Rosie and All the Riveters Honored at Long Beach Park
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At Rosie the Riveter Park in Long Beach, Calif., the final touches were recently put on the three-acre interpretive park and center honoring the women who worked at Long Beach’s Douglas Aircraft factory and other World War II defense industries.
The name “Rosie the Riveter” came to symbolize the millions of women who entered the World War II workforce and who were especially instrumental in the war industries—shipyards, munitions plants and airplane factories—that had been strictly male dominated. With millions of men in the armed services, women took over these vital jobs.
The Long Beach park features a winding, time-line walkway with dates and facts inscribed along the way. “April 1941-June 1942 Douglas Aircraft Long Beach workforce grows from 950 to 18,000,” says one entry. “1943 Douglas Aircraft sends ‘Victory Boy Scouts’ door-to-door to recruit plant workers. Housewives and 16-year-old boys offered four-hour ‘victory’ shifts,” says another.
Signs and photographs placed on poles along the walkway offer more details as well as comments from women who labored on the fighter-plane assembly line. “My third finger was numb for three years after operating a riveting gun,” Eva Lowe is quoted as saying.
Support Flower Workers This Mother’s Day
Today’s the deadline to show your solidarity with working mothers who cut and process the flowers we send on Mother’s Day.
Some 80 percent of the fresh-cut flowers sold in the United States come from Colombia, where most flower workers are women, who work long hours, especially before holidays like Mother’s Day and Valentine’s Day. They are paid poverty-level wages and face hazardous working conditions.
You can help these women by making a $35 donation ($20 student or low income) to U.S. Labor Education in the Americas Project’s (USLEAP’s) Flower Worker Economic Justice Project. USLEAP will send a card to the mother of your choice with a personalized message inside, letting her know that you made a donation in her honor.
Equal Pay Day: Women Still Paid Less than Men
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Today is Equal Pay Day—the date that symbolizes how far into 2011 women must work to earn what men earned in 2010.
Nearly 50 years after enactment of the Equal Pay Act, working women in the United States are paid an average of 80 cents for every dollar paid to men. The pay gap is even larger for women of color, with black women earning about 70 cents, and Latinas about 60 cents, of every dollar paid to all men.
U.S. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said in a statement marking Equal Pay Day:
When women start at a disadvantage, they stay at a disadvantage. Every time a woman starts a new job or tries to negotiate for a pay raise, she is starting from a lower base salary. So, the pay gap grows wider and wider over time.
The Labor Department reports the pay gap for the average, full-time working woman means she gets $150 less in her weekly paycheck. If she works all year, that’s $8,000 less at the end of the year and about $380,000 over a lifetime.
International Women’s Day: U.S., South African Union Women Share Strategies
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The problems facing working women extend across national boundaries, and today, International Women’s Day, women organizers on opposite sides of the world shared ideas and inspiration. In a live teleconference, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler and four young women organizers in the United States talked with a roomful of women organizers in Johannesburg, South Africa. Shuler began by saying:
With the global jobs crisis increasing unemployment…young workers, young women workers entering the workforce struggle to find decent work. Given the challenges facing young women workers around the world, the AFL-CIO, ITUC [International Trade Union Confederation] and [the South African trade union federations] hope to use International Women’s Day as a way to shine a spotlight on the important role unions can play in the lives of young women workers.
Organizers in both countries spoke about rising unemployment and precarious work as key challenges to organizing women workers. Unemployment among women around the world is growing. In a special report, “Living with Economic Insecurity: Women in Precarious Work,” the ITUC found that while the initial impact of the crisis was equally detrimental to men and women, increasing numbers of women are now either losing their jobs or being forced into temporary and informal forms of work. To read the full report, click here.
Report: Unions Must Open Up Opportunities for Women, Young Workers
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All the growth in union membership since 2000 has been among women, Latinos and part-time employees, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. So how can the union movement attract the next generation of working women and younger workers? A new report says unions must become more diverse and open up more opportunities for young workers and women in leadership or they will move on to other social justice organizations.
The report, “Stepping Up, Stepping Back: Women Talk Union Across Generations,” details frank discussions in March among 30 women invited to a two-day women’s summit in New Orleans and sponsored by the Berger-Marks Foundation.
While acknowledging the significant gains for women in the workplace made possible by unions and the growing diversity in the union movement, the report urges unions to do even more to become more open.
Sharan Burrow Becomes First Woman to Lead ITUC
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Delegates to the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) Congress in Vancouver late last week made history by electing Sharan Burrow as general secretary. She becomes the first woman to lead the world’s largest trade union federation.
Burrow succeeds Guy Ryder, who has accepted the post of deputy general secretary of the International Labor Organization (ILO). Since 2000, Burrow has served as president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), a post she will now give up. She was elected president of ITUC in 2004, becoming the first woman to hold that post. Michael Sommer of Germany will succeed her as ITUC president.
47 Years After Equal Pay Act, Women Still Paid Less Than Men
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Forty-seven years after President Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act, women still are not being paid the same as men for equivalent work. On average, women earn about 78 cents for every dollar earned by men. For women of color, African American women and Latinas, the gap is even wider. According to the most recent data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median wages of full-time, year-round workers in 2008 stood at $35,745 for women and $46,367 for men. That’s $10,622 less per year for women and their families in a difficult economy.
The U.S. Senate is considering the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would give employees the tools they need to close the wage gap between men and women and provide the government with enforcement power to correct pay inequities. The U.S. House passed the bill last year. The advocacy group MomsRising has an action here to urge your senator to close the wage gap and back the Paycheck Fairness Act.
International Women’s Day, March 8: Time to Recommit to Equal Rights
Women make up more than half the American workforce and are approaching half of union members. On International Women’s Day, March 8, the AFL-CIO is recommitting itself to continue the struggle for equal rights, dignity and respect for all working women.
This past week, the AFL-CIO Executive Council pointed out that much needs to be done for women workers to gain equal footing. For example, the council cites a United Nations report, which shows the majority of the world’s 1.3 billion absolute poor are women. On average, women receive between 30 percent and 40 percent less pay than men earn for the same work. Women also continue to be victims of violence, with rape and domestic violence listed as significant causes of disability and death among women worldwide.
One Year After Ledbetter: Work Still Needed on Pay Equity
One year ago today, working people celebrated a milestone in the battle for pay equity when the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act was signed into law.
The law corrected the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision that Ledbetter, a 20-year employee of the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co., had sued too late when she discovered her pay was far below that of men doing similar work. President Obama signed the bill into law Jan. 29, 2009.
In observance of the anniversary, Ledbetter, writing on Alternet, said there is still work to do:
We need to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act. This bill gives teeth to the protections against pay discrimination. And women, who are still shortchanged in the workplace, deserve just that. The bill would empower women to negotiate for equal pay, create stronger incentives for employers to follow the law, and strengthen federal outreach and enforcement efforts. It would also strengthen penalties for equal pay violations.
Today: International Day for Elimination of Violence Against Women
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Today is United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. Around the globe, workers are saying “No” to violence against women.
Although we often limit discussions on violence against women to domestic violence, it also is a human rights issue and a workplace issue, experts say.
Millions of women work in insecure, temporary, unsafe, underpaid and unpaid jobs. They are subjected to sexual harassment, abuse and rape. According to the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), certain types of work situations increase these threats, such as when women travel for their work or migrate to find work or are employed as domestic workers.
AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler says in a statement:
Violence against women is a global problem that affects women of all ages, ethnicities, races, nationalities and socioeconomic backgrounds. It is also a workplace issue. Power imbalances in workplaces and the precarious employment conditions of many women increase their risk of being victims of sexual harassment, abuse and rape.
