Steven Greenhouse on the squeeze

Bill Onasch’s review of The Big Squeeze prompted some web searching.  I came across three YouTube videos interviewing author Steven Greenhouse done by the Progressive Book Club More clips of Greenhouse after the break

Indianapolis Janitors Win Historic First-Ever Citywide Contract

Marvin Williams Justice for Janitors (J4J) lived up to their name when, on April 19, 2008, after two days of intensive contract talks, sometimes running until nearly 9:00 P.M., they ratified a first-ever, citywide contract securing higher wages, more work hours, health insurance, and paid time off for 1,500 of the lowest-paid workers of Indianapolis.  [...]

A Class Piece Of Work: A Review of “The Big Squeeze”

by Bill Onasch The Big Squeeze: Tough Times For the American Worker by Steven Greenhouse Steven Greenhouse is the best of a highly endangered species-a labor beat reporter for a mass circulation newspaper. Last year staff cuts eliminated Nancy Cleeland’s excellent labor coverage from the Los Angeles Times. Randy Furst at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune was [...]

Congress Hotel Demonstration

Bob Roman Chicago DSA Well over a thousand people showed up at the Congress Hotel on Thursday, June 12, to support the 5th year of the ongoing strike by members of UNITE HERE Local 1. Henry Tamarin, President of Local 1, expressed regret that this conflict had turned into the annual event that united all [...]

TRADE BILL INTRODUCED: Landmark Legislation To Revamp Trade Policy

by Frank Llewellyn DSA National Director It’s called the Trade Reform, Accountability, Development and Employment (TRADE) Act. Introduced in Congress on June 4, its prime sponsors are Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Rep. Mike Michaud (D-Maine). There are currently 58 co-sponsors of the bill in the House and four in the Senate. The bill’s numbers [...]

June 19 Protests Target Health Insurance Industry, Support Single Payer

June 19, 2008, Americans across the nation will demonstrate in favor of guaranteed healthcare and in protest of AHIP — America’s Health Insurance Plans — the insurance industry lobbyists who profit from pain. Their annual convention will be met by thousands of protesters onsite in San Francisco — 12 Noon, Moscone Center West, 4th @ [...]

The Toyota You Don’t Know

* Toyota linked to human trafficking and sweatshop abuse; * Ties to Burmese dictators; * 10,000 low-wage temps; * Unpaid overtime and overworked to death; * Cited by the ILO for repression of freedom of association; * Lowering wages and benefits across the U.S. auto industry. On Wednesday the National Labor Committee (NLC) released a [...]

A Southern Strategy for Unions

Jonah Lalas, who headed up the HOPE organizing project in Houston, wrote an interesting account of union organizing in the Summer 2008 Dissent. His article in now on-line and is well-worth checking out. Lalas explains why the South is crucial.

The Crisis In Organized Labor–As Viewed From The Inside and Out

By Steve Early, New Politics Summer 2008. Review of Bill Fletcher and Fernando Gapasin, Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and A New Path Toward Social Justice [Berkeley, CA:University of California Press, 2008] 320 pp, $24.95. Although he looks old and tired today, AFL-CIO president John Sweeney was once hailed as a dynamic reformer, [...]

ITUC report blasts US for violating fundamental workers’ rights

Brussels, 9 June 2008 (ITUC OnLine): The ITUC presents today its biannual report on core labour standards in the US, coinciding with the Trade Policy Review of the US at the WTO, taking place on 9 and 11 June. It reveals a poor and worsening record on worker protection, particularly in the areas of trade [...]