Magazine

  • Quebec Steelworkers Face Mining Pariah
    Jocelyn Desjardins
    May 24 2012 - 1:10pm
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    In a town of 30,000, when 8,000 demonstrate, it does not go unnoticed.

    In the small community of Alma in southern Quebec, unions gathered on March 31 for a solidarity march to denounce the lockout of 780 aluminum workers. They came from from all over Quebec and Canada and from a dozen countries where the multinational mining giant Rio Tinto has installations.

  • No Relief in Sight as Postal Service Pushes Ahead with Cuts
    Theresa Moran
    May 24 2012 - 12:48pm
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    When the Senate passed a bill on April 25 meant to provide relief to the financially struggling post office, postal activists shrugged.

    Neither chamber of Congress is adequately addressing the root cause of the Postal Service budget crisis, they say. Absent a fix, Postmaster General Patrick Donohoe’s plans for massive cuts to jobs and services soon will be underway for postal workers and communities nationwide.

  • Secondary Targets Can Be Union's Primary Focus
    Robert M. Schwartz
    May 24 2012 - 12:19pm
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    It may come as a surprise to some unionists, but the National Labor Relations Act does not prohibit boycott campaigns against neutral or secondary companies. Although the Taft-Hartley amendments of 1947 are frequently described (even on some union websites) as a ban on “secondary boycotts,” this term does not appear in the law.

  • Will Massachusetts Teachers 'Stand' Against Attacks?
    Dan Clawson
    May 24 2012 - 12:01pm
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    Under assault from the misnamed Stand for Children, teachers in Massachusetts are about to give up seniority as a criterion for layoffs, and give principals greatly increased power over personnel issues.

  • Farmworkers Push Tobacco Giant Reynolds to the Table
    Eduardo Soriano-Castillo
    May 24 2012 - 11:55am
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    The perseverance of Farm Labor Organizing Committee activists in North Carolina paid off in early April when Reynolds American finally agreed to meet with the union. FLOC has been demanding since 2008 that the tobacco giant discuss working conditions for tobacco pickers.

  • Wisconsin Recall Re-Run
    Jim Cavanaugh
    May 24 2012 - 11:45am
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    The June 5 Wisconsin recall election will be a replay of November 2010—Governor Scott Walker vs. Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett.

    Barrett swamped his closest rival, Kathleen Falk, in the May 8 Democratic primary 58 to 34 percent. Falk had the endorsement of all the large public sector unions (and $4 million for TV ads) and the state AFL-CIO. She had some environmental groups and Emily’s List, too.

  • Trade Heads Are Secretly Crafting NAFTA of the Pacific
    Cynthia Phinney
    May 24 2012 - 11:34am
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    The latest project of corporations seeking to remove barriers to movement of capital around the globe is the Trans Pacific Partnership, known by activists as “NAFTA of the Pacific.” Leaked texts indicate that the TPP is another free trade proposal that will continue strong rights for investors and weak protections for labor, the environment, and local democracy.

  • Restaurant Workers Set Sights On Walmart Wannabe: Darden
    Jenny Brown
    May 24 2012 - 11:21am
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    Restaurant workers organizing with the Restaurant Opportunities Center have trained their sights on their most ambitious target yet—a giant chain that wants to become the Walmart of sit-down dining.

  • Obama, Democrats Deal Setback To Airline Workers
    Theresa Moran
    Feb 16 2012 - 5:49pm
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    Two years after President Obama and Democrats abandoned labor’s much-anticipated Employee Free Choice Act, they have refused to block Republicans intent on making life miserable for airline and rail workers.

  • Contracts Are Worth Defending, Even with No-Strike Clauses
    Guillermo Perez
    Jan 19 2012 - 1:51pm
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    After seeing hundreds of thousands of people demonstrate in Wisconsin and Ohio to defend collective bargaining, it seems odd to read in Labor Notes that union contracts are “a trap” that “hold unions back.”

    Stanley Aronowitz’s January 2012 Viewpoint said, “Labor is confined by contract unionism, whose core is the no-strike clause.”