Hello and welcome to another session of Labor Diary Rescue. Diaries are below the fold.
To make the LDR list you must have a pro-union diary with less than 100 comments, have the words “union” or “labor” in the tag line, and not have made the rec list or any front page diary rescue.
The LDR is done every Monday and Thursday evenings, barring a bad internet connection, my insane work schedule, or Acts of God.
As of this writing, the lowest that most workers can be paid is $6.55 an hour (approx. $12.5k a year), according to a piece of Federal law known as the Fair Labor Standards Act. Not all workers are covered under Federal minimum wage laws, but most of these workers are also covered by their state minimum wage or possibly a local living wage ordinance. A month from tomorrow, the federal minimum wage will increase to $7.25 an hour (a 10.6% increase), the last in a three-stage increase passed in 2007.
While most people know of the minimum wage, and while most workers continue to benefit from its existence, few people really know the history of how it came about, how it changed, and why it stands as one of the few remaining pieces of "class politics" within the Democratic Party.
Tasini writes Screwing Seniors: "Decades Of Social Crisis" Warns OECD.
I have argued that the current crisis we are in now is the product of at least three decades of a bankrupt economic system. Now, looking forward, the same system has set the stages, according to a report just out, for a massive worldwide crisis in retirement security that will last decades. The reason we face this crisis is because of the foolishness of the "free market" ideology and the greed of the wealthiest people in society.
Teacher’s unions have been getting a bad rep, and EphemeralNotion shows another example of it in AP Takes an Underhanded Swipe at Teachers' Unions.
The headline reads "700 NYC teachers are paid to do nothing." Why has this happened? Administrative incompetence. However, the Associated Press makes it out to be the fault of the unions.
Ufw continues his writings on migrant farm workers in New Cal-OSHA heat regs still won't work.
On Saturday, we mourned the one-year anniversary of Jose Macarena Hernandez' death due to extreme heat. A veteran field worker, Jose died during record-breaking heat while harvesting squash in Santa Maria. Temperatures that day reached 110 degrees. Jose was found in the outhouse, his body blistered from the heat.
At a press conference before his funeral services, his niece, Maria Elena Curiel, expressed her frustration to a local TV station."We have a lot of unanswered questions that no one has come forth. The employer has not contacted us to at least explain the situation, what was going on that day, was he not feeling well." She went on to say, "We surely hope that he didn't suffer very long to the point where he was feeling all this going on with his body that he was cooking basically underneath this heat."
Chris Bowers graces our presence with PA-Sen: Specter Disinvited From Union Conference.
In light of the new polling data on the Pennsylvania Democratic Senate primary today, I thought that Daily Kos readers would like to hear more about an amusing event in the campaign that took place back on Sunday. At a conference for the United Steelworkers, at the urging of the union’s membership, Arlen Specter was dumped as the keynote speaker, and replaced by Joe Sestak.
Rjones tells us about a strike going on in the UK in Solidarity can win - Spread the strikes.
The strikers are construction workers at the Lindsey refinery site. They chose to strike knowing that the bosses could end up firing them. They continue on strike, and workers around Britain are joining in solidarity.
Employee Free Choice Act tells us about a protest against the Chamber of Commerce in Picket Against the Chamber of Commerce in Bloomington, Indiana.
On Friday June 19, 35 Bloomington workers, activists, and elected officials gathered for an informational picket outside the local Chamber of Commerce offices. This action was a direct response to the local chamber's choice to send representatives to Washington DC and lobby against the Employee Free Choice Act.
That’s it, everybody. Enjoy!
Treat the comments as an open thread.