By Rachel Goldfarb, originally published on Next New Deal
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The Fight for $15.37 an Hour (NYT)
Steven Greenhouse explains how the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy won its campaign to get hotel workers in L.A. a significantly higher minimum wage. The campaign used everything from community organizers at a Hollywood farmers market to clergy members visiting city council members.
This kind of coalition-building has been central to Laane’s strategy since it was founded in 1993 by a husband-and-wife team, along with Ms. Janis, to serve as labor’s bridge to community groups. At the time, that couple — Miguel Contreras and Maria Elena Durazo — were officials in the hotel workers union. “We saw that it was hard to win through the traditional way of unionizing — there was so much employer opposition,” Ms. Durazo said. “We needed a new entity to look at things differently.”
While Laane and the Los Angeles labor movement have pursued the coalition-building strategy for two decades, the A.F.L.-C.I.O., the nation’s main union federation, acknowledged only last year that organized labor had grown so weak that it needed to ally itself with other groups to win fights in Congress or in the states. In this way, many in the beleaguered labor movement look to Laane as a model.
Follow below the fold for more.
Elizabeth Warren Tells NY Fed President: Fix Your Problems, Or We’ll Find Someone Who Will (Buzzfeed)
At the Senate Banking Committee on Friday, the four senators in attendance – all Democrats – pushed back hard on William Dudley's framing of his work as a "fire warden," reports Matthew Zeitlin.
What’s a CEO Really Worth? Too Many Companies Simply Don’t Know (WSJ)
Paul Vigna writes about a new report examining how executive compensation lines up with company performance. It turns out that most companies don't measure success very accurately.
- Roosevelt Take: In her primer on the CEO pay debate, Roosevelt Institute Fellow Susan Holmberg lays out the main theories for the skyrocketing in executive pay and potential policy solutions.
Obama's Executive Action Is About Labor Policy, Not Just Immigration (AJAM)
E. Tammy Kim explains how work authorization will transform opportunities for many undocumented workers, who will have new opportunities to organize or fight wage theft without fear.
The Antitax Push Has Done Harm to State and Local Government (WaPo)
Catherine Rampell says the piecemeal way that state and local governments create new revenue sources are far worse for the economy and inequality than raising taxes would be.
- Roosevelt Take: Roosevelt Institute Fellow Saqib Bhatti explains the impact of predatory financial deals taken on by state and local governments struggling to fund public services.
The GOP Controls Congress So Now It Can Change How Math Works (MoJo)
The Republicans' preferred method of calculating budget projections uses impossible predictions about economic growth, writes Erika Eichelberger, making tax cuts appear less costly.
New on Next New Deal
Bigger Health Care Providers Mean Bigger Profits, But Not Always Better Care
Roosevelt Institute | Campus Network Senior Fellow for Health Care Emily Cerciello calls on state attorneys general to consider whether hospitals that buy up physicians' practices are violating anti-trust laws.