Posts tagged union organizers
BACKGROUNDER: Polling Results on Union Salting and Union Elections
October 25, 2023 // Between July 24-26, 2023, Institute for the American Worker commissioned the bipartisan research firm Big Village to conduct an online omnibus survey of a demographically representative U.S. sample of 1,010 adults 18 years of age and older. The polling questions gauge the public’s opinion on union organizing efforts involving “salts,” which are paid union organizers who apply for jobs at a workplace to organize an employer. Additionally, the poll asked if respondents felt unions should need a minimum threshold of votes before representing employees.
Popular Union-Busting Tactic Banned in New York in ‘Major Victory’
September 7, 2023 // New York has banned captive audience meetings, a popular union-busting tactic used by companies during organizing periods to disseminate anti-union information. Governor Kathy Hochul signed the bill on Wednesday morning, making the state the fifth in the U.S. to make such meetings illegal. “This legislation will help to ensure that all New Yorkers receive the benefits and protections that allow them to work with dignity,” Hochul said in a statement on Wednesday. “My administration is committed to making our state the most worker-friendly state in the nation, and I thank the bill sponsors for their partnership in our mission to establish the strongest and most robust protections right here in New York.”
CANADA: A New App May Allow Workers To Unionize Anonymously
June 12, 2023 // The app allows workers to anonymously ask their coworkers if they want to form a union, without management interference. If 60 per cent of the workplace responds positively, the app sends digital union cards for workers to sign. Signed cards are then forwarded to the union chosen by the initiators of the campaign, who can file them at the B.C. Labour Relations Board. Crucially, it is up to the union to make connections with the workers interested in organizing. The process sounds straightforward enough, but does raise several concerns. For one, only unions using the app can receive signed cards and connect with workers who are organizing. Without buy-in from a broad cross section of unions, workers in some industries might find themselves without digital access to a union appropriate to represent them.
Public Funds Shouldn’t Bankroll Union Coercion
March 29, 2023 // These tactics can be overwhelming. One employee testified, “It wasn’t enough that employees were being harassed at work, but now they are receiving phone calls at home. The union’s organizers refuse to take ‘no’ for an answer. The only way, it seems, to stop the badgering and pressure is to sign the card.” In another instance, an employee was told to sign the card or risk the union coming to “get her children” and “slash her car tires.” Even more galling, taxpayer dollars can be used to perpetuate these tactics. Card check occurs in some Tennessee workplaces that receive taxpayer-funded state economic incentives. Last year, Tennesseans voted overwhelmingly to support a right-to-work constitutional amendment, ensuring that workers can’t be fired for not joining or paying a union.
Starbucks will get reporters’ messages with union, federal judge rules
October 31, 2022 // A federal judge has ordered the organization behind a unionization drive at Starbucks stores in western New York to turn over all of its messages with journalists — a sweeping and unusual ruling that will let the company peek into communications that courts usually view as private and protected. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit Court,
Will California Legislature allow its workers to unionize?
July 26, 2022 // Just last month, for instance, language was slipped into a very lengthy budget trailer bill declaring the state’s intention to provide union members who do not itemize their income tax deductions with a refundable tax credit offsetting their dues. In effect, under the “Workers Tax Fairness Credit,” as it’s dubbed, taxpayers would underwrite some or all of the dues members pay to their unions. Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher, Assemblyman Mark Stone, Senate Labor, Public Employment and Retirement Committee, Assembly Bill 1577, sexual harassment, HR1096, Rep. Ro Khanna,
White House to host union organizers at Amazon, Starbucks
May 5, 2022 // The meeting is to discuss "their extraordinary efforts to organize unions in their workplaces, and how their efforts can inspire workers across the country to make the choice to join or organize a union," the official added.
Does Democrats’ support for unions extend to their own employees?
April 22, 2022 // The CWU, a group of staffers that launched a union drive earlier this year, wants the House to vote on a resolution guaranteeing staffers protections as soon as next week. Currently, the Congressional Accountability Act allows staffers to organize, but doesn’t offer them any shield from retaliation, meaning staffers could be fired and blacklisted if they do so. Thus far, Pelosi’s office has not commented on when a floor vote could be scheduled on the resolution.
Union Organizers Get Pushback From Three Brothers Coffee Owners
March 9, 2022 // The move potentially delays the first unionized coffee shop in Nashville and forces an election in order to be recognized.
SEIU DROPS ITS FRONT IN UNIONIZING STARBUCKS
March 7, 2022 // Proponents had insisted that the movement, which now extends to 103 stores, was a homespun phenomenon arising spontaneously throughout the chain’s domestic arm. The narrative held that the baristas-turned-organizers were union neophytes who discovered they shared a desire to have more say on the brand’s direction and store operations, without any choreography from an outside labor force. Few reports even mentioned that the activist employees were receiving advice or financial support from Service Employees International Union (SEIU) through its Workers United affiliate.