LABOR AND TECHNOLOGY
The Lesson for Employers at the Center of Hollywood's AI Standoff
Time
By Michelle Peng
Sept. 12, 2023
Amanda Ballantyne, the director of the AFL-CIO Technology Institute, argues that there’s one key reason worker voice should drive technology adoption: “We think of workers as experts in technology because they’re the end users.” That on-the-ground experience gives them valuable knowledge about which tools make their jobs better and which just waste their time, she explains. It’s a sentiment echoed by University of Pennsylvania professor Ethan Mollick in a recent essay: “The innovation groups and strategy councils inside organizations can dictate policy, but they can’t figure out how to use AI to actually get work, only the workers, experts at their own jobs, know that,” he writes.
JOINING TOGETHER
Metro Transit workers vote to authorize strike
MPR News
By Tim Nelson
Sept. 12, 2023
Hundreds of members of the union that represents Metro Transit workers in the Twin Cities have authorized a strike as contract negotiations continue with the agency. Talks between Metro Transit and Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1005 have been underway for more than a month. They started before the previous contract expired on Aug. 1. ATU Local 1005 said 94 percent of members voted in favor of authorizing a strike in balloting held Sunday and Monday. The vote doesn’t mean there will be a work stoppage yet — but it does empower the union’s leaders to call a strike if they deem it necessary.
UAW Threatens Strikes at Certain Auto Plants if It Can’t Reach Labor Deals
The Wall Street Journal
By Ryan Felton and Nora Eckert
Sept. 12, 2023
The United Auto Workers union plans to hold targeted strikes at certain U.S. auto factories if it can’t reach new labor deals with Detroit automakers by late Thursday, an unusual strategy that could broadly disrupt assembly-line production. In a video call with leaders of union locals Tuesday, UAW President Shawn Fain rolled out the work-stoppage plans, which also call for the actions to escalate the longer the union goes without a new contract agreement, including picketing more plants, according to people familiar with the presentation. If an agreement doesn’t look likely, UAW officials intend to announce which factories will go on strike late Thursday, within hours of when the union’s current contracts with the car companies are set to expire, the people said.
Hundreds of Hormel workers will start voting whether to approve new contract
KARE 11
By Jennifer Hoff
Sept. 12, 2023
Starting on Wednesday, hundreds of Hormel meatpackers at the Austin, Minnesota plant will start voting on a new contract. It's all happening in a city that went through a similar situation in the 1980's that was largely regarded as the "strike of the decade". "I wish every worker could just stand-up and realize that we’re the ones that make the profit," said Dale Chidester, a former employee. "They wouldn’t be able to sell anything if it wasn’t something that we make." Their current contract expired on Sunday and the workers will spend Wednesday and Thursday voting on Hormel's latest offer. The UFCW says it expects results by Friday morning and that workers will decide what's next after that.
IN THE STATES
Paid parental leave extended for Travis County employees from 8 to 12 weeks
KVUE
By Jenni Lee
Sept. 12, 2023
Travis County employees will now receive 12 weeks of paid parental leave, effective immediately. On Tuesday, the Travis County Commissioners Court approved expanding the program from eight weeks to 12 weeks. The move follows an identical one made in May 2022, when the court first approved the eight-week paid parental leave. Emily Amps with Texas AFL-CIO said Travis County is doing the right thing. According to Amps, 80% of workers in the United States do not have access to paid parental leave. "Studies show when parental leave policies are in place, there is a 20% reduction in the number of female employees leaving their jobs in the first year after giving birth and up to 50% after five years," Amps said.