Tag: Labor

As If You Needed a Reason not to Fly Delta

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Very disappointed in @Delta here. I assume they will change their attitude towards unions soon, or I’ll do my flights through (international) airlines that do not ridicule worker rights and respect workers’ voices. pic.twitter.com/W2OGKWD2qA

— Cas Mudde 🗣️ (@CasMudde) May 9, 2019

Delta’s contemptible anti-union posters

— Occupy Wall Street (@OccupyWallStNYC) May 10, 2019

The thoroughly appropriate response

Delta has been virulently anti-union throughout its history, but its latest anti-union poster has engendered a particularly trenchant response:

Two posters made by Delta as part of an effort to dissuade thousands of its workers from joining a union drew a torrent of criticism after they were posted on social media Thursday.

The posters included messages targeting the price of the dues that company workers would be paying if the union formed.

“Union dues cost around $700 a year,” one noted. “A new video game system with the latest hits sounds like fun. Put your money towards that instead of paying dues to the union.”

The other, with a picture of a football, was framed similarly.

………

In the charged world of social media, in which talk about socialism and the evils of unfettered capitalism percolates in the conversations of an invigorated left, the posters fell with a thud.

………

James Carlson, a coordinator with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace workers, the union which has been working to organize the workers, said he did not know where the poster was distributed but said an employee had sent it to him earlier. He said that Delta has been papering its employee break rooms with anti-union fliers.

“Some are like what you saw today — a stupid, insulting message to spend your money on a video game system instead of union dues,” he said. “They try to interfere with the employees’ exercise of freedom of association. And that’s not allowed.”

I happen to agree with Occupy Wallstreet’s response, extolling the cost benefit ratio of guillotines, to be wonderfully cheeky.

Good News from Illinois

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Not a common phrase, particularly with regard to legislation and politics, but post Bruce Rauner, it does look promising.

The state legislature has passed, and governor has signed, a law banning local right-to-work ordinances:

In a complete 180, the new Governor of Illinois J.B. Pritzker has signed a bill into law that would make local Right to Work laws illegal in the state. The new law, which takes effect immediately, was passed with overwhelming support from the State Senate and the State Assembly. It had been previously blocked by the Republican Governor Bruce Rauner.

The change comes after four years of anti-union policies coming out of the Governor’s mansion. Rauner was not only a major proponent of local Right to Work, but he was also a catalyst for encouraging Mark Janus to sue his union, AFSCME so that he would not have to pay fair share fees.

The need for the ban came after Lincolnshire, a northern suburb of Chicago, passed a local Right to Work law in 2015. The law created a legal gray area for Lincolnshire employees since Illinois is a free bargaining state. The new law also brings state law into line with lower court rulings that have affirmed the states right to determine whether local employees should pay agency fees.

Pritzker, much to my surprise, has also proposed amending the state constitution to allow for a progressive income tax.

Here’s hoping that this initiative is successful as well.

Walking the Walk, Bernie Sanders Again

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Sanders campaign staff is going to join a union:

Employees on Sen. Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign are joining a labor union, officials announced Friday, a historic move that comes amid a Democratic primary featuring intense competition for working-class voters.

All campaign employees below the rank of deputy director will be represented by the United Food & Commercial Workers Local 400, the union said, adding that it will start negotiating a collective bargaining agreement as soon as possible.

“We expect this will mean pay parity and transparency on the campaign, with no gender bias or harassment, and equal treatment for every worker, whether they’re in Washington, D.C., Iowa, New Hampshire or anywhere else,” UFCW Local 400 President Mark Federici said in a statement.

Sanders (I-Vt.) has faced questions about the way his 2016 campaign handled allegations of sexual misconduct. Asked if the effort to unionize was a response to that, Jonathan Williams, the communications director for UFCW Local 400, said it was not. A Sanders spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on that question.

The Sanders campaign applauded the move to unionize its members.

“We’re honored that his campaign will be the first to have a unionized workforce,” said Sanders campaign manager Faiz Shakir in a statement. The campaign said it helped pave the way for its workers to organize and did not require an election.

Bernie is walking the walk, unlike, for example, the sexual harassment in the Gillibrand Senate office, and the abusive environment in Klobuchar’s Senate office.

I think that a lot of the Democratic Presidential candidates are trying very hard to fake authenticity, and it shows.

Bernie Sanders Walking the Walk

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Bernie Sanders is all over the strike at Wabtec in Erie, PA.

GE sold the plant to Wabtec a few days ago, and Wabtec has attempted to invalidate the union agreement: (Full disclosure, I worked there from 1994-1996)

When 1,700 members of United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America Locals 506 and 618 struck at the sprawling Wabtec locomotive plant in Erie, Pennsylvania, Tuesday morning, they got an immediate show of solidarity from one of the most prominent political figures in the United States.

“Americans are sick and tired of corporate America and their wealthy CEOs ripping off working families,” announced Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, in a tweet dispatched shortly after the picket line was established. “I’m proud to stand with the locomotive manufacturing workers of @ueunion Local 506 and 618 in their fight against GE/Wabtec to maintain decent wages and working conditions.”

That’s the right response from a contender for the Democratic nomination for the presidency. Democrats have to stand in outspoken solidarity with workers, especially when their unions are struggling to preserve manufacturing jobs and maintain fair wages in historic urban and industrial centers such as Erie.

………

The strike in Erie pits a union with deep roots in Western Pennsylvania and American manufacturing against a powerful multinational corporation—Webtec (Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies Corporation)—that, after taking charge this week of a former GE Transportation manufacturing facility, has refused to maintain existing protections for workers. “We are extremely disappointed that the company could not see its way to agree to continue the terms and conditions that we have worked under for decades. Their refusal leaves us with no choice but to go out on strike to protect our members’ and our children’s future,” says UE Local 506 president Scott Slawson.

According to UE: “Wabtec’s terms and conditions, which they imposed when they took over the plant on Monday, include the introduction of mandatory overtime and arbitrary schedules, wage reductions of up to 38 percent for recalled and newly-hired workers, and the right to use temporary workers for up to 20 percent of the work in the plant.”

………

Sanders has been in the thick of this fight. Last week, he wrote Wabtec CEO Raymond Betler a letter that called out the new boss for trying to squeeze concessions out of workers. “Let’s be clear,” noted Sanders. “Wabtec is not a poor company. It is not going broke. Through the first three quarters of last year, Wabtec made a $256 million profit and had enough money to give you a $3.5 million compensation package.”

“Corporate executives must not use the merger between GE and Wabtec to hurt workers,” wrote the senator, who argued that “the Wabtec/GE merger should not be used to take away the hard-fought gains UE has achieved over the past several decades.”

Sanders promised to “provide my full support and solidarity to the workers at this plant to ensure that they achieve a fair and equitable collective bargaining agreement.” And he has done just that, using his considerable social-media presence and public appearances (including a CNN Town Hall event Monday night) to focus attention on what he has described as a struggle that has meaning for “working Americans everywhere.”

From the rest of the voluminous Democratic Presidential field?  **Crickets**

To a large degree, my experience at GE Transportation Systems (GETS) (now Wabtec) is responsible for my political move left in my middle age.

It was a contentious labor environment, and management, primarily the big bosses at the Connecticut headquarters loathed the union, and the workers.

I wholeheartedly support the strikers.

Tweet of the Day

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The CA Labor Commissioner has fined a construction contractor $12 million for wage theft and other violations committed over 3 years against 1,000 workers. Rather than just back pay and fines, bosses who steal from their employees on this scale should be locked up. https://t.co/kZ3arrOf1B

— DC (@costadaniel) February 12, 2019

Yes, and also apply the much maligned asset forfeiture laws to this as well.

That Sound You Hear is Eric Arthur Blair* Spinning in His Grave

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The head of the Federal Labor Relations Authority, the agency charged with making sure that the US Government abides by its labor agreements, has decertified it’s own union:

The chairwoman of an agency tasked with resolving disputes between federal employee unions and management at federal agencies recently decided to cease recognition of the organization’s own labor group.

Federal Labor Relations Authority Chairwoman Colleen Duffy Kiko announced the decision in a letter to the Union of Authority Employees last December, the day after the union’s collective bargaining agreement had expired. She argued that because the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act exempted the FLRA from rules requiring agencies to recognize labor unions in the federal government, the agency has been breaking the law by working with the union.

………

The decision goes against a 1980 legal opinion from the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel that stated that although there lacks any legislative record explaining the decision to exempt the FLRA from the statute, the legislative text likely is meant to prevent conflicts of interest, wherein FLRA employees could be investigating disputes between their union and the agency. The opinion cited the late Rep. Morris Udall, D-Ariz., one of the architects of the law.

………

Indeed, Union of Authority Employees acting President Fernando Colón said that for four decades, his labor organization has had a successful relationship with FLRA management, despite several restrictions unique in the federal sector. Unlike most bargaining units, the union cannot appeal arbitration decisions to an administrative body—the FLRA can simply choose whether or not to enforce a grievance award.

………

Colón said he fears the move will further erode public trust in the agency tasked with adjudicating labor-management disputes in the federal government. President Trump has neglected to appoint a general counsel to the agency, all but blocking new complaints from reaching the board. And in a lawsuit filed last week, the National Education Association, a union representing teachers and other education employees at Defense Department schools, accused the FLRA of systemic bias, noting that members frequently overturned decisions in favor of unions, but upheld every single decision that favored management.

This whole “Fox in the Hen House” bullsh%$ that the Trump administration is really getting old.

*George Orwell.

Teachers Just Won Another Strike

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Something odd is going on in this country, and the successful action by the Denver Teachers’ Union is a part of what I hope is a change in our political culture:
Denver’s teachers may soon be returning to school.

More than 2,000 educators, who have been on strike since Monday, said they reached a tentative deal Thursday with the local school district.

Details are not yet available, but the deal includes an average 11.7 percent pay raise and annual cost of living increases, according to the school district and the Denver Classroom Teachers Association, a labor union representing more than 5,000 educators in Denver public schools. It will also include raises for school support staff. Bus drivers and cafeteria workers may also get a raise, but that’s not part of the official agreement with the teachers union.

It also addresses the teachers’ biggest concern: the need to overhaul the merit-pay system, which relies heavily on annual bonuses that fluctuate from year to year. The new system will place more emphasis on education and training when considering promotions, while keeping some bonuses in place.

Where will they find the $23 million to pay for this? The district agreed to cut back on administrative costs, and will eliminate about 150 positions in the school’s central office. Five-figure bonuses for senior school administrators will also come to an end.

5 figure bonuses for senior school administrators?

Am I the only one who thinks that America’s managerial class behaves a lot more like pillaging Vikings than they do stewards of their domains?

Speaking of Chicken Sh%$s

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Amid record profits, GM is shuttering Canadian plants, and moving production to Mexico, and the Canadian auto union Unifor has run a Super Bowl ad condemning the move.

GM has responded by threatening to sue the labor union:

The Canadian trade union Unifor is pissed that GM is shutting down the Oshawa Assembly Plant, which has a long and rich history spanning over 100 years. GM says on its website that the facility—which now builds the Cadillac XTS, Chevy Impala, Chevy Silverado, and GMC Sierra—has been open since 1953, but that before that, it built McLaughlin Buicks and Chevrolets prior to The Bowtie merging with GM in 1918.

Despite all of that history, in 2018, GM announced plans to close the historic manufacturing site. Shortly thereafter, workers walked out in protest, and the president of Unifor, the trade union representing the plant workers, voiced his displeasure, saying “They are not closing our damn plant without one hell of a fight,” per CTV News.
But last night, during the Super Bowl, the battle between Unifor and GM got heated, with the former unleashing this commercial in Canada:

The commercial is scathing, mentioning how Canada helped GM with the bailout last decade, and criticizing the company’s expansion into Mexico. “GM, you may have forgotten our generosity,” the commercial concludes, “but we’ll never forget your greed. If you want to sell here, build here.”

 According to the Detroit News, GM wasn’t thrilled, and even threatened legal action:

Who knew that the automobile manufacturer was such a bunch of beautiful cinnamon rolls who are too good for this world?

In related news, Unifor is also calling for a boycott of Mexican made vehicles.

If the VIN starts with the number “3”, it’s from Mexico.

A Deal Inked in LA Teachers’ Strike

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And true to their word, the contract is primarily about protecting the public school system from the predations of the hedge fund crowd:

What was going to be a fierce morning march on school district headquarters became a celebration instead Tuesday as thousands of striking teachers learned of a tentative agreement to end a six-day strike.

“You just taught the best lesson of your life,” union President Alex Caputo-Pearl told a sea of supporters in union-red T-shirts gathered in Grand Park.………

“Public education is now the topic in every household in our community,” he said. “Let’s capitalize on that. Let’s fix it.”

“We can’t solve 40 years of underinvestment in public education in just one week or just one contract,” he said.

The Board of Education is expected to move quickly to ratify the deal. Board members convened a morning closed session to review and discuss it. The deal also must be approved by United Teachers Los Angeles through a vote of its members.

………

The tentative deal includes what amounts to a 6% raise for teachers — with a 3% raise for the last school year and a 3% raise for this school year. (Teachers also lost about 3% of their salary by being on strike for six days, according to the school district.)

This 6% offer had been on the table before teachers went on strike, but the walkout was always about more than salary.

The agreement, which runs through June 2022, also includes a reduction of class sizes over four years to levels in the previous contract, but removes a contract provision that has allowed the school district to increase class sizes in times of economic hardship, Caputo-Pearl said in an interview. It was not immediately clear how that issue would be dealt with going forward.

………

Under the agreement, the district agreed to create 30 community schools — a model that has been tried in Cincinnati and Austin, Texas. These schools are supposed to provide social services to students and family, rich academic programs that include the arts and leadership roles for parents and teachers.

The district also agreed to expand to 28 the number of schools that will no longer conduct random searches of middle and high school students. That provision was especially important to students who marched in support of their teachers.

What is remarkable is just how much support that the UTLA has received throughout the entire strike was amazing.

I hope that this is an indicator of some sort of sea change in society, but I fear that it is not.

It’s On

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The teachers of the Los Angeles Unified School District have gone on strike, meaning that over 30,000 teachers will be on the picket lines, 500,000 students will be out, and 900 schools will be shuttered.

You will see a lot about pay and benefits, but this is really about the leadership of the LAUSD wanting to starve the public schools to feed the charter school industry:


More than 30,000 Los Angeles public-school teachers began the largest school strike in the country on Monday and the first in three decades in the district. Holding plastic-covered signs on rain-drenched picket lines across the city, they demanded higher pay, smaller classes and more support staff in schools.

The strike effectively shut down learning for roughly 500,000 students at 900 schools in the district, the second-largest public school system in the nation. The schools remained open, staffed by substitutes hired by the city, but many parents chose to keep their children at home, either out of support for the strike or because they did not want them inside schools with a skeletal staff.

With negotiations apparently at a standstill, the strike could last days or even weeks.

The decision to walk off the job came after months of negotiations between the teachers’ union, United Teachers Los Angeles, and the Los Angeles Unified School District. Although educators on all sides agree California should spend more money on education, the union and the district are locked in a bitter feud about how Los Angeles should use the money it already gets.

The above article only mentions charter schools by accident, but when you actually listen to the teachers, it is clears that looting by charter schools, and incessant high stakes testing, are the top of the list of grievances.

First, You Burn down Parliament, and THEN You Go with Slave Labor

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It appears that Hungarian PM Viktor Orban has moved too quickly to make slave labor a reality in his country:

Viktor Orban, the far-right prime minister of Hungary, has been confronted by an unusually persistent wave of street protests after pushing through a bill this month that could require workers to put in up to 400 hours of overtime — a measure that opponents call a “slave law.”

 About 5,000 demonstrators took to the streets of Budapest again on Friday, after President Janos Ader signed the bill into law. In a radio interview Friday morning, Mr. Orban dismissed opposition to the changes as “hysterical shouting.”

 Since re-entering office in 2010, Mr. Orban has made a series of moves that have set off alarms among European allies and others in Hungary: curbing judicial independence, restricting news media freedom and plurality, and blatantly enriching his business allies. But few of his actions have ignited such anger as the changes to the labor law.

 What does the law say?

 The amendments to the Hungarian labor code passed by the governing majority in Parliament raise the yearly cap on overtime to 400 hours from 250, and gives companies three years instead of one to pay for the work.

 In some cases it also lets them avoid paying extra for overtime, allowing them to compensate some employees at their regular hourly rate instead, experts said.

………

Analysts say the labor law changes have struck a rare chord among ordinary Hungarians, including outside the opposition heartland of the capital, Budapest, because the issue affects their daily lives.

………

Why did the government take this step?

The government needs Hungarians to accept longer hours because the country is running out of workers.

As many as 350,000 Hungarians, or more than 5 percent of the country’s working-age population, are working in another part of the European Union, according to Mr. Kollo.

These people have left to work elsewhere because pay is complete sh%$ in Hungary.

You have people voting with their feet.

Opponents of the changes argue that they were passed as a favor to multinational companies like German automakers, which have built plants in the country in recent years and whose economic model depends on a cheap and flexible work force.

And there you have it:  It’s a desperate race to the bottom, and this is a (possibly the) core EU value, which, ironically enough, has denied Orban the freedom of action that (for example) Mussolini had in the 1920s.

It will be fascinating to see where this ends, but my guess is that it’s time for the ordinary Hungarian to get the f%$# out of Dodge.

Qu’ils Mangent De La Brioche

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The French police are seriously considering joining the gilets jaunes protesters because of how they have been treated:

The French government is desperately trying to keep its exhausted police force onside following weeks of violent protests demanding economic reforms, improved living standards and the resignation of President Emmanuel Macron.

On Wednesday, French officials met with police trade union leaders to work out a deal to soothe anger in law enforcement ranks regarding overwork, unpaid overtime and difficult working conditions, Le Monde reported.

………

Police have accumulated some 23 million hours of overtime that is yet to be paid. According to The Local France, police union leader Frédéric Lagache explained, “Faced with this irresponsibility [of the government], we are forced to be irresponsible in our actions.”

It really is remarkable just how badly Macron is screwing this all up.

I’m waiting for him to start a speech with, well, you know.

Fröhliche Weihnachten Motherf%$#er

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Amazon workers in Germany have just gone on strike:

Workers at two Amazon distribution centers in Germany have gone on strike as part of a push for improved work conditions, leading to fears that Christmas orders may not arrive in time.

The German news agency dpa reported that workers in Leipzig in eastern Germany and Werne in western Germany went on strike early Monday.

The ver.di union representing the workers says Amazon employees receive lower wages than others in retail and mail-order jobs in Germany.

Merry Christmas, Jeff Bezos.

It Sucks to be Uber, Too.

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The New Work City Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) just imposed a minimum hourly wage on Uber and Lyft:

The city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) said on Tuesday that it passed rules that will require “high volume” drivers of for-hire vehicles to receive a wage per trip that corresponds to $27.86 per hour, or $17.22 after expenses. The rules will go into effect in mid-January.

“New York City is the first city globally to recognize that the tens of thousands of men and women who are responsible for providing increasingly popular rides that begin with the touch of a screen deserve to make a livable wage and protection against companies from unilaterally reducing it,” TLC chair Meera Joshi said in a statement.

According to the commission, the rules will result in the equivalent of a $10,000 annual raise for 96% of New York City’s Uber, Lyft, Juno, and Via drivers. A report commissioned by the TLC found that median earnings for high-volume drivers of for-hire vehicles decreased by over 10% between 2016 and 2017.

………

The New York City Council in August voted in favor of establishing a minimum wage for ride-hailing drivers and preventing ride-hailing services from hiring new drivers for a year. The decision came after a report from transportation analyst Bruce Schaller that said ride-hailing services increased traffic congestion.

In July, the New York Unemployment Insurance Appeal Board issued a ruling that requires Uber to provide unemployment benefits for its drivers.

Increasingly, people are coming to realize that Uber, Lyft, and the rest of the, “Gig Economy,” are little more than con men who are personally profiting from negative externalities, much like polluters, the banksters, and spammers.

More of This

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Acero, a large public school chain in the Chicago area, has the dubious distinction of being the first charter school in the nation to have its teachers strike:

Hundreds of educators at Chicago’s Acero charter schools walked off the job Tuesday morning, halting classes for 7,500 predominantly Latino students and launching the nation’s first strike over a contract at the independently operated campuses.

Backed by affiliates at the Chicago Teachers Union, the charter network’s teachers said they would not return to work after what they described as a series of fruitless negotiations with management.

“We’re going to stay on strike until we get educational justice for the people who work in Acero charter schools,” CTU President Jesse Sharkey said outside the charter network’s empty Zizumbo elementary school campus as dozens of picketers settled in. “We’re going to stay on strike until the students at Acero charter schools get the resources into their classrooms that they need to do their jobs.”

The charter network cancelled all classes, athletics and extracurricular activities. School buildings will remain open with group activities supervised by nonunion staff members, though parents were encouraged to keep children at home or at nearby parks and community facilities.

Acero’s chief executive blasted the walkout as the product of an “anti-charter political agenda.”

………

The CTU has said key issues include reduced class sizes, maternity and paternity leave, a revamped teacher evaluation system and better pay. The union said they were also unable to secure commitments on special education services and guaranteed protections for undocumented students and families.

I am surprised that this has taken so long.

The underlying business plan of most charter schools is to treat their teachers like garbage.

God: 1 – Man Who Thinks that He is God: 0

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Specifically, I am referring to Jeff Bezos.

It appears that Amazon has been forced into private negotiations in Minnesota, because they were f%$#ing with the state mandated prayer breaks for its Somali immigrant workers.

Normally, immigrants tend to be less demanding, and harder to organize, because they remember how things were back home, but when you try to go after their religion  ……… BOOM!!!

Soon after Hibaq Mohamed immigrated to Minneapolis from Kenya, where she had been living as a refugee, in 2016 she got a job at a new Amazon warehouse near the city. At first, she enjoyed packing boxes for delivery to consumers.

 But over time, she said, Amazon required her and her co-workers to pack at a faster rate, at least 230 items an hour, up from 160. Ms. Mohamed, who is Muslim, said that Amazon let her take paid breaks to pray, as required by state law, but that her managers had told her that she still needed to keep pace.

 “There is just pressure,” Ms. Mohamed, 24, said. “The people they don’t fire worry one day they will be fired.”

 Ms. Mohamed and scores of East African colleagues, many of them, like her, born in Somalia, responded in an unusual way for Amazon workers: They organized to complain.

Now, tied together by a close cultural connection and empowered by a tight labor market, they appear to be the first known group in the United States to get Amazon management to negotiate.

………

Last week, Amazon offered some compromises at its facilities in the Minneapolis area. The company said it would require a general manager and a Somali-speaking manager to agree on any firings related to productivity rates, designate a manager to respond to individual complaints within five days and meet with workers quarterly.

Jeff Bezos’ tears are sweet.

This is Bullsh%$

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Trump’s people on the NLRB has effectively banned union picketers when they are employed by contractors:

An all-Republican panel of President Trump’s National Labor Relation Board (NLRB) recently ruled that janitors in San Francisco violated the law when they picketed in front of their workplace to win higher wages, better working conditions and freedom from sexual harassment in their workplace. The ruling could result in far-reaching restrictions on picketing that limit the ability of labor unions to put public pressure on management.

The NLRB reached its conclusion by using the complex and convoluted employment structure created by the janitors’ employers. The janitors were technically employed by one company, Ortiz Janitorial Services, which was subcontracted by another company, Preferred Building Services, to work in the building of a third company.

………

The NLRB based its decision on a particularly onerous provision in federal labor law that prohibits employees from engaging in boycotts, pickets or other activities that are aimed at a secondary employer. The provision was added as part of the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act, taking away one of labor’s most powerful weapons.

In this case, the NLRB overturned an administrative law judge’s ruling that because the second company had significant control over the employment relationship, it constituted a joint employer. The judge based her conclusion on evidence that Preferred Building Services was involved in the hiring, firing, disciplining, supervision, direction of work, and other terms and conditions of the janitors’ employment with Ortiz Janitorial Services. Therefore, both Ortiz and Preferred acted as joint employers to the janitors.

When Obama entered office, he dropped support for card check so fast it made your head spin.

Among other things, the Democratic Party needs to be more than a f%$#ing ratchet, where, whenever the Democrats take power, every reactionary action of the Republicans is never, ever reversed.

Not a Surprise

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Since Amazon’s takeover of Whole Foods, the lot of its employees has deteriorated.

There have been benefit cuts, layoffs, and the implementation of a new centralized inventory system that has led to empty shelves and crushed worker morale.

Think of it as the, “Amazon Way,” transferred from their hellhole warehouses to the local grocery store.

Now there is an aggressive effort to unionize, which is not a suprise

From the moment that Whole Foods sold out to Amazon, it was clear that the lip service that the grocer had paid to treating its employees well was, to quote Ron Zeigler, “Inoperative”:

A group of workers at Whole Foods Market is leading an effort to establish a union for the Amazon-owned company’s 85,000+ workforce.

 In a letter addressed to Whole Foods employees, the group — members of Whole Foods’ cross-regional committee — wrote that they are “concerned about the direction” of Whole Foods in an Amazon era. The letter outlines several demands, including a $15 minimum wage for all employees, 401k matching, paid maternity leave, lower health insurance deductibles and more.

 “We cannot let Amazon remake the entire North American retail landscape without embracing the full value of its team members. The success of Amazon and [Whole Foods] should not come at the cost of exploiting our dedication and threatening our economic stability,” they wrote.

 ………

 The letter, which calls out both Jeff Bezos and Whole Foods’ CEO John Mackey directly, says there will “continue to be layoffs in 2019 and beyond as Amazon aims to aggressively trim our labor force before it expands with new technology and labor models.”

 Since the Amazon acquisition, several hundred Whole Foods workers have been laid-off as Amazon infuses “Whole Foods with its efficient, data-driven ethos,” per The Wall Street Journal. Shoppers, however, have saved millions as a result of the shake-up.

………

 Here’s the full letter, obtained by New Food Economy.

Silicon Valley Rules: When the Going Gets Tough, Hire Lobbyists

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In response to a state court ruling saying that workers for Uber, Lyft, Instacart, etc. are employees, the “gig” companies are lobbying for a law change.

They knew that their business plans, which included meticulous tracking of so-called “independent contractors” ran afoul of the law, ignored this, and now they want the law changed to validate their criminality.

F%$# that.

These guys, who see themselves as Randian supermen, may not get it, but their businesses are predicated on a subsidy from the rest of society.

Not having to pay unemployment, workmens comp, foisting liability on underpaid workers, etc. is more than a violation of the law:  It is a subsidy from the rest of us to line their pockets:

Leading gig economy companies including Uber and Lyft are quietly lobbying California’s top Democrats to override or undermine a court ruling that could make many of their contract workers into employees.

In April, the California Supreme Court issued a far-reaching ruling which could make it much harder for companies to claim their workforces of independent contractors are not full-fledged employees under the state’s wage laws. Over the months since, business leaders have been pleading their case to state officials including members of Governor Jerry Brown’s cabinet, Brown’s presumed successor Gavin Newsom, and members of the state legislature.

The business leaders are pushing to blunt the ruling’s impact, either through legislation or through executive action by the governor — moves that would reverberate across the national debate over the rights and roles of workers in the modern gig economy, and what Democrats’ posture toward tech companies should be.

Let me translate the next of bullsh%$ bingo that is coming from the lobbyists:

An executive at one of the companies behind the push, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that because Brown and Newsom are both pro-tech and pro-worker, they are uniquely positioned to strike a compromise with the potential to be replicated. Forging a balance between the need for flexible, scalable work arrangements and workers’ rights shouldn’t just be left to the courts or calculated based on old models, the executive said.

We broke the law, but let us continue to do so, and we’ll transfer some of our ill-gotten gains to your campaign coffers:  We need your subsidies to survive.

Mind you they don’t see this as a subsidy, they see it as disruption, but they will have a very tough time competing, and a tougher time raising massive amounts of venture capital, if they have to treat their employees fairly:

The April ruling in the California case, Dynamex Operations West Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles, established what’s sometimes called an “ABC” test for enforcement of the state’s wage laws. Among the key elements of the new standard, which is more stringent than most states’ or the federal government’s, is the determination that people are employees of a company unless they are conducting “work that is outside the usual course” of the company’s business. For businesses whose core capacity is delivering a service to customers via an army of workers classified as independent contractors, that could be a challenging test to pass.

 The court ruling applied only to California, but companies worry that, along with upending their operations in the nation’s most populous state, it could be a harbinger of things to come elsewhere. The week after the Dynamex decision, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders introduced a bill — backed by a handful of fellow potential contenders for the Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential nomination — that would make an equivalent ABC test the standard for federal labor laws, like who has the right to unionize.

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Leading gig economy companies including Uber and Lyft are quietly lobbying California’s top Democrats to override or undermine a court ruling that could make many of their contract workers into employees.

In April, the California Supreme Court issued a far-reaching ruling which could make it much harder for companies to claim their workforces of independent contractors are not full-fledged employees under the state’s wage laws. Over the months since, business leaders have been pleading their case to state officials including members of Governor Jerry Brown’s cabinet, Brown’s presumed successor Gavin Newsom, and members of the state legislature.

The business leaders are pushing to blunt the ruling’s impact, either through legislation or through executive action by the governor — moves that would reverberate across the national debate over the rights and roles of workers in the modern gig economy, and what Democrats’ posture toward tech companies should be.

“The magnitude of this issue requires urgent leadership,” nine companies wrote in a July 23 letter reviewed by Bloomberg, which warns of the ruling “stifling innovation and threatening the livelihoods of millions of working Californians” and says that without political intervention it will “decimate businesses.” The letter was sent on behalf of Uber Technologies Inc., Lyft Inc., Instacart Inc., DoorDash Inc., Postmates Inc., TaskRabbit Inc., Square Inc., Total System Services Inc. and Handy Technologies Inc. It was addressed to the governor’s secretary of labor and cabinet secretary.

A spokeswoman for the governor’s office declined to comment on whether Brown, whose final term ends in January, was mulling granting the companies’ pleas.

An executive at one of the companies behind the push, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that because Brown and Newsom are both pro-tech and pro-worker, they are uniquely positioned to strike a compromise with the potential to be replicated. Forging a balance between the need for flexible, scalable work arrangements and workers’ rights shouldn’t just be left to the courts or calculated based on old models, the executive said.

Spokespeople for Lyft, Handy, TaskRabbit, Square, Postmates and Instacart declined to comment on the companies’ lobbying efforts. DoorDash did not respond to inquiries. Spokespeople for TSYS and Uber referred requests for comment to the California Chamber of Commerce, which has been an outspoken opponent of the new requirements. “If you have a business model that doesn’t lend itself to the strict structure that an employer-employee relationship dictates,” said the Chamber’s president and CEO Allan Zaremberg, then the ruling “puts you in a situation that it’s almost impossible to continue your business model.”

Zaremberg declined to comment on the prospect of executive action from the governor’s office, but said the Chamber aims to get a legislative fix introduced and passed by the state’s assembly and senate before the legislative session closes at the end of the month. Without it, he said, workers and companies alike will be “hamstrung,” and whole sectors of California’s economy could be in jeopardy. “People depend very much now on an on-demand economy,” said Zaremberg. “In the worst-case scenario, it isn’t a viable business model anymore.”

The California Labor Federation pledged Sunday to resist the efforts to suspend or reverse the ruling. “With income inequality at an all-time high and millions of working families struggling to survive in this unfair economy, why would our state’s leaders intervene to protect big corporations from paying the wages owed to their workers?” said the group’s legislative director Caitlin Vega.

Federal and California state laws entitle employees to a suite of rights including minimum wage, overtime pay, protection from sexual harassment, payroll tax contributions from employers and the chance to win collective bargaining. Those perks don’t extend to independent contractors, a category for workers with greater autonomy to choose the terms of their work. The boundary between an employee and a contractor can be fuzzy, though, and is defined differently under different laws. The question of who gets employee protections has been hotly contested in a slew of government agency proceedings and lawsuits around the country, frequently targeting app-based sectors like ride-sharing as well as older industries such as trucking and health care.

The April ruling in the California case, Dynamex Operations West Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles, established what’s sometimes called an “ABC” test for enforcement of the state’s wage laws. Among the key elements of the new standard, which is more stringent than most states’ or the federal government’s, is the determination that people are employees of a company unless they are conducting “work that is outside the usual course” of the company’s business. For businesses whose core capacity is delivering a service to customers via an army of workers classified as independent contractors, that could be a challenging test to pass.

The court ruling applied only to California, but companies worry that, along with upending their operations in the nation’s most populous state, it could be a harbinger of things to come elsewhere. The week after the Dynamex decision, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders introduced a bill — backed by a handful of fellow potential contenders for the Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential nomination — that would make an equivalent ABC test the standard for federal labor laws, like who has the right to unionize.

Rather than treating that as an idle threat, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has already been lobbying congressional offices about the bill, according to federal disclosures. In meetings with U.S. Senate staff, business leaders have been emphasizing the downsides of Dynamex’s ABC test, according to a person familiar with the conversations. Getting Democratically controlled California to pump the breaks on its new court-decreed standard could also have a significant impact on national-level discussions.

In their letter to Governor Brown, the businesses floated options to curtail the ruling’s influence. Those included issuing an executive order barring state agencies from implementing the ABC test, reviving a defunct state commission that could amend it and passing legislation that would suspend it. The companies cite an estimate by the pro-free-market research group R Street Institute that more than 300,000 California workers could be newly considered employees rather than independent contractors due to the ruling. Once the imminent damage from Dynamex is averted, the companies say in the letter, there could be “a robust legislative discussion about how we can collectively invest to protect worker voices and benefits” in the new economy, as well as a “balanced test” for who is an employee.

Besides the letter, the companies have also met with the governors’ office to plead their case, according to a person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified because the meetings were private. And they have discussed the issue with the Democrats who lead the state’s assembly and senate and with Lieutenant Governor Newsom. Spokespeople for Newsom, Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and Senate President Pro Tempore Toni Atkins declined to comment.

Gig-economy startups aren’t the only companies concerned. The “I’m Independent” Coalition, a project of the California Chamber of Commerce devoted to opposing the ABC test, also counts the Internet Association as a backer. The association’s members include Google, Amazon and Facebook, all of which also hire contractors. “The internet industry is concerned about the implications of the Dynamex ruling and its potential to jeopardize internet-enabled, freelance work,” the association’s California government affairs director Kevin McKinley said in an emailed statement.

The Chamber’s coalition also includes the state associations representing restaurants, retailers, publishers, hospitals, shopping centers, child-care providers, farms, grape growers, manufacturers, trucking, taxis, ambulances and insurers. The coalition has gathered statements from workers about why they prefer to be classified as contractors, and is working to mobilize some for an Aug. 15 rally at the state capitol in Sacramento.

Company officials are also urging their own workers to join the cause. On Thursday, DoorDash sent an email to its “California Dashers” telling them that the Dynamex ruling threatens their “flexibility to choose when, where and how you want to work,” and providing a web tool to send their state legislators a message asking them “to help protect my freedom to choose the way I work.”

Attorney Shannon Liss-Riordan, who represents a worker suing DoorDash, responded by filing a motion Friday in federal court asking a judge to enjoin the company from “engaging in further coercive and misleading communications” that she alleged encourage workers covered by her putative class action lawsuit to “undermine their claims” in the case. DoorDash did not respond to inquiries.

Workers’ advocates have argued that responsible companies should welcome the clarity of the court’s April ruling. “It’s been a bit of a free-for-all, particularly in California, where a whole economy of companies has risen up in recent years saying that they can build their workforce off of workers that don’t have any employment protections,” said Liss-Riordan, who also represents workers currently suing other gig economy companies including Uber, Lyft and Postmates over alleged denials of employee rights (the companies have denied wrongdoing).

Labor advocates say there’s no reason for California to water down workers’ rights. “These companies continue to have choices about their business model,” union leaders from the state’s building trades, Teamsters union affiliates, and AFL-CIO chapter told Governor Brown and legislative leaders in a July letter reviewed by Bloomberg. “They can convert workers to employees and retain control over their work rules and their rates. Or they can contract with true independent contractors. The only thing they can’t do after Dynamex is have their cake and eat it too.”

I prefer to to call them moochers, but, “Have their cake and eat it too,” works too.