Posts tagged Transparency
MEMBERSHIP IN SEIU 1000, CALIFORNIA’S LARGEST STATE EMPLOYEES UNION, FALLS BELOW 50 PERCENT
June 20, 2024 // In May 2018, the month before Janus was decided, 96,229 state employees worked under SEIU 1000 contracts, effectively all of whom had union dues or fees deducted from their paychecks by the state. The next month, following the Supreme Court’s ruling, the number of represented employees with union payroll deductions had dropped to 58,953 — a membership rate of 61.4 percent — reflecting the loss of fee payments from nonmembers rendered unconstitutional by Janus.
How California’s nonprofits got dragged into a fight between unions and local governments
June 19, 2024 // It was the latest salvo in a big-money lobbying fight between labor unions and local governments over the hiring of private contractors that perform services for the state’s 4,800 counties, cities, special districts and schools. Local governments rely on contractors to perform a wide range of services paid with taxpayer funds. Contractors run animal shelters and after-school programs. They provide health care in local jails as well as homeless, legal aid and immigration services. Contractors cut fire breaks around rural communities, perform engineering services for public works projects, build affordable housing and fix government computer systems.
Warn workers before unions persuade them to join underwater pension funds
June 13, 2024 // Unions know their pension plans are in serious trouble. The Teamsters have already begged the Biden administration for a $36 billion bailout. At least $127 million of that money went to about 3,500 dead recipients, which was returned only after Sen. Cassidy, Louisiana Republican, investigated the “wrongfully obtained funds.” Yet other union pension plans are still on the road to failure, and no amount of taxpayer money can paper over the underlying challenges they face.
TSA Union Formation Faces Scrutiny
May 30, 2024 // The union that represents TSA agents was put into place via a series of administrative actions undertaken by the Obama Administration. This has led some labor experts to wonder if the union representing these tens of thousands of workers was properly instituted. To address these concerns, Americans for Fair Treatment (AFFT) sought answers through a series of requests made under the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
Parity in Labor Transparency
April 24, 2024 // The institutional left has sought to reward Big Labor by making union organizing campaigns shorter, or bypassing them with “card check.” Big Labor knows that the dynamics of union organizing rely on labor unions being able to make their pitches to workers from trusted positions without skeptical responses from other workers or employer representatives. And they only need to win the vote once to start collecting dues and engaging in compulsory bargaining. As long as government-recognized and government-empowered compulsory union bargaining exists, the government require workers be given all the information before deciding whether to form a union and bargain collectively. The SALT Act would accomplish this needed reform.
Commentary: Congress Should Close This Labor Union Loophole
April 24, 2024 // Workers themselves have made clear that salting is manipulative. In Buffalo, New York, many Starbucks employees became upset after learning that their supposedly neutral coworkers were union salts. One employee called salts “very scheme-y,” saying they were “unsettling” because “some of these people I thought were my friends.” Another Starbucks employee lamented that salts were more interested in their job with the union than their fellow baristas. At least 25 Starbucks stores have begun the process of decertifying their unions, potentially reflecting employee anger at having been tricked by salts. Since unions won’t make these disclosures on their own, Congress must intervene. The SALT Act would require unions to do exactly what businesses do, filing detailed public reports within 30 days of hiring or otherwise entering into an agreement with a salt. Labor unions say they respect workers, but their continued use of undisclosed salts shows profound disrespect for the men and women who make our economy run. Workers deserve better than union manipulation. They deserve the transparency, accountability, and honesty that help them make a fully informed decision about whether unionization is right for them.
How much time do federal bureaucrats spend working for unions?
April 6, 2024 // As an example of how the administration was already pursuing such policies, the report boasted of how Biden had “restored” official time at the Department of Veterans Affairs. The upshot: The more than 400 medical staff Trump had returned to their actual federal jobs could once again spend their workday on union activism rather than caring for the nation’s veterans. In a March 2023 update, the task force “proudly announced” the unionization of 80,000 more federal employees, purportedly due to the administration’s pro-union strategies. And earlier this month, Biden issued still another order directing federal agencies to establish “labor-management forums” at which agency leaders will engage in “pre-decisional” consultation with union officials over “workplace matters” and discuss how to “promote satisfactory labor relations.”
WASHINGTON EDUCATION ASSOCIATION GIVES BIG TO PROGRESSIVE CAUSES, TAX RETURN SHOWS
March 25, 2024 // WEA president Larry Delaney, elected to that position by the union’s members, received total compensation from the union of $312,281 for a reported average of 37.5 hours of work per week. The union’s elected vice president, Janie White, received $257,936 in total compensation. However, the union’s hired executive director, Aimee Iverson, far outpaced them both, receiving $415,545 in total compensation from the WEA that year. The Form 990 also disclosed a dozen other top staff, each earning well over $200,000 per year in total compensation. The total number of such employees on the payroll is unknown. Interestingly, unfunded pension obligations towards its current and former staff represent a significant liability for the WEA. In fact, the weight of the union’s reported $45 million in liabilities for employee retirement benefits pulled its net assets into negative territory that year by nearly $1.3 million.
Owens Leads Labor Union Transparency Bill
March 21, 2024 // Imagine a scenario where an employee, without the knowledge of their colleagues and employer, is receiving compensation from a union while advocating for its interests within the workplace,” said Congressman Burgess Owens “This deception not only breeds suspicion but also erodes the very foundation of trust and transparency between employers and employees. The #SALTAct seeks to address this issue by requiring union salts to disclose their affiliation with the Department of Labor, ensuring transparency and fairness in the workplace.”
Sen. Joni Ernst Introduces Legislation To Track Taxpayer Dollars Subsidizing Federal Employee Unions
March 15, 2024 // President Joe Biden’s Office of Personnel Management (OPM) stopped reporting “taxpayer-funded union time,” or “official time,” which agencies use to pay federal employees to conduct activities on behalf of federal employee labor unions, not the agencies which employ them or U.S. taxpayers. In 2019, which is the last year for which data is available, OPM reported that union activities during official time cost taxpayers $135 million. Federal employees spent 2.6 million hours, or 296 years, working for their union instead of doing their agency jobs.