The Weekly Download

“In this blogcast, Burnes Center for Social Change Senior Fellow Seth Harris is joined by Martha Gimbel, the Executive Director of the Budget Lab at Yale University, and Ernie Tedeschi, the Director of Economics at the Budget Lab. Watch now to learn how they view the current economy and how they expect Trump's presidency will impact it. Also hear their perspective on how worker power will change in the next economy.”

“Remote work is allowing workplaces to span across entire states, artificial intelligence is turning what used to take a week’s worth of effort into a 10-minute affair, and workers across the country are demanding a shorter work week. With so many changes in such a short time, it should come as no surprise that labor rights are popping into the forefront of Americans’ minds.”

“Adriana still remembers the day last spring when she got paid less than minimum wage. She was at a big suburban house outside Philadelphia that was at least three stories tall, and it had taken her and a crew more than six hours, without breaks, to clean it. At the next house, the supervisor told Adriana, who’d asked for a break, to wait in the van. She’d been fired. Adriana said she got $40 cash for the eight hours she spent in the van and cleaning that day. She’d been promised $90 for the day. If she’d been paid minimum wage, she would have earned $58…That’s why Adriana is working to urge passage of a new bill intended to enforce worker protection ordinances, fight wage theft and protect the victims of workplace retaliation. Slated to be introduced in 2025, it is backed by Philadelphia’s National Domestic Workers Alliance and a coalition of other nonunionized worker organizations and is aimed at one of workers’ thorniest problems, in Philadelphia and nationwide: making sure employers follow the rules.”

“On November 5, Massachusetts voters passed a groundbreaking ballot initiative making it possible for rideshare drivers in the state to unionize.  The new law is a big deal. It will allow drivers for companies like Uber and Lyft to create strong, independent unions that can bargain collectively for the entire sector based on models that have proven successful elsewhere for hard-to-organize workers. The initiative creates the potential for drivers to improve their working conditions and build the power necessary to create real and lasting changes in industry. It isn’t perfect – the law reflects some nasty political realities. But the new law gives drivers a powerful tool for improving their work lives and it offers a model that other states might follow. The new Massachusetts law calls for a different type of unionization and bargaining process than is common in the U.S.  The typical American processes for forming a union and bargaining collectively are unnecessarily difficult for most workers  but nearly impossible for workers in industries like rideshare with high turnover, irregular hours, and more isolated workplaces.”

“Federal labor officials issued a ruling Wednesday prohibiting employers from holding mandatory anti-union meetings at work, a long-sought policy objective of unions that want to level the playing field with corporations in organizing campaigns. In its 3-1 decision, the Democratic majority of the National Labor Relations Board said such workplace gatherings — often called “captive audience” meetings due to their obligatory nature — tend to ‘coerce’ employees and therefore violate the law. The board’s lone Republican dissented. The case revolved around the Amazon warehouse in New York City that became the retailer’s first to unionize 2 1/2 years ago. Amazon enlisted managers and outside consultants to hold meetings where they fed employees anti-union talking points in the run-up to the vote. The company spent millions on its campaign against the union.”

“In a final push to bolster union rights ahead of a Trump presidency, the National Labor Relations Board on Wednesday banned employers nationwide from forcing workers to attend anti-union meetings. Separately, Democrats are also deploying a last-ditch effort to try to get the Senate to reconfirm NLRB Chair Lauren McFerran in the last December session, allowing the agency to maintain a Democratic majority and continue its labor-friendly rulings into the next Trump administration. These efforts could help President Joe Biden cement his legacy as the most pro-union president since Franklin D. Roosevelt and protect efforts to safeguard unionized workers in a Trump administration. But labor experts widely expect the Trump administration to swiftly undo Biden-era gains for unions.”

“CLIMATEWIRE | The return of former President Donald Trump to the White House puts at risk new heat protections for workers that were proposed over the summer by the Biden administration, say workplace advocates. Trump on the campaign trail never directly addressed the proposal from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which would force employers to provide their workers with water and cool places to rest when temperatures are high.”

“On January 19, 2024, teachers went on strike in the Boston suburb of Newton, Massachusetts. Before their union came to the decision to strike—with 98 percent of members voting in favor—it spent 10 months negotiating new contracts with the city to no avail. By striking, the teachers hoped to secure pay increases on par with hikes in Newton’s cost of living, especially for classroom aides. They also demanded social workers in every school, describing them as essential to students’ mental well-being, particularly after the pandemic. Furthermore, in fiscal year 2024, the school district’s budget was cut by nearly $4 million, even as the city held nearly $29 million in surplus.”

“Times Tech Guild members who power the technology behind mobile push alerts and app and website maintenance at the New York Times walked off the job earlier this week in an ongoing unfair labor practice strike. The strike is the first NewsGuild-CWA work stoppage to coincide with a presidential election day in 60 years and the largest strike of tech workers in modern U.S. history.”

“Amazon workers in Alabama will decide for the third time in three years whether to unionize after a federal judge ruled that the retail giant improperly influenced the most recent vote in which employees rejected a union. Administrative law judge Michael Silverstein on Tuesday ordered the third vote for Amazon warehouse workers in Bessemer, Alabama, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) south of Birmingham, after determining that Amazon committed six violations leading up to the second election in March 2022. Amazon managers surveilled employees’ union activities and threatened workers with plant closure if they voted with the union, Silverstein said in an 87-page decision. Amazon managers also removed pro-union materials from areas where anti-union materials were available, the judge determined. The National Labor Relations Board also found improper interference in the first election in 2021, leading to the redo in 2022.”

“Intimacy coordinators have unanimously elected to unionize under the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. Members of the bargaining unit voted 100% in favor of unionization in an official election overseen by the National Labor Relations board, the union announced Tuesday. Intimacy coordinators are the professionals who help actors navigate scenes involving nudity, simulated sex and other sensitive scenarios on set.”

“Worker organizing has surged in recent years amid the highest levels of support for unions in decades. Petitions for union representation elections are up 27% at the National Labor Relations Board and have more than doubled since 2021 (NLRB 2024b). Workers are winning a higher share of elections than they have in years. Union membership has increased in each of the last two years (BLS 2024; Shierholz et al. 2024). Research shows that nearly half of nonunion workers would vote for a union at their workplace if given the opportunity (Shierholz et al. 2024). This conservatively translates into 60 million workers who would like union representation—a huge increase from the 14 million workers who are currently union members.”

“A labor union that represents thousands of hotel and food service workers at Disney World in Orlando has filed an official complaint against a Disney Springs contractor, alleging the Patina Restaurant Group illegally fired a young cashier. The complaint, formally known as an unfair labor practice charge, was filed …with the National Labor Relations Board on Nov. 6. It comes less than two weeks after the union, Unite Here Local 737, held a press conference, announcing that cashier and server Julie Ruiz, an employee of the Patina-owned Pizza Ponte eatery at Disney Springs, had been abruptly fired. The official reason, according to Ruiz, was that she walked into work last month wearing an earbud.”

“The International Longshoremen’s Association has broken off contract negotiations with East and Gulf Coast port employers, accusing them of pushing automation technology into a new coastwise labor pact that would eliminate union jobs. The ILA and employers represented by the United States Maritime Alliance this week resumed bargaining on a new six-year master contract covering 45,000 union workers involved in container handling at dozens of East and Gulf Coast ports.”

“Union leaders have a duty to tell members the truth about politics and how they affect our union. As the President of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, I did: I spent all of October and the first few days of November traveling through Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin to get out the vote for Vice President Kamala Harris.”

“Federal workers will continue to do their jobs regardless of who sits in the White House as they’re sworn to uphold the law and the Constitution. As the union representing more than 800,000 federal and D.C. government workers, AFGE will continue to represent our members and advocate for the programs and services that government employees deliver for the American people.”

“A unique support effort to provide yet another level of security for members of United Food & Commercial Workers Local 655 has been approved by an overwhelming vote of the union’s membership, President David Cook announced.”