Posts tagged Unionization
Op-ed: The evidence is in: Forcing workers to join unions destroys good-paying jobs
May 5, 2025 // He then noted: “This difference is substantial, equivalent to a 28 percent increase in manufacturing employment” in right-to-work counties relative to their forced-unionism neighbors. Practically all elected officials in the U.S. claim to support the creation of new manufacturing jobs and the retention of current ones. But the many Big Labor politicians in Washington, D.C., who support the elimination of state right-to-work laws and the expansion of union bosses’ forced-unionism privileges to all 50 states are objectively in favor of the destruction of good-paying manufacturing jobs.
Clark Atlanta launches labor institute to develop Black strategists for a renewed union movement
April 29, 2025 // Clark Atlanta University has partnered with national labor rights group Jobs With Justice to launch a first-of-its-kind academic center for training young Black and Brown labor movement leaders, on the belief that the South is the front line for revitalizing the US labor movement as a force in political democracy. The Labor Institute for the Advancement of Black Strategists is housed within the historically Black university’s W.E.B. Du Bois Southern Center for Studies in Public Policy.
Writers Guild West Staffers Launch Their Own Unionization Drive (Exclusive)
April 24, 2025 // Now, many of those staffers are attempting to organize their own workplace, citing a desire to have their voices heard. WGA West employees are launching an effort to join the Pacific Northwest Staff Union, which specializes in representing workers in the labor movement, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.
CDW Urges Support for Worker Enfranchisement Act
April 16, 2025 // “Current labor law allows unions to become the exclusive bargaining representative of a workforce with bare minimum support from the workers. This is possible, because there is no participation rate requirement in the National Labor Relations Act. The Worker Enfranchisement Act would fix this oversight by requiring at least two-thirds of a potential bargaining unit participate in a representation election before the results can be certified. By requiring real participation from the impacted workforce, Congress can guarantee that workers’ desires on union representation are both heard and carried out. Unions would have to have true majority support before they can obtain exclusive representation over those workers. CDW urges Congress to pass this common-sense bill.”
Op-Ed: Question 3 Still a Question: Massachusetts’ Experiment in Sectoral Bargaining for Gig Workers
April 10, 2025 // These impracticalities explain why Question 3 embraces sectoral bargaining. Under this regime, once the drivers form a union, that union will represent all the drivers in the state, no matter what rideshare company they work for. (Rideshare companies can also team up to simplify the negotiations.) This will put the drivers in a vastly superior bargaining position than if they had to incrementally organize smaller units of drivers or even company by company, as is the norm under the NLRA. Under the NLRA, organizers would next have to get the support of 30% of drivers in a bargaining unit before being able to call an election. But how do organizers reach that 30%? For rideshare drivers, there is no workplace where everyone congregates. The closest equivalent is the airport parking lot, where many drivers wait to get a ride request. But to even encounter 30% of drivers there, much less to convince that 30%, could be a prohibitively high bar. Additionally, driver turnover is high. By the time 30% is convinced, those drivers may have moved on, a new cohort taking their place. Part-timers also pose a problem. For these reasons, Question 3 requires that the would-be union collect signatures from only 5% of Active Drivers (defined as those that have completed more than the median number of rides in the last six months). That is a much more plausible bar to clear, given that rideshare drivers are quite literally a moving target, in time and in space.
UAW Local 2110 Requests Abrams Unionization Vote
April 10, 2025 // UAW Local 2110, which bills itself as a union for “technical, office, and professional workers,” also represents employees at HarperCollins (the sole Big Five publisher to have a union), the New Press, and the Asian American Writers Workshop, as well as workers at the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and Columbia University.
Commentary: Is bill a state-led worker’s board, or a gift to SEIU?
April 7, 2025 // A secret ballot election for unionization requires a certain percentage of the bargaining unit to sign so-called “showing of interest” cards. When an organization allegedly has resorted to forgery is tasked with gathering and submitting these cards, it calls the integrity of the process into question. SB 1138 and HB 3838 present themselves as measures to improve workforce standards for care providers, but they have but one purpose — growing SEIU 503’s membership and influence. By embedding the union into training programs, handing it access to personal contact information and placing itself in workforce oversight, SEIU is positioned to grow its ranks at the expense of worker autonomy.
President Trump and Republicans in Congress can give workers a real voice in unionization elections.
April 2, 2025 // Representative Onder introduced a bill in Congress to empower more workers. The Worker Enfranchisement Act would require at least two-thirds of eligible workers to participate in a unionization election. If that threshold is cleared and the union wins, it gets the monopoly to represent all workers. If that threshold isn’t met, the election is invalid, because not enough workers had an opportunity to make their voices heard. Quorum requirements are common in Congress, state legislatures, and even the federal board that certifies union elections. Jobsites shouldn’t be different — not when workers’ futures are on the line.
The push to unionize doctors at Mass General Brigham
April 1, 2025 // “We are not claiming poverty or trying to bemoan our financial status as people who are suffering in the current economy,” he said. “We’re very aware of our position in kind of the socioeconomic hierarchy. That being said, it is really within everyone's interest to have a primary care workforce that has the most talented, engaged, excited, and productive doctors that we can.”
Workers hope to steer giant Southern EV battery plant toward unionization
March 25, 2025 // Buoyed by notable victories in the last couple of years, the United Auto Workers union is revving up efforts to organize the EV and battery sector in the South. One target is a sprawling campus in rural Kentucky that, once completed, will be one of the largest EV battery plants in the world. A supermajority of workers at BlueOval SK has asked the National Labor Relations Board for a vote on joining the United Auto Workers. The nearly $6 billion electric vehicle battery campus in Glendale, Kentucky, is part of a joint venture between Ford and South Korea’s SK On. It’s not up and running yet, but early hires say they’re exposed to hazards on the job, including formation production operator Alisha Miller.