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In the News
Frozen feud: How Trump and the Supreme Court helped put historic Whole Foods union bid on ice
October 7, 2025 // John Kruzel, Daniel Wiessner for Reuters
When the NLRB will regain members depends on how quickly the Republican-led U.S. Senate moves to confirm two nominees picked by Trump in July, Boeing's chief labor counsel and an NLRB career staffer. A Senate committee is set to hold hearings on Trump's nominees on Wednesday. An NLRB spokesman did not respond to a request for comment about the delays. William Cowen, the board's acting general counsel, in an August press release addressing efforts in several states to pass new labor protections said the agency's work has "largely been unaffected" by the lack of quorum.
Labor Law Reform Part 1: Diagnosing the Issues, Exploring Current Proposals
October 7, 2025 // author for Senate Health Education Labor and Pensions Committee
Boeing St. Louis to train permanent replacements as machinists strike enters third month
October 6, 2025 // James Drew for St. Louis Business Journal)
The company announced Sept. 4 that it was starting the process to hire permanent replacement workers for manufacturing jobs to replace union members who have been on strike at the three defense plants in the St. Louis area for 60 days. The International Association of Machinists Union District 837 has about 3,200 members who manufacture munitions, assemble fighter jets and other aircrafts and make composite parts for the Boeing 777X commercial aircraft.
AI Needs Data Centers—and People to Build Them
October 6, 2025 // Mark P. Mills for City Journal
That brings us to the second tool for expanding the skilled workforce: convincing more people to pursue a career in the trades. Here, policymakers should tap into the vast potential workforce among young men released from prison for nonviolent offenses by expanding inmates’ access to vocational education. Only a small fraction of this group currently receives such training. And to train more would-be tradesmen in general, we need to make training more effective—and more interesting. Technology can help here, too. Leading construction-equipment makers already use virtual reality and augmented-reality systems for their training simulators. Tests show VR training significantly improves users’ training-completion and employment outcomes.
Pratt & Whitney Employee Slams IAM Union With Federal Charges For Imposing Illegal Post-Strike Discipline
October 6, 2025 // author for National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation
Union officials insulted worker for wanting to resign membership and keep working, incorrectly told workers P&W was “closed shop”
Commentary: Trump gave the Labor Department more control over career-technical education. Will students benefit?
October 6, 2025 // Kalyn Belsha for Chalkbeat
In May, Trump officials signed an interagency agreement that maintains the Education Department’s oversight authority for career-technical education, but hands over the day-to-day operations to the Labor Department. That includes distributing over $1 billion to states in Perkins funding, which pays for CTE programs in K-12 schools and community colleges, making compliance monitoring visits, and helping states and schools with technical questions. High-ranking Democrats in Congress have said this transfer of funds and responsibilities is illegal, and the proposal should have gone to Congress. Others in the career and technical education field say the Education and Labor Departments already work closely together and this move isn’t necessary to improve collaboration.
Santa Ana Councilman Calls on State Attorney General to Probe Police Union Spending
October 6, 2025 // Hosam Elattar for Voice of the OC
Santa Ana City Councilman Ben Vazquez is calling on the State’s Attorney General Rob Bonta to thoroughly probe how Santa Ana’s police union spent taxpayer dollars over the last decade to see if there has been any misuse of public dollars. It comes as the city’s police department faced a host of accountability questions this past summer and as city officials brace for an expected deficit in a couple years that city staff project will be tens of millions of dollars deep. Vazquez says he is requesting the investigation after a city audit found officials overpaid $3.4 million for officers’ health benefit plans in 2023 despite the union’s health benefits account operating at over $608,000 deficit.
Milford MA cancer nurses seek election to unionize. Why that can’t happen right now
October 5, 2025 // Norman Miller for The Milford Daily News
Registered nurses at the Dana-Farber Brigham Cancer Center at Milford Regional Medical Center are seeking to unionize. The effort has been delayed because the National Labor Relations Board is closed due to a government shutdown.
85% of Americans Want Union Transparency. Connecticut’s Labor Dept Says No
October 5, 2025 // Meghan Portfolio for Yankee Institute
Connecticut tried to close that gap. The state enacted Conn. Gen. Stat. §31-77, requiring any union with more than 25 members to file verified annual financial reports with the CTDOL. The statute’s intent is straightforward: protect workers from abuse, make sure dues were spent responsibly, and give members the right to demand audits. Yet the safeguard has little force today. In an Aug. 8 letter to state Senators Stephen Harding (R-Brookfield) and Rob Sampson (R-Wolcott), Labor Commissioner Danté Bartolomeo described §31-77 statute as “redundant” and “burdensome” — and announced the department’s decision not to enforce it. That choice effectively renders the law optional.
Op-ed: When Workers Have Other Options: Rethinking Power in the Multi-Earner Economy
October 5, 2025 // Liya Palagashvili for Labor Market Matters
Well, monopsony is the flip side: when one (or just a few) buyers dominate a market. In labor markets, that “buyer” is your employer. And when employers have monopsony power, they can pay you less than what your work is actually worth—because where else are you going to go? Here’s the thing: you don’t need to live in a company town with one employer to experience monopsony power. It happens if the cost of leaving your job is too high. Maybe you need the health insurance.
Commentary: California Teachers’ Union Ruins an Earnest Effort to Confront Antisemitism
October 5, 2025 // Will Swaim for National Review
In its July letter opposing the assembly measure, the CTA makes it clear that its highest priority isn’t the education of students. It’s about progressive politics. The letter opens with a prefabricated declaration that the union is (of course) “firmly committed to schools that are free of racism, sexism, religious and gender discrimination.” The implied “but” arrives promptly: “We are also concerned with academic freedom and the ability of educators to ensure that instruction include perspectives and materials that reflect the cultural and ethnic diversity of all of California’s students.”
Republicans invite Teamsters president to testify on labor laws
October 5, 2025 // author for Fox Business
Cassidy’s invitation comes after the Teamsters’ decision in September 2024 not to endorse a presidential candidate – the first time the union did so since 1996 – and follows O’Brien’s remarks at last year's Republican National Convention, the first time in history that the organization’s leader addressed the RNC. The hearing, which is set to take place next Wednesday, as well as O'Brien’s invitation to it, is emblematic of the GOP’s slow crawl toward embracing parts of a working-class union message that would have turned heads even half a decade ago.
Commentary: Next BLS head needs be an innovator, not a loyalist
October 5, 2025 // Sean Higgins for Competitive Enterprise Institute
BLS’s monthly jobs numbers now regularly include adjustments in excess of 100,000 jobs to prior months’ reported results, thanks to late survey responses trickling in. On top of that, technological innovations like rideshare apps have created new categories of jobs where it is unclear how, or even if, BLS data accounts for them. There simply has to be a better, more innovative way to gather data. Given the need for important and significant changes, the top job at BLS therefore needs to go to an economist committed to getting the data right the first time, who can withstand withering scrutiny and is not beholden to “That’s how we have always done it” thinking. It is a difficult, often thankless, job, and to find that person, the administration cannot make loyalty the most important factor.
COMMENTARY: If Mamdani Wins, the Gig (Work) Is Up
October 3, 2025 // Jonathan Wolfson for Real Clear Politics
California shows the answer. In 2019, California passed a law attacking independent work. The state’s many photographers, freelance writers, translators, and designers quickly discovered that their once-lucrative work had dried up. Company after company cut jobs. The Mercatus Center found that one out of 10 self-employed jobs disappeared in short order. Even worse job losses were surely on the horizon. Recognizing the danger, California voters almost immediately passed a ballot measure that gave app-based workers and app-based companies the freedom to once again enter into freelance arrangements. The legislature then passed another law to carve out a dozen more professions. But those carve-outs didn’t apply to many other freelancers, like independent truckers, whose ability to work in California remains much more difficult. To this day, because politicians strangled freelance work, Californians have fewer of the jobs they want and need.
Former teachers union president sued, accused of $40M campaign cash grab
October 3, 2025 // Alan Wooten for The Center Square
Dupont said she opted out of supporting the union’s PAC when she signed her membership card. “Then I found out that a handful of union insiders spent $40 million of teachers’ dues – including mine – on the union president’s political ambitions. That’s wrong, and I believe it’s illegal.”
IAM union modifies offer to Boeing after meeting with mediator
October 3, 2025 // Nick Gladney for Fox 2 Missouri
In response to Boeing’s offers, IAM 837 members created their own proposed offer, featuring increased 401k contributions and improved raises for top of scale members, but was rejected by the company. Boeing and the union returned to the bargaining table on Monday with the inclusion of a federal mediator to help provide a new avenue to resolve the ongoing dispute. On Tuesday, the union modified its proposed offer to the company.
Trump’s NLRB Nominees Get Grilled While Board Faces Uncertain Future
October 3, 2025 // Layla A. Jones for Talking Points Memo
If confirmed by the whole Senate, Mayer and Murphy will join the NLRB’s only member, Democratic appointee David A. Prouty, returning the usually five-person board to a three-person quorum with two GOP members and one Democratic one. Historically, the political affiliation of the board members breaks along a 3-2 split, with the majority coming from the president’s political party. With a quorum, the board should be able to return to its work of helping settle labor disputes as outlined under the National Labor Relations Act.
Striking Genesys nurses launch effort to unionize other Henry Ford hospitals
October 3, 2025 // Susan Bromley for Hometown Life
The strike at Henry Ford Genesys Hospital, which began Sept. 1, centers on disputes over nurse-to-patient ratios, wages, and health insurance costs. Striking nurses claim there are unsafe staffing levels at the hospital, with some nurses caring for up to 11 patients at once. Henry Ford Health cites financial losses at Genesys and describes the unionization efforts as a recruitment tactic.
Zohran Mamdani joins Starbucks workers picketing for better pay in NYC
October 2, 2025
Over a dozen Starbucks workers raised their voices and picketed outside a store in Lower Manhattan on Wednesday morning. It comes as New York City officials said they are aware of dozens of Starbucks that are closing as part of a $1 billion restructuring plan that will shutter more than 400 stores nationwide. The baristas were joined by mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani as they highlighted their demands for fair contracts.
INDIANAPOLIS: Mayor’s Action Center employees unionize
October 2, 2025 // Matt Christy for Fox 59
Teamsters Local Union No. 135 welcomed the call center employees into their union earlier this month, following the Indianapolis City-County Council’s unanimous 25-0 vote in support of the Mayor’s Action Center workers organizing as Teamsters.