layoffs

  • Organize the Unemployed?
    Jenny Brown
    Jan 19 2012 - 12:20pm
    ** Print only

    Wrenching testimonies from laid-off workers are overflowing the internet, crying out from the pages of policy reports, and popping up in commercial media. But unions are still grappling with how to organize the unemployed, including their own ex-members, into a political force.

  • Clericals Say UAW Should Practice What It Preaches

    Clerical workers at United Auto Workers headquarters in Detroit are protesting layoffs that will take effect Friday. They picketed this month carrying signs that read “What about shared sacrifice?” and “Justice for ALL workers.”

  • Koreans Brave Pepper Spray, Thugs to Rally at Crane Sit-In

    About 15,000 rallied in the South Korean port city of Busan last weekend to support a woman welder whose lone sit-in atop a shipyard crane has lasted 208 days.

  • Protests Pay off as California Gets More $ for Education

    Three days after statewide protests and lobbying by California teachers, Governor Jerry Brown earmarked an additional $3 billion for education--a result of many months of massive protests and lobbying across the state.

  • Teachers Are Singled Out in Attacks on Public Employees
    Howard Ryan
    May 4 2011 - 3:00pm

    Like other public employees, teachers find their bargaining rights under fire in the Republican-governed states. But the attacks on teacher job security and the drive to replace public schools with charters are universal—and bipartisan.

  • Mass Teacher Layoffs and School Closures Hit Detroit
    Howard Ryan
    Apr 19 2011 - 6:08pm

    Detroit is now a trendsetter in the dismantling of public schools and stripping of teachers’ union rights. The schools' chief handed layoff notices to all 5,466 teachers and staff, in a bid to pick and choose who stays and who goes.

  • Don't Target Our Mentors, Say Young Teachers

    What damage is done to schools if teaching becomes a revolving door job? Young teachers say they’d prefer not to find out. A group in New York schools called on state leaders this week to preserve “last in, first out” seniority rules.

  • Behind the Layoffs at KPFA Radio

    Executives of the listener-supported radio network Pacifica have moved to take control of the Berkeley flagship station KPFA, laying off unionized staff of a popular drive-time program with no notice. The events are reminiscent of those a decade ago that kicked off a long struggle over control of Pacifica.

  • As Layoffs Hit, NY Transit Workers Push for $5 Worth of Solidarity

    Sunday would have been Sabrina Greenwood’s five-year employment anniversary in New York’s transit system. But she won’t make it: She’ll be laid off Friday. Her union, Transport Workers Local 100, is trying to soften the blow by funding the laid-off workers’ health care with a special $5-a-week assessment from its 35,000 active members.

  • New York Musters to Fight as Layoffs Sweep Mass Transit

    The recession has hammered transit agencies across the country. Some 700 New York City transit workers—mostly bus operators and station agents—have been laid off since May and another 200–300 may be gone by the end of the summer.