Posts tagged COVID-19
Port Strike Halts: Now What? Commentary
October 9, 2024 // Even a new contract agreement, if it does not fundamentally address American port uncompetitiveness, would prove to be only a six-year punt. Legislation has been introduced to move port workers from the main National Labor Relations Act governance structure that applies to most private-sector workers to the Railway Labor Act, which governs the railroad and airline industries. This change would give Congress and the administration more power to impose a negotiated settlement and prevent strikes, but the idea has been batted around for nearly a decade.
Boston’s hotel workers are on strike, impacting some of city’s landmarks
October 8, 2024 // The hotel workers union, Unite Here Local 26, released a statement Sunday morning saying they will strike and picket outside hotel entrances 24 hours a day, 7 days a week until a deal is reached. The union has been negotiating a new contract since April and have held a series of three-day strikes that started last month. The union is calling for more staffing, better working conditions and higher wages.
Union workers at Hawaii’s largest hotel go on strike
September 26, 2024 // Around 2,000 hotel workers went on strike Tuesday at the world’s largest Hilton hotel and the biggest hotel in Hawaii Unionized workers at Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikiki Beach Resort — the largest Hilton in the world — began an open-ended strike at 5 a.m. They are calling for conditions including higher wages, more manageable workloads and a reversal of cuts implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic such as limited daily room cleaning.
Harris Pushes Gig Workers, Contractors into Corporate Jobs with New Rule
September 25, 2024 // America already has too few people working. If the employment rate were the same as it was before the COVID-19 pandemic, 2.9 million more people would be working today. The last thing Americans need is another regulation that makes it harder to make a living and to afford the rising cost of living. Although the Biden-Harris regulation has only been in effect since March, and it’s too early to fully study its effects, the employment-to-population ratio dropped by 0.3 percentage points between March and July. This decline represents a loss of 700,000 workers.
Why the protests at American Dream? Workers try to unionize, clash with employers
September 19, 2024 // They’re cleaning staff trying to organize and join part of the union 32BJ Service Employees International Union, and they’ve been protesting the treatment of several of their fellow workers at American Dream. Among their grievances, 32BJ alleged that two people working at the mall as cleaning staff — Jose Terán and Luis Verela — were fired because of their union organizing efforts by HSA Cleaning, a company the mall contracted for cleaning services.
Can Distributed Organizing Unionize Millions?
September 17, 2024 // Together with similarly bottom-up union campaigns like Starbucks Workers United (SBWU) and the reformed UAW’s organizing across Southern automakers, EWOC has demonstrated the viability of a new strategy of seeding unionization efforts, rather than passively waiting for workers to reach out (“hot-shopping”) or exclusively organizing pre-chosen workplaces (“strategic targeting”). Along these lines, Svoboda describes EWOC’s proactive efforts to provide organizing tools to as many workers as possible as “planting seeds of worker power.”
More Workers Are Filing For — and Winning – Union Elections Than in Any Year in the Past Decade
September 12, 2024 // A surge in union activity since the COVID-19 lockdown shows no signs of stopping, though it’s still not enough to reverse the two-decade downward trend in union membership in New York and across the nation.
Strikes start at top hotel chains; housekeepers seek higher wages, daily room cleaning
September 2, 2024 // The union hopes to build on its recent success in southern California, where after repeated strikes it won significant wage hikes, increased employer contributions to pensions, and fair workload guarantees in a new contract with 34 hotels. Under the contract, housekeepers at most hotels will earn $35 an hour by July 2027. The American Hotel And Lodging Association says 80% of its member hotels report staffing shortages, and 50% cite housekeeping as their most critical hiring need. Kevin Carey, the association's interim president and CEO, says hotels are doing all they can to attract workers. According to the association's surveys, 86% of hoteliers have increased wages over the past six months, and many have offered more flexibility with hours or expanded benefits. The association says wages for hotel workers have risen 26% since the pandemic.
Syracuse University employees to hold public rally after voting against contract offer
August 26, 2024 // According to a spokesperson for the union, workers feel that management has not acknowledged the difficult work employees performed through COVID-19 to keep the university running. The four-year contract would have provided a 3%raise. When juxtaposed with the university's $1.85 billion endowment and the recent rise in total enrollment costs to $88,000 per year per student, union members felt it was an unfair proposal.
Opinion: Political Vendettas Put Small Business in the Crossfire
August 17, 2024 // Senator Bernie Sanders’ recently released Amazon Investigation Interim Report is an example of such an effort that put America’s small business community in the crossfire. I can't help but think that the report was created to serve a personal agenda against the nation’s largest online marketplace. It relied on outdated data to draw misleading conclusions that Amazon is a uniquely dangerous workplace and sets an inappropriate and extreme precedent rife with questionable methodology and bias. Read Newsmax: Political Vendettas Put Small Business in the Crossfire | Newsmax.com Important: Find Your Real Retirement Date in Minutes! More Info Here