The way the media, corporations and the 1% talk about the economy is not only inaccurate, it is a means to maintain power for the wealthiest among us and keep working families powerless, delegates to the AFL-CIO convention in Los Angeles declared today.The latest resolution passed at the convention describes the scope of the problem and announces a concrete plan to change the conversation.
Attendees of the action session, “This Is NOT What Democracy Looks Like! The Democracy Initiative,” heard hopeful solutions to large problems with our democratic process. The tool for correcting these problems of political inequality was the topic of the session: the Democracy Initiative . The executive director of the Democracy Initiative, Marissa Brown, summed up the group’s task: “We are about making government function for people who voted for a government that functions.”
Delegates at the AFL-CIO’s quadrennial convention elected Tefere Gebre as the AFL-CIO’s new executive vice president this afternoon. Gebre was nominated to succeed Arlene Holt Baker after she announced her retirement in July.
Delegates to the 2013 AFL-CIO Convention today elected a trio of top officers to lead the labor movement to become, said re-elected AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, “the movement America needs us to be and we must be.”
AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Elizabeth Shuler was elected to a second term and, in a classic American success story, Tefere Gebre, a 45-year-old Ethiopian political refugee who immigrated to the United States as a teenager, was elected executive vice president.
In a time when the globalized economy means that steelworkers in Bahia, Brazil, work for the same multinational as their counterparts in Beaumont, Texas, the AFL-CIO is ramping up efforts to help workers organize around the world and fight against bad international trade deals that strip workers of their rights and give corporations unchecked power. Delegates to the AFL-CIO Convention in Los Angeles passed two resolutions directly dealing with these important issues.
Lazy. Out of touch. Greedy. Self-serving. Thuggish.
Chances are you’ve heard a union member or leader called one of these things (and in all likelihood, more than once), and it made your blood boil. The unfortunate truth is that misconceptions, stereotypes and all-out lies seem to be dominating the public discussion and perception of labor unions, even among some progressives. We in the labor movement know that unions stand for the working class as the sole and vital counterbalance to corporate greed and excess…but no one else seems to have gotten the memo.
Today, the AFL-CIO reaffirmed its commitment to a comprehensive immigration policy that respects workers' rights, including a road map to citizenship . Delegates at the AFL-CIO Convention called for an immigration policy that protects U.S. workers, reduces exploitation of immigrant workers and reduces employers' incentive to hire undocumented workers rather than U.S. workers. Such a policy, the convention resolution states, will increase shared prosperity, improve productivity and quality, limit wage competition, strengthen labor standards and collective bargaining rights, protect the health and safety of workers and provide a social safety net and quality education and training for working families.
“The labor movement,” Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez told delegates to the 2013 AFL-CIO Convention in Los Angeles this morning, “is one of the greatest forces for middle-class economic security."
An economy that grows from the middle out can only be achieved if we continue to have a dynamic and empowered labor movement in America.
No worker is invisible, and that's exactly what AFL-CIO delegates and attendees said as they hit the streets of Los Angeles last night to raise awareness about the value of work.
Check out the video highlights in this post, and see our blog post from yesterday explaining what these cardboard workers are all about .
Last night, women of the labor movement came together to talk about creating a movement that matters to women at a "Bread and Rosie" reception.
Sponsored by Union Plus, the reception featured special guests and speakers, including former Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Elizabeth Shuler, AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker and María Elena Durazo, executive secretary-treasurer of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor.
It’s been four years since low-wage workers got a raise. Sign the petition to tell Congress it’s time to raise the minimum wage.
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