Posts tagged frontline workers
Layoffs, frustrated public among concerns for union president ahead of SEPTA cuts
August 19, 2025 // "What I'm going to do is send a letter to Chief Bethel and the Chief of Transit Police and ask them, on the 24th, that they man our lines. It's going to be a frustrating time, and I'm worried that the backlash is going to come on my operators - and I'm not going to accept that," he said. Pollitt added that some union members are also concerned about potential layoffs. While workers with more than a year on the job are contractually protected, those with less than a year are not - a group he estimates includes more than 700 employees. However, SEPTA says there are no immediate plans for layoffs. "As we get started, there's no immediate plans for layoffs," said SEPTA spokesperson Andrew Busch.
OPM calls for quicker firings, more stringent performance standards
June 25, 2025 // Don Kettl, professor emeritus and former dean of the University of Maryland School of Public Policy. “In the case of any downsizing in government, training is always the first to go. So is there going to be investment to try to make happen what they’re proposing?” The former HR official said the plan to reduce performance improvement plans to 30 days belies the overall memo as a “red herring.” “If you can’t articulate why someone’s failing and you only give them 30 days to show that they’re no longer failing, it becomes a procedural widget to sustain a termination,” they said. “[And] the Trump administration has done such a thorough job in the last five months cutting the balls off of unions—which is a mistake, because they help provide due process—and the Merit Systems Protection Board, the [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission] and [Office of Special Counsel], it’s going to be hard for current employees under these constraints to win anything.”
Homeland Security ends collective bargaining agreement with TSA workers
March 10, 2025 // In its announcement Friday, the TSA said it found that nearly 200 employees were working on union matters full-time while collecting a government salary — claims disputed by the union. Under federal law, employees serving as union representatives are entitled to devote part of their work time to union matters in a manner that is “reasonable, necessary, and in the public interest.” Trump implemented a similar reporting requirement during his first term, but it appears to have stopped during President Joe Biden’s time in office.
The State of the Union: Unpacking the Recent Rise in Labor Unionization
January 20, 2023 // Considering unions’ historical role in curbing disproportionate corporate profits and inequality, it makes sense that the NLRB reported a 57% jump in union representation petitions and 14% more complaints of unfair labor practices in the first half of 2022. In the current moment, it seems that workers are turning to unionization as a means of righting the wrongs of corporate inequality. But this push for unions, while having recently enjoyed a burst of momentum, has been a long time coming. Public support for unions stands at 71%, up from 48% in 2010 and at its highest since 1965, according to a recent Gallup poll. Organizers are also being buoyed by a political environment conducive to labor organizing. President Biden has taken decidedly pro-union stances since entering office, replacing Trump’s pro-business and anti-labor NLRB general counsel with former union attorney Jennifer Abruzzo and backing the PRO Act, which would simplify the process of unionizing. It also helps that unions have evaded the extreme partisanship that has swamped most other issues in contemporary politics: While Democrats are twice as likely to view unions favorably compared to Republicans, almost half of Republicans still say that they would approve of unionization in their workplaces.
Video: Face the Facts: Captive Audience Meetings and Pandemic Pay for Frontline Workers
March 16, 2022 // NBC Connecticut's American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) President Ed Hawthorne talks about the deal that's on the table and another measure that's being discussed.
Some Minneapolis workers, including snowplow drivers, could go on strike
December 27, 2021 // After IUOE Local 49 voted down the city's latest deal, the door was open for a strike on Tuesday.