Archive for April, 2008
AFL-CIO, Guatemalan Unions File Complaint for Violations of Labor Rights
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During the congressional debates over the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), the Bush administration repeatedly asserted the trade pact’s labor provisions were “world class, best ever” and that it would do much to strengthen labor protections and increase living conditions in the region. However, very little has changed in Guatemala. The at times violent suppression of workers for exercising their internationally recognized worker rights continues to be part of everyday life in Guatemala.
In an effort to vindicate their rights, the AFL-CIO and six Guatemalan unions filed a petition, the first of its kind, under the labor provisions of CAFTA with the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Trade & Labor Affairs. Click here to read the complaint.
The petition contains five cases. The first two concern the brutal murders of union leaders Pedro Zamora and Marco Tulio Ramirez, as well as ongoing threats against other leaders and union members. No serious investigation has been undertaken in either case and no one has been arrested or prosecuted for the crimes.
‘Death on the Job’ Report: More Workers Killed, Fewer Employer Penalties
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More workers are being killed on the job, but employers who are found to have violated federal safety laws in fatality cases are paying as little as $750 in penalties for each death, according to the latest edition of the AFL-CIO’s annual report Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect.
Released today, the 17th edition of the national and state-by-state profiles on worker safety and health in the United States reveals that in 2006, 5,840 workers died from workplace injuries, compared with 5,734 in 2005. The figures show a continued and significant increase in fatalities among Latino and foreign-born workers. The year 2006 is the most recent year for which U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures are available.
Justice Isn’t Blind. It’s Partisan
AFL-CIO Legal Counsel William Lurye describes a new AFL-CIO report that finds Republican-controlled courts regularly rule against workers’ rights.
The AFL-CIO has prepared a new report that examines the impact of Republican-controlled federal Courts of Appeals on unions and workers from 2001 through this year. Of the 109 cases workers and their unions won before the anti-worker National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the Courts of Appeals refused to enforce the NLRB’s decision in 88 of them. A copy of the report, The Impact of Republican-Appointed Judges: The Courts of Appeals’ Mistreatment of Union and Worker Success Before the NLRB, is available here.
Republican Minority Denies Women Equal Pay Rights
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One day after Equal Pay Day, a minority of primarily Republican senators once again made it harder for women workers to overcome pay discrimination.
The Senate failed to cut off debate on the Fair Pay Restoration Act (S. 1843) and bring the bill to the floor for a vote. The 56-42 margin fell four votes short of the 60 needed to end debate and vote on the bill. The House passed the legislation in July 2007. President Bush has threatened to veto the bill if passed by the Senate.
The legislation, also known as the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, would reverse a 2007 U.S. Supreme Court decision dismissing a suit by Lilly Ledbetter, an employee for 19 years at a Goodyear Tire plant in Alabama. Her suit alleged she was paid less than her male counterparts. (see video.)
New Report Shows True Cost of Shrimp to Workers
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Tasty shrimp comes with a high price tag—and in the $13 billion seafood processing industry, workers pay it. In a report released today, the Solidarity Center documents child labor, beatings and torture, sweatshop wages and hazardous working conditions in shrimp processing plants in Bangladesh and Thailand. Those two countries export $4 billion worth of shrimp sold in U.S. retail stores and restaurants such as Wal-Mart, Costco, Sysco, Harris Teeter, IGA, Trader Joe’s, Cub Foods, Giant, Long John Silver’s and Red Lobster.
The study, The True Cost of Shrimp, compares the abuses in the shrimp industry to sweatshop conditions in the apparel industry. Click here to read or download the report.
Every year, Americans eat more than 450,000 tons of shrimp, about three pounds for every man, woman and child in the country. Eighty percent of that shrimp is imported, with one-third coming from Thailand.
Standing Room Only for Labor Council Meetings on Health Care Reform
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From New York City to the Quad Cites on the Illinois/Iowa border, AFL-CIO central labor councils are getting the word out to local union leaders and activists that fixing our nation’s broken health care system promises to be a pivotal issue that spurs working families to the polls in November.
So far this month, more than 200 labor councils have dedicated their union meetings to helping local unions mobilize their members around health care reform for the coming elections. The turnout for these special sessions has been overwhelming. Most recently, some 300 union members turned out in Baltimore, 200 in New York City and the Quad City Federation of Labor saw a standing-room-only crowd.
Central labor councils also are getting strong commitments from local unions to join the union movement’s Labor 2008 mobilization to push working family issues to get the country on the right track and Turn Around America.
Ohio Union Members Ask McCain for Real Solutions
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As Arizona Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, travels across the country, he’s getting tough questions from union members who want real answers on what McCain will do to help working families.
AFL-CIO union members came out in force in Ohio yesterday, with nearly 60 union members and Working America members greeting McCain as he held a high-priced fundraiser in Toledo. More than 20 union activists turned out at a McCain event in Youngstown. (See video.)
Jaladah Aslam, an AFSCME member from the Youngstown area, pointed to McCain’s votes against overtime protections and his proposal to tax health benefits as reasons that he just doesn’t get it.
Strong Union Turnout in Pennsylvania Primary
Last night’s Democratic primary in Pennsylvania drew more than 2.3 million voters, continuing an election season of unprecedented turnout in the primary process. Union members came out strong. According to exit polls, 31 percent of voters in the Democratic primary were members of union households.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) defeated Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) 54.7 percent to 45.3 percent in a hotly contested race. Clinton won 59 percent of union households, and Obama won 41 percent of these voters, according to exit polls.
Gas Workers in New Mexico, Firefighters in Alabama and More Join AFL-CIO Unions
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Gas and electric utility workers in New Mexico and Arkansas, firefighters in Alabama, call center workers in Iowa, sports television employees in Minnesota and mechanics in California are among the latest workers to win a union voice at work.
In New Mexico, some 262 gas workers at Public Service New Mexico are now members of the Electrical Workers (IBEW) after voting to join IBEW Local 611. With the pending sale of the gas division to new owners with a track record of outsourcing work and cutting costs, workers turned to the union. As soon as they did, the new owner, Continental Energy Corp., turned to union-busters.
Women Don’t Ask? No, Employers Don’t Pay
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This is a cross-post by Ellen Bravo, former director of 9to5, National Association of Working Women and author of Taking on the Big Boys: Or Why Feminism Is Good for Families, Business and the Nation.
Congratulations, working women! As of today, your salary since January 1, 2007, has finally reached the total earned by your male colleagues in 2007 alone. What’s more, this pay gap is all your fault!
According to the media, the problem is that women just don’t ask. If we learned to speak up in salary negotiations, pay equity would be a hard fact.
An ABC News segment called the negotiation process “something that each of us has the ability to control….No employer has an obligation to whisper in the woman’s ear, ‘Hey, you know, you just lost out on more money because you didn’t speak up.’”
Stories like these leave out a few important realities: The majority of women work in jobs where they have no right whatsoever to negotiate for pay. Many are like Donna, a software developer whose employment agreement lists “discussing salary with colleagues” among “fire-able offenses.” Hard to know you’re making less than others if you’re not allowed to know what the others earn.
