I’m a former West Virginia newspaper reporter, staff writer for the United Mine Workers Journal and managing editor of the Seafarers Log. I came to the AFL- CIO in 1989 and have written for several federation publications, focusing on legislation and politics, especially grassroots mobilization and workplace safety. When my collar was still blue, I carried union cards from the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers, American Flint Glass Workers and Teamsters for jobs in a chemical plant, a mining equipment manufacturing plant and a warehouse. I’ve also worked as roadie for a small-time country-rock band, sold my blood plasma and played an occasional game of poker to help pay the rent. You may have seen me at one of several hundred Grateful Dead shows. I was the one with longhair and the tie-dye. Still have the shirts, lost the hair.
California’s paid family leave law “has been remarkably successful” and received high marks from both employers and workers, according to a new study released yesterday by researchers from UCLA/City University of New York (CUNY) and the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR).
While House Republicans have put a vote on health care reform repeal on hold in the wake of the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and the murder of six others Saturday in Tucson, they haven’t backed off their threat to repeal a law that eventually will provide health coverage for 30 million people.
In less than two minutes, the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO has provided a wonderfully entertaining history of the union movement in a fun and easy to understand animated video. It’s something for adults and kids.
In a bitter battle late last year, Republicans in Congress filibustered an extension of the emergency unemployment insurance (UI) program for more than 1.4 million long-term jobless workers—and they didn’t approve the bill until they won an extension of Bush tax cuts for the rich.
Last week, we highlighted a move by House Republicans who are so incensed at the word “labor”—because some folks might complete the phrase with the word “union”—that they ripped out the word “labor” from the name of the House Education and Labor Committee.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says that Saturday’s Tucson, Ariz., assassination attempt against Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) and the murder of six of her constituents:
serves as a terrible reminder to all of our political and civic leaders about the need to end the use of appeals to violence in our political rhetoric. We must find ways to passionately debate and even disagree with each other without using words that can give unstable individuals an incitement to engage in violent acts.
In Florida, Gloria’s daughter, like so many young people today, returned home from college “with a BA degree and no job.”
LabourStart subscribers from around the world selected Gerardo Correa’s photo of a Canadian farm workers’ march as the winner in the news service’s 2010 Labor Photo of the Year contest.
More than 44 million private-sector workers in the United States—42 percent of the private-sector workforce—don’t have paid sick days they can use to recover from a common illness like the flu, according to new research by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR).
Max Hall has seen the fight for health care reform from both sides—as an advocate and a patient. In a Point of View (POV) guest column at the AFL-CIO website, Hall (no relation to me) writes how he first saw passing health care reform as part of the principles of fairness he believes in. But later, the issue turned personal for the 30-year veteran trade unionist when, in September, he confronted serious medical issues.
Sign the pledge to fight for a common-sense immigration process that creates a road map to citizenship for aspiring Americans.
Click here »
Tell us about the good stuff happening where you live and work.
