Today's AFL-CIO press clips
MUST READ
MarketWatch
By Aarthi Swaminathan
Aug. 9, 2024
“Today, the very CEOs who benefited most from Trump’s tax gift to the wealthy are making 268 times what their workers are making. And while corporate profits and stock prices surge, working people’s wages aren’t keeping up,” Fred Redmond, secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO, said in a statement.
POLITICS
Harris Leads Trump in Three Key States, Times/Siena Polls Find
The New York Times
By Lisa Lerer and Ruth Igielnik
Aug. 10, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris leads former President Donald J. Trump in three crucial battleground states, according to new surveys by The New York Times and Siena College, the latest indication of a dramatic reversal in standing for Democrats after President Biden’s departure from the presidential race remade it. Ms. Harris is ahead of Mr. Trump by four percentage points in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, 50 percent to 46 percent among likely voters in each state. The surveys were conducted from Aug. 5 to 9.
Harris and Walz speak at campaign event in Las Vegas, Nevada
PBS News
By Rio Yamat and Josh Boak
Aug. 10, 2024
“The path to victory runs through Nevada,” the union said in a statement, “and the Culinary Union will deliver Nevada for President Kamala Harris and Vice President Tim Walz.”
Actors’ Equity Is Latest Union to Back Kamala Harris
Variety
By Gene Maddaus
Aug. 9, 2024
Actors’ Equity Association joined numerous other unions Friday in endorsing Kamala Harris for president, citing her record of support for labor issues. The union represents 51,000 actors and stage managers who work in live entertainment. Its legislative priorities include the PRO Act, which would make it easier for unions to organize, and the Performing Artist Tax Parity Act, which would restore income tax deductions for performers’ business expenses.
Jocelyn Woodards Delegate To The Democratic National Convention 2024
Heart & Soul
By Staff
Aug. 7, 2024
You are a delegate during this election cycle. What does it mean to you? I originally became a delegate to support Joe Biden against a possible 2nd Trump term which would essentially be the end of the “democratic experiment” in the United States. Now that Kamala Harris is the democratic nominee my level of excitement (along with millions of others) is through the roof! We can make history and move this experiment in democracy forward at the same time! I am so excited to make Kamala Harris the first woman of color to become President of the United States!
Biden’s White House has tried to boost unions. The election could change that.
NBC News
By Davis Giangiulio
Aug. 10, 2024
“Biden has been pretty forward with his thought that he wants to be the most pro-union president in history, and I think that actually has kind of taken place,” said Joel White lawyer who advises employers in labor matters at Fox Rothschild. Before joining the law firm in 2022, White worked for a decade at a regional NLRB field office under the Obama, Trump and Biden administrations. The agency’s current approach, he said, marked “the biggest swing thus far.”
In Las Vegas, Kamala Harris sees a chance to improve her odds of winning
Las Vegas Sun
By Associated Press
Aug. 10, 2024
But the union representing 60,000 workers in that industry, the Culinary Workers Union, announced Friday night its endorsement of Harris. About 54% of the union's members are Latino, 55% women and 60% immigrants. “The path to victory runs through Nevada,” the union said in a statement, “and the Culinary Union will deliver Nevada for President Kamala Harris and Vice President Tim Walz.”
Election Highlights: Harris and Walz Rally in Las Vegas to End Their Introductory Tour
The New York Times
By Chris CameronMichael Gold and Simon J. Levien
Aug. 11, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, campaigned in Las Vegas on Saturday night, the final stop on their introductory tour of battleground states that began in Philadelphia on Tuesday. Earlier on Saturday, new polls by The New York Times and Siena College showed Ms. Harris ahead of former President Donald J. Trump by four percentage points in the critical battlegrounds of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan. The surveys of likely voters in each state were conducted from Aug. 5 to 9.
PAYWATCH/CEO PAY
Pay Day: Corporate executives earned 268 times more than their employees’ pay (Subscription only, no sharable link)
Politico Pro
Aug. 9, 2024
S&P 500 CEOs make more than 268 times their median worker’s income
Quartz
By William Gavin
Aug. 8, 2024
It would take more than five career lifetimes for workers to earn what S&P 500 index chief executive officers earn in just one year, according to a new report from the AFL-CIO. “Years of poor policy decisions have favored large corporations at the expense of working people and allowed corporate executives to game the system for their own gain,” AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond said in a statement, as he reiterated the union’s support for Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign.
Which Minnesota companies have the largest pay inequality — and other labor news
Minnesota Reformer
By Max Nesterak
Aug. 9, 2024
The AFL-CIO has a searchable database of CEO-to-worker pay ratios for all public companies, which are required to disclose the data under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. The AFL-CIO, a federation of labor unions representing some 12.5 million workers, calculated that the average CEO pay at companies listed on the S&P 500 was $17.7 million, 268 times the typical worker in 2023. That’s down from the average pay ratio of 272-to-1 in 2022 and 324-to-1 in 2021. Low-wage workers have recently seen their incomes increase for the first time in decades, which has chipped away at inequality. Between 2019 and 2023, real wages of low-wage workers rose 13.2%, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Utah cosmetics firm pays CEO 10,377 times what its workers make
People’s World
By Mark Gruenberg
Aug. 9, 2024
As labor and its allies battle to defeat Donald Trump, the candidate of the billionaires, and elect Kamala Harris, endorsed by the nation’s major unions, the AFL-CIO Paywatch report just issued shows why the electoral fight against billionaire power is so important. In a horrifying example of corporate greed, Provo, Utah-based Nu Skin Cosmetics topped the AFL-CIO’s annual Paywatch report by paying its CEO last year 10,377 times what its median worker made. That ratio is so huge, said the federation’s Secretary-Treasurer, Fred Redmond, that the worker would have to start toiling for Nu Skin from “before the invention of writing” thousands of years ago through now to equal the $5.87 million CEO Ryan Napierski took home last year in compensation.
ORGANIZING
Shelter Workers at Do Good Multnomah Seek Union Representation
Willamette Week
By Anthony Effinger
Aug. 9, 2024
Employees at Do Good Multnomah are asking the nonprofit shelter operator to recognize a newly formed union, saying they need representation to push for better safety protocols and guaranteed leave time made necessary by trauma inflicted on the job. “The amount of near and actual death we encounter as front-line workers for Do Good is cumulative and takes a massive toll on our mental health,” Kelli Schaefer, a case manager at Do Good’s Roseway shelter said in a statement. “We need a protocol surrounding traumatic events, so that the burden of having to choose between self-care and a loss of income, doesn’t fall on an already taxed nervous system.” A majority of Do Good’s 270 workers signed union authorization cards and asked Do Good to voluntarily recognize the new union, according to the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Workers, which is organizing the workers. If Do Good refuses, union cards will be sent to the National Labor Relations Board next week to trigger an election, AFSCME said.
Bookmans workers file petition to unionize
KOLD
By 13 News Staff
Aug. 9, 2024
Workers at Bookmans Entertainment Exchange’s East location on Speedway and Wilmot filed a petition for representation with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), taking the first step towards forming a union. Seeking to be represented by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW) Local 99, the Tucson-area bookstore workers would become the first in their industry to unionize, pending a successful NLRB election. The board is expected to issue an election date in the coming weeks.
I Helped Organize An Architect's Union
The Progressive Magazine
By Chris Beck
Aug. 10, 2024
Unionization in design industries is approaching a tipping point. In July, three different sectors achieved major victories for the labor movement. At Blizzard, a video game developer where other members have already unionized, more than 500 employees formed a “wall-to-wall” union. Workers at the Apple Store in Towson, Maryland—the first such store to unionize at the world’s most famous design company—ratified their first contract. And finally, my colleagues and I at Bernheimer Architecture (BA) ratified the first collectively bargained contract at a private-sector architecture office.
N.M. School for the Deaf educators start a new school year with union representation
Santa Fe New Mexican
By Margaret O'Hara
Aug. 11, 2024
It was a tough choice, Jesse Crespin said. As New Mexico School for the Deaf's lead residential night attendant, it's his job to ensure students sleep well in the on-campus dorms. But throughout the 2023-24 school year, Crespin faced a choice that mostly affected the school's adults: whether to unionize staff. "The more and more I talked to my co-workers, the more and more I realized that this was the best choice," Crespin said. The New Mexico Public Employee Labor Relations Board on Aug. 6 voted to ratify the results of a union card check for the school's staff, finding majority support establishing a branch of the American Federation of Teachers-New Mexico. The school did not object to the card check.
Hospital employees in Heppner unionize
East Oregonian
By Tori Schuller
Aug. 11, 2024
Nurses and technical support workers at Pioneer Memorial Hospital in Heppner have joined the Oregon Nurses Association. Nurses and technicians in x-ray, lab and radiology announced their interest to unionize in March, which the state and the hospital would have to recognize, according to a press release from the Oregon Nurses Association. Since Pioneer Memorial Hospital is a public hospital and not federal, it was required the hospital go through the state. If the hospital was federal, it would have had to go through the National Labor Relations Board.
More Texans join unions although national membership is down
KRGV
By Juan Salinas II
Aug. 10, 2024
About a year ago, Soleil Baker noticed their coworkers weren’t getting enough hours. Many of them struggled to pay rent and buy groceries. Baker decided it was time to take action. “I just wanted everyone to be able to afford to live,” they said. A barista at the Starbucks in this small North Texas town, about 15 miles northwest of Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, contacted Starbucks Workers United, the national union for Starbucks workers, and asked for more information about how to start a union. Two months later after getting enough worker signatures to force a vote, Baker and about 20 other employees formed a union. They were among 68,000 Texans who joined a union in 2023, an increase from 2022. This uptick was fueled by workers in the technology and nonprofit sectors — as well as coffee shops. In total, there are about 586,000 union workers in Texas, a fraction of the millions who work here. And yet, the increase is somewhat remarkable given the state's long history of hostility toward unions. And nationwide, union membership dipped during the same time.
NEGOTIATIONS & STRIKES
After Walkout, Crooked Media Union Reaches Tentative Deal With ‘Pod Save America’ Company
The Hollywood Reporter
By Katie Kilkenny
Aug. 9, 2024
After a rocky final stretch of negotiations, the union representing staff members at Crooked Media and the progressive media company behind Pod Save America have reached a tentative contract agreement. The labor group and management jointly announced their provisional deal, which is still subject to ratification, on Friday. “We’re delighted to have agreed on a contract that we all feel reflects the values of Crooked Media and that can serve as a new benchmark for our industry,” the parties stated. “Bargaining can be contentious, but we’re excited about this agreement and ready to channel the immense talent, passion, and creativity of this team into calling JD Vance a creepy weirdo.”
Another set of American Airlines flight attendants are weighing a strike
Quartz
By Melvin Backman
Aug. 9, 2024
A group of American Airlines (AAL) flight attendants are calling a strike authorization vote. The workers are employed by PSA Airlines, a regional carrier that’s part of American’s American Eagle network. Represented by the Association of Flight Attendants, they say a wage proposal given to them by the company doesn’t match what they’re seeing at larger airlines and leaves many of them struggling to pay bills. “Flight Attendants at PSA and other regional airlines across the industry are fighting to end tiers in aviation,” said AFA president Sara Nelson in a statement accompanying the announcement. “PSA Flight Attendants wear the same uniforms, fly the same routes, and perform the same service as mainline Flight Attendants. But airlines leave them behind in compensation and benefits.”
Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners reach labor deal with government workers' unions
WEMU
By Kevin Meerschaert
Aug. 9, 2024
The Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners approved a new collective bargaining agreements with its AFSCME unions this week, but not without some late drama. It has started off well as Locals 2733 and 3052 has already ratified the three-year contracts that include 2-3% pay increases each year, years of service bonuses, and an increase in employer HSA contributions.
State labor unions, McKee Administration reach tentative 3-year contract agreements
WJAR
By NBC 10 NEWS
Aug. 9, 2024
The state and unions representing thousands of state workers finalized negotiations and signed a three-year tentative agreement that includes wage increase and savings in health care. Officials said the unions in the agreement are the Rhode Island Council 94, American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and the Coalition.
San Francisco Hotel Workers Vote 'Yes' to Potential Strike
KQED
By Farida Jhabvala Romero
Aug. 10, 2024
Thousands of San Francisco hotel workers authorized their union Friday to call a strike as early as next week, joining other industry employees in several cities who also approved potential walkouts as contract negotiations with large employers have yet to produce a deal. The hospitality union Unite Here could hold a work stoppage after Aug. 14, when contracts covering 3,000 employees at eight Marriott, Hyatt and Hilton hotels in downtown San Francisco expire. The strike authorization vote passed with 94% support, according to the union, which represents housekeepers, bellmen, dishwashers, bartenders and other workers. Lizzy Tapia, president of Unite Here Local 2, said the union and the hotels remain far apart in negotiations on increases in wages and staffing levels, which the union argues management keeps too low, even when there is a surge of guests.
Hawaii hotel workers voted by an overwhelming 94% to authorize strike at 7 Waikiki hotels (Video)
Hawaii News Now
By Staff
Aug. 8, 2024
5,000 unionized hotel workers in Waikiki voted to authorize a strike at seven hotels on Thursday, according to Unite Here Local 5 members.
Animation Guild Fires Up Members at Pre-Negotiations Rally: “We’re Going to Win Our Industry Back”
The Hollywood Reporter
By Katie Kilkenny
Aug. 10, 2024
Animation workers and supporters argued that recent technological and business shifts have left their craft hanging in the balance during a packed union rally in Burbank on Saturday, with one speaker positing that “the American animation industry is at stake.” The Animation Guild (IATSE Local 839) organized the event before it heads into bargaining over a new three-year contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers that will tackle hot-button issues like AI and outsourcing. Gathering at the parking lot of IATSE Local 80 in sweltering, mid-80-degree heat, attendees heard from guild leaders, local politicians, rank-and-file workers and a few boldfaced names (director Guillermo del Toro sent a rallying cry, telling the workers to “fight like hell”), who emphasized the urgency and stakes of this year’s talks.
SPORTS UNIONIZATION
NWSL and NWSLPA agree terms on new collective bargaining agreement
The New York Times
By Meg Linehan
Aug. 9, 2024
The National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) and the NWSL Players Association have agreed terms on a new long-term collective bargaining agreement, confirmed to The Athletic by a source with knowledge of the negotiations who was not authorized to speak publicly on the deal. Players plan to announce the new deal later this month.
WORKPLACE SAFETY AND HEALTH
Heat killed a sanitation worker. Pending safety rules may have saved him.
The Washington Post
By Scott Dance
Aug. 10, 2024
Four days after a Baltimore sanitation worker died of overheating, the city halted trash collection for a day so pickup crews could attend a heat safety training session. It was so urgent, they made the class mandatory and offered free rides to get there. Such education would have been required under a workplace heat stress policy likely to take effect in Maryland this year, after clearing final bureaucratic hurdles. And though unions hoped the rules would have been final months ago, they were not in place when Ronald Silver II, 36, passed out on the job on Aug. 2, weeks after inspector general reports showed mounting evidence that city trash workers like him received little relief from scorching temperatures, and lacked access to cold water, ice and air conditioning. Maryland is poised to become just the sixth state to adopt heat protections for workers.
Oregon State Hospital nurses raise safety fears as they work mandatory overtime
Jefferson Public Radio
By Ben Botkin
Aug. 11, 2024
The union that represents registered nurses at Oregon State Hospital has filed more than 200 grievances in the past month. Maggie Simpkins starts her workweek at 6:30 a.m. Sundays at Oregon State Hospital, where the registered nurse dispenses medication to patients, goes over their treatment plans and maps out the day’s schedule, including appointments, meals and care.
Her shift is supposed to end at 5 p.m. But most Sundays, Simpkins has to work mandatory overtime, which can stretch until about 10 p.m.
LABOR AND COMMUNITY
Labor unions, nonprofit build beds for Louisville children in need
Spectrum News
By Tyler O'neill
Aug. 11, 2024
The west Louisville chapter of Sleep in Heavenly Peace and local labor unions helped build 50 beds for students who don’t have their own, with nearly 50 volunteers making it possible. IBEW 369 was one of six different labor unions participating in the build. Over the local chapter of Sleep in Heavenly Peace's six-year lifespan, it has created about 1,000 beds.
UNION BUSTING
Dallas Black Dance Theatre has fired its entire company of dancers, according to union
KERA News
By Elizabeth Myong
Aug. 10, 2024
Dallas Black Dance Theatre terminated its entire company of dancers on Friday, according to a statement posted on social media by the labor union representing the dancers. A national organizer for the union confirmed Saturday that nine dancers were impacted. The surprise move comes months after the dancers had formed a union to negotiate with the company’s management.