MUST READ
Panel: Unions are the road to good jobs for Black workers
People’s World
By Mark Gruenberg
Feb. 22, 2023
There was one big agreement by a panel of top Labor Department officials, union leaders, and rank-and-file Black workers: Unions are the road to a decent standard of living and good jobs for Black Americans and critical to the struggle to overcome the impact of centuries of ingrained racism in the U.S. And, added AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond, federal law should ban contracts from firms “which engage in union-busting.”
LABOR AND ECONOMY
How the Fed can close the racial wealth gap: AFL-CIO’s William Spriggs (Video)
CNBC
By Macklin Fishman and Lindsey Jacobson
Feb. 22, 2023
AFL-CIO chief economist and Howard University economics professor William Spriggs says that the impact of discrimination against Black employees is less acute when the labor market operates at full employment. He tells CNBC how the Federal Reserve can close the racial wealth gap and how an economic slowdown might affect Black workers.
JOINING TOGETHER
4 million days of strikes: Why so many workers walked out in 2022
Fast Company
By Kristin Toussaint
Feb. 22, 2023
There may be only 365 days in a year, but workers collectively were on strike for nearly 4,500,000 days in 2022, according to new research from the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations. That figure comes from the Cornell-ILR Labor Action Tracker annual report, which looks at strike and work-stoppage activity across the country.
Maui and Lānaʻi hospital workers strike after rejecting new contract
Hawaii Public Radio
By HPR News Staff
Feb. 22, 2023
After about eight months of negotiations, hundreds of Maui County hospital employees walked out on Wednesday morning to show their dissatisfaction with Maui Health's proposed contract agreement. United Public Workers AFSCME, Local 646, and AFL-CIO represent the workers and said their members voted by almost a 98% majority to authorize the strike at Maui Memorial Medical Center, Kula Hospital and Lānaʻi Community Hospital. Maui Health is affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.
House cafeteria workers eyeing pickets, walkouts if contract talks sour
Roll Call
By Jim Saksa
Feb. 22, 2023
If contract negotiations with dining services operator Sodexo don’t improve, the union representing House cafeteria and catering workers expects some representatives, staff and visitors may have to skip lunch at some point later this year. “We expect to probably have to do the kind of actions ... on the House side like we did on the Senate,” said D. Taylor, president of Unite Here, the union that represents House dining workers.
NLRB
WGA East Files Third Unfair Labor Practices Charge Against Hearst Magazines Media
Deadline
By David Robb
Feb. 22, 2023
After two years of collective bargaining, the WGA East has filed another unfair labor practices charge against Hearst Magazines Media – this time for giving employees a raise while in contract negotiations with the guild. The guild, which says that this violates federal labor law, represents some 500 of the publishing giant’s editorial, video, design and photo staff at more than 25 brands, including Esquire, Cosmopolitan, Harper’s Bazaar, Town & Country, Good Housekeeping, Popular Mechanics, Car & Driver, Oprah Daily, Seventeen, Elle, Redbook and Woman’s Day. The complaint, filed today with the National Labor Relations Board, claims that “Within the last six months, the employer unilaterally implemented a wage increase for bargaining unit employees while it is in negotiations for a collective bargaining agreement with the charging party.”
LABOR AND COMMUNITY
Thomas Donahue, Influential Leader of Organized Labor, Dies at 94
The New York Times
By Robert D. McFadden
Feb. 19, 2023
Thomas R. Donahue, the second in command to Lane Kirkland, president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. for 16 years, and briefly his interim successor in an era of relentless union membership declines and diminished influence by organized labor in American life, died on Saturday in Washington, D.C. He was 94.
CIVIL, HUMAN, AND WOMEN’S RIGHTS
Actors' Equity Association Report Reveals 'Progress Towards Diversity and Equity' in 2021
Broadway World
By Chloe Rabinowitz
Feb. 22, 2023
Actors' Equity Association has published Progress During an Atypical Year: Hiring Bias and Wage Gaps in Theatre in 2021. The latest installment in Equity's series of Hiring Bias and Wage Gaps reports, this document examines employment opportunity and average salaries for members of the union in 2021. This report found that the industry may be making progress towards diversity and equity in union jobs for stage managers and actors. "Transforming our industry is a group project, as well as a long game; it's urgent that we continue to collectively rededicate ourselves to this work," said Kate Shindle, president of Actors' Equity Association. "It's my hope that the data presented here will inspire all of us working for change to consider how we can level the playing field within our own spheres of influence."