Thirty-five cities saw protests against wage theft on Thursday as part of the Interfaith Worker Justice National Day of Action against Wage Theft.
Organizers of the rallies say wage theft is an epidemic, with billions legally earned by workers but stolen by their employers. For most victims of this crime, the theft is on top of already inadequate wages.
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How do rank and file auto workers create the awareness and solidarity at our local unions to fight concessions in the upcoming Big Three contract talks?
Contracts with Ford, GM, and Chrysler expire in September 2011. Both GM and Chrysler workers gave up the right to strike when the United Auto Workers negotiated the government bankruptcy/bailout contracts last year. Those contracts included big concessions, especially for new hires, who were placed on a permanent half-pay scale, with no pensions. In fall 2009 Ford workers voted 3-1 not to reopen their contract to match the new “pattern” of givebacks at Chrysler and GM.
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Negotiating Committees from Raytheon Missile Systems of Old Pueblo Lodge 933 in Tucson, AZ, and Rugby Manufacturing of Local 2525 in Fargo, ND, got ready for their respective rounds of contract negotiations at the unique Negotiation Preparation for Bargaining Committees program at the IAM’s William W. Winpisinger Education and Technology Center in Hollywood, MD.
Both groups face potentially difficult rounds of negotiations and their respective committees came up with strategies to change bargaining history, map a new direction for relations with their companies, put better language in their contracts and build solidarity in the bargaining units.
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When national Section 6 Notices were served last November, we were more than a year into the worst economic crisis America has seen since the Great Depression, and the national unemployment rate continues to hover around 10 percent. BLET members have not been spared from the hardships of the current recession. Between May 2008 and June 2009, T&E employment on the “Big Four” Class I carriers dropped over 19-1/2 percent.
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ABF Freight System, Inc. (ABF), the largest subsidiary of Arkansas Best Corporation (Nasdaq: ABFS) and a leading less-than-truckload transportation company, has filed legal actions today against the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) and other parties including several YRC Worldwide subsidiaries (Nasdaq: YRCW) for violation of the National Master Freight Agreement (NMFA), the collective bargaining agreement covering most unionized trucking employees in the country.
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