Thousands of engineers and technical workers at Boeing Co. plants in the Pacific Northwest will begin voting next week on the latest contract offer and whether to authorize a strike, the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA)/IFPTE Local 2001 announced Thursday.

We’ve said it for years. Because of the “Union Difference”—fair wages and better benefits for workers who belong to a union—unions are the ticket to the middle class. Even if you don’t belong to a union, there is a spillover effect to the whole economy. In other words, when unions are strong, everyone benefits. But don’t take our word for it, here’s what Time magazine contributor Eric Liu says:

The fact is that when unions are stronger the economy as a whole does better.

In New Orleans this Super Bowl week, there are plenty of fans sporting 49ers' red and gold caps and jerseys and Ravens' purple and black gear. But there also are thousands of union members—including many from unions in the Greater New Orleans AFL-CIO (GNO)—who proudly display their union label and are making the game possible and the fan experience in the Crescent City run smoothly.

The American Legislative Exchange Council’s (ALEC's) long history of influencing state legislators—sometimes even writing legislation for them—to pass laws and promote policies that advance a corporate profit agenda, and at times an extreme conservative agenda, is well documented.

Now a new report shows another group—led by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush—is following the ALEC blueprint in pushing state education policy backed by for-profit education corporations.

Trumka sent this message to working family activists on Tuesday:

I’m from Nemacolin, Pa. It’s like a lot of other little towns: close-knit, lots of great families, working together in tough times and good times, just trying to make something of themselves.

A coalition of Michigan labor unions—including the UAW—and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) asked a judge Thursday to strike down the recently passed "right to work" for less law because it was enacted while the public was locked out of the Capitol, which is a violation of the Open Meetings Act, the First Amendment and the Michigan Constitution.

While the nation’s economy added 157,000 new jobs in January, the job creation wasn’t enough to prevent the unemployment rate from slightly ticking up from December’s 7.8% to 7.9% last month, according to figures released this morning by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

The "chained" CPI is a Social Security benefit cut (not an innocuous "adjustment"), and the majority of voters understand this, with 55% opposing this policy proposal. 

A new poll, Strengthening Social Security: What Do Americans Want? from the National Academy of Social Insurance (NASI), highlights working people's opposition to benefit cuts, including the "chained" CPI, which reduces the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA).