago, there’s been growing talk of a resurgence of the labor movement, with that sense of resurgence increasing as the number of strikes and union drives has soared in recent months. But there’s one aspect of labor’s resurgence that has gotten far too little attention and analysis: many unions are now winning far bigger raises and better contracts than they did just a few years ago, and that’s largely due to workers’ increased willingness to stand up and demand more.”

“For this episode, we invited Barry Eidlin back on the show to unpack the gains and wider implications of the UAW’s tentative agreements. Barry Eidlin is an associate professor of sociology at McGill University, who studies class, labor, politics and social movements. He is the author of Labor and the Class Idea in the United States and Canada, published by Cambridge University Press in 2018. We explore why the agreements may represent a shift toward a ​’new kind of unionism,’ how the UAW’s prospects for organizing the rest of the auto industry may have changed, and what listeners should be following in the rest of the labor movement.”

“Classes in Portland Public Schools will be canceled again Wednesday as its teachers strike continues its third week, the district announced late Tuesday…Late Tuesday, the union sent a cautiously optimistic email to its members, calling the day’s bargaining ‘very productive’ and said they had offered significant cost reductions to a number of their proposals, in hopes of moving towards a settlement.”

“Five days. That’s how long AFSCME members who work for Oregon’s Yamhill County government were on strike seeking a fair contract. And five days is all it took to force Yamhill County management to offer a three-year contract that the members of Yamhill County Employee Association/AFSCME Local 1422 (Oregon AFSCME) found palatable.”

“Over 200 bartenders, event staff, and other in-house workers across seven venues affiliated with First Avenue marched on the boss and delivered a petition that included the faces and names of over 70% of staff who want to unionize with UNITE HERE Local 17.”

“Woodland Pulp workers, members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) Local 1490 (District 4), Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 330-3 and Millwrights Local 1121 have become the first striking workers in Maine to be eligible for unemployment benefits.”

“In November 1994, Californians passed Proposition 187, which would have cut off a number of health and social services, including access to public education, to undocumented immigrants and their children. Proposition 187 was conceived by a group of extreme right-wing groups and elected officials as part of an effort to target immigrants in California… Proposition 187 created a spark in the immigrant rights movement.”

“After securing historic deals with the Big Three automakers, the UAW is continuing to go on the offensive. It has set its sights on nonunion automakers, from Toyota and Hyundai in the South to Tesla in California.”

“An alliance of influential online communities with a combined social media following of more than 300,000 individuals is teaming up to support the launch of  a new worker empowerment project called The Pharmacy Guild. The effort aims to unite pharmacists and pharmacy technicians to address unsafe staffing levels and dangerously high workloads throughout the industry.”

“In a major victory for farmworkers and the labor movement, approximately 250 tomato harvesters in California’s Stanislaus County won unionization, United Farm Workers (UFW) announced. The victory by Di Mare workers is the first under recent state law strengthening farmworkers’ union rights, including how laborers can vote in their union elections.”

“In Washington and most other states, agricultural companies can simply ignore demands to unionize, as the former owners of the Sunnyside mushroom farm did when more than 200 workers signed a petition last year demanding union representation. Early this September, workers tried again. More than 250 signed a petition whose demands included the right to negotiate pay and production quotas – and for the current owner, Windmill, to ‘recognize our union and begin negotiations of a labour agreement.’”

“It’s been a hectic two weeks. The Future of Freight Festival was last week, the federal government is cracking down on broker fraud, and the Teamsters union is still unionizing new trucking companies (when its president isn’t busy getting into potential fistfights with a certain Oklahoma lawmaker…). On Nov. 9, lawmakers in both the House and Senate introduced legislation that would remove the clause in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 that exempts motor carriers from providing overtime pay.”

“Ever since the union Workers United began organizing Starbucks stores in late 2021, the company has denied it threatened or retaliated against union supporters like Clark. But a growing body of decisions by NLRB judges and board members is undermining the company’s public insistence that it has run a clean campaign against the union.”

“The UAW strike against Big Auto succeeded in winning impressive wage gains, but it failed to obtain a little-reported demand: that the auto companies reinstate defined benefit pension plans for new employees that had been suspended as a concession during the 2008 Great Recession. Instead, as a consolation prize the auto companies offered and the unions took larger company payments to employee 401(k) plans. This was a significant loss for newer workers who were not grandfathered into the preexisting pension plans.”

“Last year, during a mandatory meeting of employees at a Manhattan REI store, a manager ticked off a list of what he called ‘serious red flags’ about the union trying to organize the company’s employees. The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU) has suffered a decline in membership and revenue, he said, which should be concerning…Employees at eight of REI’s roughly 180 US stores, starting with the Manhattan one, have voted to unionize over the past two years with the RWDSU or other chapters of the United Food & Commercial Workers, seeking a say in issues such as safety, scheduling and benefits. But—like their newly unionized counterparts at Amazon.com, Apple and Starbucks—none has gotten close to negotiating an actual union contract with the company.”

“At a small press conference in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Nov. 3, farmworkers, activists, and advocates gathered to honor the dead. Steps away from the state’s Department of Agriculture, farmworker advocates transformed Bicentennial Plaza into a public ofrenda for Día de los Muertos that included images of farmworkers who recently died in the line of work—including José Arturo González Mendoza. The 30-year-old and most of the other men honored were young, fit, and in the prime of their lives—factors that make little difference when the body is exposed to extreme temperatures for long periods while deprived of water, shade, and rest.”

“The tendency in recent discussions about union density has been to focus on organizing and solidifying organizing gains. Where will the labor movement find new members? Which sectors are amenable to union organizing? Will newly organized workers win contracts that lock in their organizing successes? These are some of the right questions.”

“Signs of a reinvigorated labor movement have emerged in recent years as union election petitions in 2022 rebounded from the pandemic to their highest level since 2015. This increased organizing activity has been accompanied by the highest public opinion of labor unions in more than 50 years. Though widely credited with improving pay, fringe benefits and working conditions for union members, these positive outcomes also extend to non-members, help support racial, and gender pay equity, and build a thriving middle class, all of which translate into gains for the broader U.S. economy.”

“In this podcast episode, Leonhardt discusses how the critical factors of political power, enlightened corporate culture, and government investment operated in a virtuous cycle during the four decades after the end of World War II to bring about widespread prosperity. But after 1980, a reversion to what Leonhardt calls ‘rough-and-tumble capitalism’ meant that these critical factors moved the country into a vicious cycle instead. Leonhardt emphasizes that ‘the Great Stagnation’ of the past four decades — as the working class and lower middle class have experienced it, at any rate — can be overcome. But failure to do so will mean that ‘every problem we have in our society becomes much harder to solve if we don’t solve that.’”

“The role of unions in labor markets has been widely studied with a renewed interest in the last few years. Most work focuses on the role unions have in determining wages, employment outcomes, and income inequality. However, union bargaining power may also play an important role in shaping non-pecuniary working conditions such as work schedules, which have been shown to importantly affect workers’ wellbeing.”

“Hyundai Motor (005380.KS) said on Monday it will hike wages for nonunion production workers at its Alabama factory by 25% by 2028, weeks after the United Auto Workers won new contracts with the Detroit Three automakers. The Korean automaker joins Toyota Motor (7203.T) and Honda Motor (7267.T) in raising U.S. factory wages after the UAW won a new contract with General Motors (GM.N), Ford Motor (F.N) and Chrysler parent Stellantis (STLAM.MI) that will result wage increases of 25% through 2028. The Detroit Three wage hikes amount to 33% when expected cost-of-living adjustments are factored in.”

“SAG-AFTRA leaders are defending the artificial intelligence terms of their tentative deal with the major Hollywood studios in response to criticism from some members that the union did not secure enough protections for performers. Both SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher and National Executive Director Duncan Crabtree-Ireland have given interviews this week addressing actors’ doubts about the proposed new contract — which is currently in the member ratification process after the negotiating committee voted unanimously to recommend it and 86% of the national board approved it. Voting began Tuesday and will close the first week of December.”

“Production workers at Ford's (F.N) Louisville assembly and Kentucky truck plants have voted against the tentative labor agreement, while skilled trades workers voted in favor, the local chapter of the United Auto Workers (UAW) said on Monday. The ratification of the contract was voted down by 55% of the production workers whereas 69% of the skilled trades workers, which includes maintenance and construction employees backed it, the UAW Local 862 said in a Facebook post.”

“Teachers in Andover, Massachusetts, returned to the classroom Wednesday after their union and the Andover School Committee agreed on a new contract. The Andover Education Association announced shortly before 5:10 p.m. Tuesday that a deal had been reached to end its strike, which lasted five days and led to three days of canceled classes.”

“The Power At Work Blog is proud to present this Veterans Day blogcast. In this very special blogcast, Burnes Center Senior Fellow Seth Harris is joined by William Attig of the AFL-CIO Union Veterans Council and Martin Helms of Helmets to Hardhats to discuss veterans in the labor movement. Learn about the role unions play in the lives of veterans, the role veterans play in unions, the best programs in the movement for veterans, and much more.”