Troublemakers Blog
June 05, 2020 /
Trauma would be the best way to describe the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the working class. Suddenly workers found ourselves in a situation beyond our control. But it’s also a moment of opportunity to actually take more control over our work lives and push for a more democratic society. Workers and unions have to hit the streets and organize. »
June 05, 2020 /
At a Taco Bell in Washington Township, Michigan, the action began when Jonathon Foster, a shift leader, approached the district manager about paid sick leave during the pandemic. She flat-out refused, despite pledges from Taco Bell’s CEO. »
June 02, 2020 /
For five days in 1919, union members took control of the city of Seattle. They arguably ran it better, and certainly more justly, than it had ever been run before.
The strike began when waitresses, laundry workers, streetcar workers, and more—65,000 union workers in all—walked off the job on February 6, 1919, to support striking shipyard workers. »
![Drawing of four fist of different skin tones emerging from a megaphone; one holds a heart wand. head shots of nine artists. text: "Event I: Unionism in America: June 6, 2020, at 8:00 PM EST. PICplays: perform inform change." @actorscirclensemble [with social media logos]](https://labornotes.org/sites/default/files/styles/blog_thumb/public/main/blogposts/Unionism-In-America---LaborNotes_Poster.jpg?itok=aXAoTmbF)
June 01, 2020 /
In a free, online event June 6 at 8 p.m. Eastern time, the nonprofit theatre company Actors Circle Ensemble will present via Zoom three short plays that explore the contemporary American labor movement. »
May 29, 2020 / Saurav Sarkar
The organized labor movement has begun swinging into action to support protests against the racist police murder of Minneapolis resident George Floyd.
Floyd was filmed being suffocated to death under the knee of police officer Derek Chauvin on Monday in a video that reverberated around the country and has sent the Twin Cities into turmoil. »
May 27, 2020 /
UPDATE, September 18: In a mail-in ballot election, registered nurses at Mission Hospital voted 70 percent in favor of joining National Nurses United. »
May 27, 2020 /
When the Orlando Sentinel’s newsroom employees won our election in May with 81 percent voting for The NewsGuild, the organizing committee had not seen our co-workers in person for nearly two months. The election was conducted entirely by mail. Supporters watched the vote count at the National Labor Relations Board’s Tampa office by videoconference. »
May 27, 2020 / Samantha Winslow
One reason today's horrific recession feels so familiar is that we're still digging out of the last one. When the housing market collapsed in 2008, 10 million people lost their homes and 9 million lost their jobs. »
May 26, 2020 / Jane Slaughter
Workers this spring were forced to find new ways to assert their rights when faced with a deadly foe and employers indifferent to their lives. »
May 22, 2020 / Chris Brooks
A video taken by an auto worker and obtained exclusively by Labor Notes shows a rowdy and chaotic scene inside Ford’s Dearborn, Michigan Truck Plant on Wednesday as workers refused to work after a co-worker tested positive for COVID-19.
Some stood by the lines; others simply went home. »