Labor Rights News Thread

weatheriscool
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Judge says Starbucks committed 'egregious and widespread' labor violations fighting unions
Starbucks committed “egregious and widespread” violations of federal law in its campaign to halt unions, a federal administrative judge ruled Wednesday, ordering the company to give back pay and damages to workers who launched national organizing efforts.

The decision from Judge Michael A. Rosas, an administrative law judge at the National Labor Relations Board, comes as the coffee giant faces growing unionization efforts at its stores nationwide. The company’s efforts to squash them has put it in the crosshairs of progressive lawmakers.

The over 200 page ruling from Rosas concluded that Starbucks showed “a general disregard for the employees’ fundamental rights,” resolving a case that included 33 labor complaints from 21 New York Starbucks locations. Rosas also ordered the company to post a “Notice to Employees” at all of its facilities in the U.S. notifying workers that “the National Labor Relations Board has found that we violated Federal labor law.”

Rosas further ordered that the company reopen a Buffalo area store and reinstate a number of workers that the board concluded were fired for their union activities.

https://thehill.com/business/3880236-ju ... ng-unions/
weatheriscool
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Arkansas Gov. Sanders signs law loosening child labor protections
Source: Washington Post/By Jacob Bogage
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R) signed into law this week legislation that rolls back significant portions of the state’s child labor protections.

The law eliminates requirements for the state to verify the age of children younger than 16 before they can take a job.

Sanders believes the provision was “burdensome and obsolete,” spokeswoman Alexa Henning said in an emailed statement. Remaining state and federal regulations are still in effect, she said. Sanders signed the Republican-backed bill on Tuesday.

Federal officials have pledged to crack down on child labor law offenses after regulators discovered hundreds of violations in meatpacking plants and after press reports emerged of children working in hazardous occupations around the country.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... ild-labor/
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caltrek
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The Unconscionable Push to Bring Back Child Labor
by Tom Conway
March 8, 2023

Introduction:
(Other Words) Brad Greve has been a Scout leader for more than 20 years. The Davenport, Iowa retiree leads 50-mile canoe trips on Minnesota’s Boundary Waters that test teens’ mettle while teaching them essential skills.

Greve told a story recently where two boys, despite being warned repeatedly, let their canoe drift perilously close to a section of stream that swept over rapids into a lake below. They just barely recovered and made it to streambank.

That near-accident a few years ago, Greve said, underscores the vulnerability of young teens. And it fuels Greve’s anger at Republicans across the country who want to gut child labor laws and fill dangerous jobs with still-maturing high schoolers.

A GOP bill in Iowa, for example, would allow 14-year-olds to work in industrial freezers, meatpacking plants, and industrial laundry operations. The legislation would also put 15-year-olds to work on certain kinds of assembly lines, allow them to hoist up to 50 pounds, and allow employers to force kids into significantly longer work days.

In some cases, it would even permit young teens to work mining and construction jobs and use power-driven meat slicers and food choppers.

The article goes on to note unsuccessful efforts in Minnesota and Ohio to loosen child labor restrictions. Workplace injuries of a young teenagers in Tennessee and instances of child labor in Alabama are also noted.

Read more here: https://otherwords.org/the-unconsciona ... ld-labor/
Don't mourn, organize.

-Joe Hill
weatheriscool
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Child labor laws are under attack in states across the country
At a time when serious child labor violations are on the rise in hazardous meatpacking and manufacturing jobs, several state legislatures are weakening—or threatening to weaken—child labor protections. The trend reflects a coordinated multi-industry push to expand employer access to low-wage labor and weaken state child labor laws in ways that contradict federal protections, in pursuit of longer-term industry-backed goals to rewrite federal child labor laws and other worker protections for the whole country. Children of families in poverty, and especially Black, brown, and immigrant youth, stand to suffer the most harm from such changes.

Summary of findings

Both violations of child labor laws and proposals to roll back child labor protections are on the rise across the country. The number of minors employed in violation of child labor laws increased 37% in the last year and at least 10 states introduced or passed laws rolling back child labor protections in the past two years.

Attempts to weaken state-level child labor standards are part of a coordinated campaign backed by industry groups intent on eventually diluting federal standards that cover the whole country.

Youth labor force participation declines over the past 20 years reflect that a steadily growing share of young people are choosing to complete high school and obtain additional education in order to increase their long-term employability and earnings. Putting off work in order to obtain more skills and education is a positive trend—for both individuals and the economy—not one that should be slowed or reversed.
https://www.epi.org/publication/child-l ... 56485f06ea
weatheriscool
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Disney World reaches deal with union on minimum $18 hourly wage
Source: CNBC

Unions for service workers at Walt Disney World reached a tentative deal with the company on Thursday that would raise the starting minimum wage from $15 to $18 an hour by the end of the year in a pact that could set the basement for starting pay throughout central Florida’s sprawling tourism industry.

Disney World service workers who are in the six unions that make up the Service Trades Council Union coalition planned to vote next Wednesday on the contract proposal after rejecting an earlier offer that fell short of the $18 hourly minimum wage last month. The agreement covers around 45,000 service workers at the Disney theme park resort outside Orlando. Workers could see their hourly wages rise between $5.50 and $8.60 by the end of the five-year contract if it’s approved, union leaders said.

“Securing an $18 minimum hourly rate this year, increasing the overall economic value of Disney’s original offer, and ensuring full back pay for every worker are the priorities union members were determined to fight for,” said Matt Hollis, head of the coalition of unions. “Today, we won that fight.”

Disney said in a statement that the tentative deal also included “industry-leading” benefits in health insurance coverage and tuition reimbursement. “Our cast members are central to Walt Disney World’s enduring magic, which is why we are pleased to have reached this tentative agreement,” Jeff Vahle, president of Walt Disney World Resort, said in the statement.
Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2023/03/24/disney- ... -wage.html
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LAUSD reaches historic deal, meets demands of union workers following 3-day strike
Source: KTLA.com
The “historic” deal includes a 30% pay increase that Local 99 of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) had been seeking along with a vast expansion of benefits including:

-$2 per hour increase for all employees effective January 1, 2024
-6% ongoing wage increase retroactive to July 1, 2021
-7% ongoing wage increase retroactive to July 1, 2022
-7% ongoing wage increase effective July 1, 2023
-Members working at least part-time (four days or more) or more will receive fully paid healthcare benefits along with their dependents.
-$1,000 bonus for current employees with the district from 2020-21 “during adverse circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.”
-Raise the minimum wage to $22.52 an hour
-Increase hours and compensation for paraprofessionals serving students with special needs
-Invest $3 million in an Education and Professional Development Fund for SEIU members
...

The tentative agreement will be moved to union members to vote for its approval. If approved, the deal could prevent schools from being shuttered again as members were not opposed to another strike if negotiations failed to pan out.

“This week, the eyes of our entire nation were on the cooks, custodians and classroom aides who make education possible in Los Angeles, a workforce overwhelmingly made up of women and people of color,” said Max Arias, Executive Director of SEIU Local 99. “We emerged stronger than ever from this week’s strike and showed the entire nation that unions are the most powerful force for economic opportunity and equity. Members’ sacrifice, courage, and strength – and the solidarity of 35,000 teachers of UTLA – led to this moment.”

Read more: https://ktla.com/news/local-news/lausd- ... l-reached/
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LAUSD schools reopen after 3-day strike ends with no contract settlement for service workers
Source: ABC7 KABC Los Angeles
LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Sudents in the L.A. Unified School District will return to classes Friday following a three-day strike by service workers that shuttered the nation's second-largest school system and culminated in a massive labor rally at Los Angeles State Historic Park.

No new contract came out of the three-day walkout by members of the Service Employees International Union Local 99 -- nor was there any word on whether progress was being made in the contract dispute between the union and the district.

Mayor Karen Bass has been facilitating discussions between the sides, but it remained unclear if the talks were materializing into actual contract negotiations.

Nevertheless, it will be back to school on Friday, as the union confirmed Wednesday night it would hold to its three-day strike strategy.
Read more: https://abc7.com/lausd-strike-reopen-schools/13003708/
weatheriscool
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Chipotle agrees to pay after closing store that sought union
Source: AP

By PATRICK WHITTLE today

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Chipotle Mexican Grill has agreed to pay $240,000 to former employees as part of a settlement stemming from a complaint that the company violated federal law by closing a restaurant where workers wanted to unionize.

Chipotle announced it was permanently closing its Augusta, Maine, location last year after workers filed a National Labor Relations Board petition for a union election. The NLRB later said the closure was illegal.

The Maine location was the first in the chain to file a union petition. The settlement, released by union officials on Monday, states that two dozen employees will receive payments from Chipotle and they will be placed on a preferential hiring list for other Maine locations.

The company must also post a notice in dozens of stores in New England that it won’t close stores or discriminate against employees due to union support, the settlement states.
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/chipotle-uni ... 1bae040181
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Howard Schultz Came Out of Retirement to Destroy Starbucks’ Union—and His Legacy
by Noah Lanard
May June Issue, 2023

Introduction:
(Mother Jones) In November 2021, Victoria Conklin, a 23-year-old shift supervisor at a Starbucks near Buffalo, was talking to Rossann Williams, then the company’s president of North American retail. Workers at three nearby stores had recently petitioned to become the chain’s only unionized locations in the United States, but Conklin’s hadn’t. Williams wanted to keep it that way.

As the company wrapped up its anti-union campaign, Williams told Conklin that a “special guest” was coming in for a big event. “It’s Howard Schultz,” Conklin responded. “Don’t act like it’s Taylor Swift or something.”

Almost four decades before, Schultz had joined Starbucks as an operations and marketing executive. In 1987, he bought the company for $3.8 million, serving as CEO as it grew into the world’s largest coffee business. Starbucks is now worth more than $110 billion, with more employees than Iceland has people. Schultz stepped down, for the third and final time, in March. With a net worth of nearly $4 billion (including a superyacht worth at least $100 million), he’s not the richest tycoon of his generation, but he is emblematic of its self-satisfied paternalism.

In running Starbucks, Schultz claims he set out to protect people like his blue-collar dad, who was “not respected and dignified and did not have any value.” The threat posed by a union, then, was as much psychic as economic: By organizing, his employees were rejecting the protector who Schultz’s father never had and who Schultz thought he’d become by providing benefits like health care for part-time workers. Organizers’ efforts undermined the good billionaire’s faith in the frictionless existence he thought he’d built, buoyed by global adoration, immense wealth, and the gratitude of the workers who created it.

Read more here: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2 ... brooklyn/
Don't mourn, organize.

-Joe Hill
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