Chuck Schumer must make the Senate vote on protections for pregnant workers, before it's too late

Daily Kos Staff

Tuesday August 16, 2022 · 12:04 PM PDT

2022/08/16 · 12:04

A pregnant woman wearing a hazmat suit and a mask walks in the streets in the Elmhurst neighbourhood of Queens on April 27, 2020 in New York City. - In the US, states are moving at different clips to roll back confinement measures that have wiped out tens of millions of jobs. While New York Governor Andrew Cuomo sketched plans to resume some manufacturing and construction activity in low-risk parts of the state on May 15, other conservative-led US states are speeding up the timeline. (Photo by Johannes EISELE / AFP) (Photo by JOHANNES EISELE/AFP via Getty Images)

Senate Democrats have been getting stuff done for a change, using reconciliation to get the Inflation Reduction Act past unified Republican opposition and passing bipartisan bills to provide care for veterans exposed to toxic burn pits, domestic semiconductor manufacturing, and guns (albeit in a very modest way). But there’s another important bill with enough Republican support to overcome the filibuster that Democrats, for some reason, haven’t moved on—and advocates are concerned that the window of opportunity could close in early November.

The bill in question is the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, which would close gaps in the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, preventing employers from forcing pregnant workers out of their jobs or denying them reasonable accommodations. Since it was first introduced in 2012, 30 states have passed versions of the legislation. According to a recent Data for Progress poll, 90% of likely voters support the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.

A bill protecting the rights and the health of pregnant workers would seem to be important in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade and many states moving immediately to force pregnant people to remain pregnant.

“Why aren’t pregnant women a priority on the heels of losing our reproductive freedom?” Sonia Ossorio, president of NOW New York, asked. “At this moment in history, it is not acceptable to tell women to wait.”

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday August 13, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/08/13 · 15:55

NEW YORK, NEW YORK - JULY 19: Activists participate in an event dubbed the Un-Birthday Party and picket line for Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz on July 19, 2022 in New York City. Activists gathered near Schultz's West Village home on his 75th birthday to protest the treatment of Starbucks workers attempting to unionize, as well as Schultz's recent announcement to permanently close 16 locations. The company has stated that the closing of the stores, which are mostly located on the West Coast, is due to safety concerns. However, Starbucks Workers United, the union representing the baristas, has filed a labor complaint claiming that the store closures is an act of retaliation. Over 100 of the company's 9,000 U.S. stores have voted or are in the process of voting to unionize since a Buffalo, New York location became the first to join a union at the end of 2021. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

There are now 221 Starbucks stores where workers have voted to unionize—but the company has only engaged in first bargaining sessions at three of them. Meanwhile, the National Labor Relations Board is handling hundreds of unfair labor practice charges against the company, and the reason for that is not hard to see: The company’s vicious union-busting campaign continues, including the firing of one union supporter after another. The fact that stores continue voting to unionize shows the workers’ determination and the screaming need for workers to have the power to make management listen.

Companies have been firing workers for their union participation for years, but thanks to phones with video capability and social media, now it’s visible, as in the videos below.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday August 06, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/08/06 · 15:55

Starbucks' Executive Chairman, Howard Schultz delivers a speech during the openning ceremony of the "Seeds & Chips, the Global Food Innovation Summit" in Milan on May 7, 2018. (Photo by MIGUEL MEDINA / AFP) / The erroneous mention[s] appearing in the metadata of this photo by MIGUEL MEDINA has been modified in AFP systems in the following manner: [May 7, 2018] instead of [April 7, 2018]. Please immediately remove the erroneous mention[s] from all your online services and delete it (them) from your servers. If you have been authorized by AFP to distribute it (them) to third parties, please ensure that the same actions are carried out by them. Failure to promptly comply with these instructions will entail liability on your part for any continued or post notification usage. Therefore we thank you very much for all your attention and prompt action. We are sorry for the inconvenience this notification may cause and remain at your disposal for any further information you may require. (Photo credit should read MIGUEL MEDINA/AFP/Getty Images) — Howard Schultz

Amid Starbucks’ vicious union-busting campaign, which has involved the firing of at least 70 pro-union workers—more than 50 of them since April, in what’s clearly an escalating effort—the company tried to convince the National Labor Relations Board that union activists in Phoenix, Arizona, violated labor law by “threatening and coercing employees and the public.” Starbucks claimed workers surrounded a store and pounded on the windows during an action. The NLRB investigated and found that no such thing happened. (And since there were news cameras there for the protest, there’s an actual video of the peaceful picket.)

Meanwhile, Starbucks continues announcing pay raises and new benefits only to workers at stores that have not unionized—a practice that NLRB general counsel Jennifer Abruzzo told Steven Greenhouse was (in principle, without naming Starbucks) is an unfair labor practice, “unlawful, absent compelling business justification.”

Starbucks management is absolutely committed to fighting its workers, often in direct violation of the law. But so far, at least, its lawlessness and cruelty has not stopped the momentum of its workers coming together to form unions.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Monday August 01, 2022 · 10:26 AM PDT

2022/08/01 · 10:26

Tenant Irma Aguilar walks past posters in front of homes, including hers, on a balcony in this apartment block where, with no rent control due to the year it was built, the landlord has increased some rentals by as much as $800.00 on August 3, 2017 in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles, California..Pending gentrification and increasing rent is sparking concern among longtime residents and community aid groups..... / AFP PHOTO / FREDERIC J. BROWN / TO GO WITH AFP STORY by Veronique DUPONT, US-Art-Protest-Minorities-Housing / The erroneous mention appearing in the metadata of this photo by FREDERIC J. BROWN has been modified in AFP systems in the following manner: [Irma Aguilar] instead of [Maria Aguilar]. Please immediately remove the erroneous mention from all your online services and delete it from your servers. If you have been authorized by AFP to distribute it to third parties, please ensure that the same actions are carried out by them. Failure to promptly comply with these instructions will entail liability on your part for any continued or post notification usage. Therefore we thank you very much for all your attention and prompt action. We are sorry for the inconvenience this notification may cause and remain at your disposal for any further information you may require. (Photo credit should read FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty Images)

The average wage needed for someone to afford a market-rate one-bedroom apartment rental in this country is $21.25 per hour. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour. It’s not hard to see the problem here.

Both sides of the equation are responsible: The rent is too damn high and the pay is too damn low.

According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s annual report on housing costs, the market rate for a modest two-bedroom home requires an hourly wage of $25.82 for affordability, defined as 30% of income on housing costs. Across the entire country, “In approximately 9% of counties or county equivalents (including Puerto Rico), the renter wage is below the federal, state, or local minimum wage.” In the continental U.S., Arkansas is the winner, requiring just 1.4 full-time minimum wage jobs to afford a two-bedroom apartment.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday July 30, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/07/30 · 15:55

MIAMI BEACH, FL - APRIL 14: A store associate distributes hand sanitizer to customers as they enter the Trader Joe's store in South Beach on April 14, 2020 in Miami Beach, Florida. The city of Miami Beach put in place an emergency measure requiring all customers and employees at grocery stores, restaurants and pharmacies to wear face coverings to help fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. (Photo by Cliff Hawkins/Getty Images)

Trader Joe’s Hadley, Massachusetts, store became its first to unionize after workers voted 45 to 31 to form an independent union, Trader Joe’s United.

“This victory is historic, but not a surprise,” the union said in a statement after the votes were counted. “Since the moment we announced our campaign, a majority of the crew has enthusiastically supported our union, and despite the company’s best efforts to bust us, our majority has never wavered.”

The company responded to the vote by saying that it would recognize the union and begin bargaining. It said it was “willing to use any current union contract for a multistate grocery company with stores in the area,” a suggestion the workers rejected.

”We’re going to be negotiating a different contract, specifically for us, that the crew wants to see. We won’t be taking any boilerplate template contracts,” Maeg Yosef, the union spokeswoman and an 18-year Trader Joe’s worker, told the Daily Hampshire Gazette. She noted that the union won’t be alone in negotiations, saying, it was getting “donated legal support, so we won’t be going it alone, and the legal team is going to grow at this point, so we’re feeling good on that front.”

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Friday July 29, 2022 · 6:00 AM PDT

2022/07/29 · 06:00

TOPSHOT - A person carries items collected from the train tracks as a Union Pacific locomotive passes through a section of Union Pacific train tracks littered with thousands of opened boxes and packages stolen from cargo shipping containers, targeted by thieves as the trains stop in downtown Los Angeles, California on January 14, 2022. (Photo by Patrick T. FALLON / AFP) (Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images)

Supply chain problems could get much, much worse in September if 115,000 railroad workers go on strike. The workers have gone more than two years without a contract, dealing with one cut after another, including job cuts that have led to serious understaffing. The rail companies have been very profitable as they’ve put these and other cuts into place, but they’ve continued to squeeze workers—and they’re making moves that could harm a lot of people beyond their own workers. In fact, many observers say the rail companies have contributed to supply chain problems as they’ve tried to cut costs to the bone.

The rail industry has consolidated enormously over a period of decades, David Dayen reported at The American Prospect, and the companies have “intentionally gutted their own spare capacity, which meant the surge in goods production during the pandemic has produced skyrocketing freight prices—and then record profits—instead of more deliveries.” Now two of the remaining seven Class I railroads in the country want to merge, which would worsen the situation.

Rep. Katie Porter, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, and Sen. Dick Durbin have expressed varying levels of concern about that merger, with Porter saying it posed “a grave threat to competition in the domestic rail industry” that would result in “job losses, harm to other industries reliant on railroads, and more fragility in American supply chain infrastructure.”

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday July 23, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/07/23 · 15:55

Get your expressions of stunned awe ready here, because the Starbucks union has reached a truly amazing milestone: 200 unionized Starbucks stores. Of those, 52 voted unanimously to unionize, labor reporter Steve Greenhouse notes, with the union winning about five out of six stores to vote.

Last summer, when the organizing drive kicked off in Buffalo, unionizing one corporate-owned Starbucks seemed like a long shot. (Some Starbucks stores in airports and other locations are already unionized.) When the first Buffalo store voted yes, it seemed—and was—monumental. This momentum is historic and astonishing.

But management remains viciously opposed to just … working with its workers. The stores the company has recently closed show how it is targeting union stores for closure: “3% of Starbucks stores nationwide are in the process of unionizing,” More Perfect Union reports. “Yet somehow, 30% of the stores Starbucks is closing have active union campaigns.” That’s in addition to the company’s campaign of harassment and illegal firing of worker-activists, which is taking a toll.

Between the historic string of wins for the union and the company’s cruel and often illegal union-busting campaign, we’re seeing both the possibilities of building worker power in the United States and one of the key reasons it’s so difficult.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday July 09, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/07/09 · 15:55

The first union representation election in Trader Joe’s history will happen this month, as workers in Hadley, Massachusetts, vote on July 27 and 28. There are 81 workers in the store eligible to vote, according to organizer Maeg Yosef.

“We’re just really thrilled to finally have an election date and we’re really excited to get the final vote total,” Yosef told the Daily Hampshire Gazette’s Brian Steele. “We’re feeling good right now.”

Workers in a Minneapolis Trader Joe’s also recently announced they are organizing. But while the organic spread of organizing is reminiscent of what’s been happening at Starbucks, Trader Joe’s response is, like Starbucks’, to engage in union-busting attempts. The company fired a pro-union worker in the Minneapolis store. Trader Joe’s is also lying, claiming the union effort is backed by Service Employees International Union (SEIU), but in reality, it is an independent union like the one at Amazon.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday June 25, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/06/25 · 15:55

Associate Justice Samuel Alito participates in the swearing-in ceremony for Defense Secreaty Mark Esper in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, on July 23, 2019. - The Senate Tuesday voted overwhelmingly 90 to 8 to confirm President Donald Trump's pick for secretary of defense, Mark Esper, giving the Pentagon its first permanent chief since James Mattis stepped down in January. (Photo by NICHOLAS KAMM / AFP) (Photo by NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP via Getty Images) — Justice Samuel Alito

This week, the Supreme Court gutted abortion rights. This is a workers’ issue, in a country where many struggle to afford an abortion and lack the paid leave needed to take multiple days off work to travel out of state for abortion access as state bans go into effect. The Economic Policy Institute’s Heidi Shierholz points out research showing that people who want but cannot get an abortion experience long-term financial consequences and increased poverty. Also highlighted here: The states where abortion bans are most likely are also states where wages and worker power are low.

The Supreme Court also essentially nullified states’ rights to limit permits to carry firearms, sending a signal that it would become more and more extremist on guns. This, too, is a workers’ issue, in a country where workplace shootings are all too common.

But make no mistake that this Supreme Court is also specifically opposed to workers’ rights and efforts to build worker power. Justice Samuel Alito may end his career most remembered for his spiteful opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, but he also has a long and equally spiteful track record of anti-union activism. As Jenny Hunter wrote at Balls and Strikes in 2021, “Alito’s ‘impartiality’ in cases about unions can not only ‘reasonably be questioned’; it simply does not exist. There is no doubt he will rule to limit workers’ collective power at every opportunity. The only question is how quickly he’ll upend the law in order to engineer his desired result.”

This month, the court gutted an important California workplace enforcement rule. Because, of course, Alito has company in his basic anti-worker stance. A lot of company on this Trump-packed court. Workers around the country are showing renewed interest in unions, but they will encounter a hostile Supreme Court for a generation or more, unless Democrats expand the court.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday June 18, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/06/18 · 15:55

Microsoft entered a neutrality agreement with the Communications Workers of America, saying it would not get in the way of Activision Blizzard workers’ union rights if it acquires the video game company. This is believed to be the first such neutrality agreement in the tech industry, and it is a major one, affecting most of Activision Blizzard’s nearly 7,000 U.S. workers.

“In practical terms, [the neutrality deal] means that we’re not going to try to jump in and put a thumb on the scale,” Microsoft President Brad Smith said in The New York Times. “We will respect the fact that our employees are capable of making decisions for themselves and they have a right to do that.” Imagine that! Respecting your workers’ ability and rights to make decisions for themselves! It seems so basic, but it’s an enormous departure from typical corporate practice when faced with the possibility of workers organizing, as we’ve seen recently in the abuses that Starbucks and Amazon have heaped on their unionizing workers.

As some Activision workers have protested sexual harassment at the company and some have sought to unionize, the company has engaged in some of those same union-busting tactics, so a Microsoft acquisition would mean a significant shift.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Monday June 13, 2022 · 9:31 AM PDT

2022/06/13 · 09:31

SEATTLE, WA - MARCH 23: Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz speaks during during the Starbucks Annual Shareholders Meeting on March 23, 2016 in Seattle, Washington. Schultz reported on the company's expansion into China. (Photo by Stephen Brashear/Getty Images) — Howard Schultz

Starbucks is continuing its vicious anti-union campaign, even as the failure of that campaign to keep workers from voting to unionize becomes more clear by the day. Speaking to The New York Times’ Andrew Ross Sorkin late last week, Starbucks interim CEO Howard Schultz made clear that, under his leadership, the company will not bargain in good faith with its union.

Asked if he could imagine “embracing the union,” Schultz simply said “No,” in a “why are you asking me this ridiculous question” tone. Starbucks Workers United has filed an unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board over that statement, which is in direct conflict with the company’s claim that “We will bargain in good faith for those seeking third-party representation.” In fact, Starbucks is required by law to bargain in good faith. If the NLRB finds merit to the charge (and Schultz is on video here), it will try to get Starbucks to settle, and if the company refuses, the NLRB can take the charge to court.

That’s not all, though.

Laura Clawson

Daily Kos Staff

Saturday June 04, 2022 · 3:55 PM PDT

2022/06/04 · 15:55

The 100th Starbucks store went union on May 27, and the momentum has not let up. On May 31, the union won votes in South Carolina, Oklahoma, and Pennsylvania—the first of those unanimously. On June 1, the union won three stores in Maryland. June 2 saw another unanimous win in South Carolina and three wins in Oregon. June 3, it was four unanimous votes at four Massachusetts stores, along with the first Starbucks union win in Texas.

Dozens more stores have union votes scheduled in the weeks to come.

Meanwhile, the anti-union campaign rages on:

NEW: Starbucks is firing union leaders during elections for increasingly preposterous reasons.

One union leader was fired for showing up to work too early. Another was terminated after her co-worker refused to return from lunch.

The reasons only get more absurd from there. pic.twitter.com/R0gowlMPFA
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) June 2, 2022

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