Posts tagged picket
A union strike interrupts Minnesota United’s final game of season in St. Paul
October 9, 2023 // The local chapter of the IATSE has contracts with the Twins, Timberwolves, Wild, Bally Sports North, the Big Ten Network and other crewing contractors, Cushing said. They have voted down only one previous recent contract with Bally Sports North, but agreed and ratified a second offer. The Bally deal, Cushing said, also had 4% wage increases. On Saturday, MNUFC was able to cobble together enough crew to film and upload a stream to MLSSoccer.com and clips to air Apple TV’s highlight show and online.
GM Asks Salaried Employees To Cross Picket Lines At Parts Distribution Centers
September 27, 2023 // The expanded strike targets 32 locations total across 20 states, including both GM and Stellantis facilities. The UAW will continue to strike at the initial targets, including the GM Wentzville plant in Missouri, the Stellantis Toledo Assembly Complex in Ohio, and the Ford Wayne Assembly plant in Michigan. GM has also idled production at its Fairfax Assembly plant in Kansas as a result of the strike.
How state unemployment benefits impact the UAW strike
September 27, 2023 // "We were very confused if we were going to get (strike pay) or not," Halle Heinz, one of the Ford employees laid off, told WXYZ-TV in Detroit. "They were trying to hold as much strike pay as they could in order to make everything survive." Under Michigan law, UAW workers generally won't qualify for unemployment if they get laid off because of a labor dispute involving other workers at the same worksite, Brett Miller, an attorney specializing in labor law for Butzel in Detroit, tells Axios. UAW's Ohio and Indiana director is also navigating murky waters when it comes to unemployment. "It's clear as mud," UAW Region 2B director David Green told Crain's Cleveland Business. "I don't want to say all our members are going to get unemployment, because that's not going to happen." Disputes over unemployment benefits could end up in court, he said.
UAW widens strike against GM and Stellantis but not Ford
September 24, 2023 // GM called the strike escalation “unnecessary” and accused union leaders of “manipulating the bargaining process for their own personal agendas.” “We have now presented five separate economic proposals that are historic,” the company said. The 20 percent raise in its latest offer would boost 85 percent of GM’s UAW workforce to base-wage earnings of $82,000 a year by the end of the contract, the company said this week. It is also offering two weeks of paid parental leave and other perks. Stellantis said it submitted a new offer to the UAW on Thursday but has not received a reply. It said its 20 percent wage increase offer would boost all its full-time UAW workers to earnings of $80,000 to $96,000 annually by the end of the contract. The company questioned “whether the union’s leadership has ever had an interest in reaching an agreement in a timely manner.”
UAW strike: What the media won’t tell you about the strike
September 21, 2023 // The Wall Street Journal reported that some in the UAW, including President Shawn Fain, pushed for a full strike, but “there was a simple financial calculation to consider: Such an option would rapidly drain the UAW’s $825 million fund that it uses to pay striking workers, likely depleting it within about two months.” In other words, the union itself doesn’t think it could hold out for long if it tried to shut all three companies. Hence the spin surrounding the current limited strike: UAW is trying to make a virtue out of necessity. In past negotiations, UAW has tried to secure a deal with one of the three automakers ahead of the others and then use that agreement as a template for bargaining with the other two. That UAW didn’t try that this time suggests the union feared it could not wrestle even one company to the ground.
UAW strike Day 4: GM threatens to send 2,000 workers home, Ford cuts 600 jobs
September 18, 2023 // Normally companies give partial pay to workers when a plant is idled. But because in this case it's due to a strike, the companies say there is no such compensation. General Motors said in a statement, "We are working under an expired agreement at Fairfax. Unfortunately, there are no provisions that allow for company-provided SUB-pay in this circumstance." Fain accused the companies of choosing temporary layoffs in an effort to intimidate workers. The UAW says it will make sure that affected workers don't go without an income.
UAW strike 2023 against Detroit automakers: Live updates, news from the picket sites
September 15, 2023 //
Newsom in the hot seat after California passes bill to give striking workers unemployment benefits
September 15, 2023 // At an event hosted by Politico on Tuesday, the governor expressed concerns about the unemployment insurance fund's debt but didn't say whether he would veto the bill. California's unemployment fund is more than $18 billion in debt after it borrowed money from the federal government to pay for unemployment benefits. "I think one has to be cautious about that before you enter the conversation about expanding its utilization," Newsom said. Democrats, on the other hand, have been voicing their support for the unions.
As L.A. City Hall staffers consider unionizing, competing unions seek to woo them
September 12, 2023 // The city work force, like the vast majority of the public sector work force across California, is heavily unionized. Staffers for elected officials, however, have long been at-will employees — they can be hired without dealing with civil service requirements, but also lack the protections that a civil service job confers. That’s the norm for staffers to elected officials across the country. But the City Hall effort is far from an outlier.