MetaFilter posts tagged with workers and labor

Sixteen workers are killed a day

shetterly — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 10:52:14 -0800

Sixteen workers are killed a day "Every eight hour workday, two people are killed on the job. Most companies are never prosecuted for negligence, even after repeated warnings that their workers were in danger. Meanwhile, workers who blow the whistle face threats and retaliation at the workplace." In a short video examining several cases of worker deaths, David Uhlmann suggests the sanction for an offense that results in a worker's death should be as great as the sanction for killing a deer out of season.

“…If you stand up straight, people can’t ride your back. And that’s what we did. We stood up straight.”

univac — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 00:00:30 -0800

When Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated April 4, 1968, he was helping sanitation workers in Memphis form a union. In 1967, SCLC initiated the Poor People's Campaign to unify the African-American civil rights movement with working people's movements more generally. In MLK's words, "It must not be just black people, it must be all poor people. We must include American Indians, Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, and even poor whites." The campaign brought him to Memphis in 1968 to rally with striking sanitation workers. A movement of clergy & community activists had grown in support of the strikers after two workers died on the job. After King's death, the workers won recognition of their union, AFSCME Local 1733, as well as a collective bargaining agreement containing wage increases, a grievance procedure, and improvements to outdated & dangerous equipment. In 1968, union membership in the United States was at 29.4 % of the workforce. Since then, the country's election of a black president has prompted suggestions that King's dream has been fulfilled, while union membership has decreased to under 13%.

Announcing: The International I.T. Workers Union

Babylonian — Tue, 01 May 2007 13:05:43 -0800

Today is May 1st, also known as International Workers Day. International Workers Day began when 340,000 in Chicago, Milwaukee and other cities struck for the eight-hour day in 1886. Flash forward to today where for many workers in the I.T. industry, years of 60-hour weeks and taking classes on your own dime to keep up with technology leave you in the unemployment line, after being laid off with no notice. For years, people have been calling for the I.T. Workers of the world to unite and form a unified labor union. I.T. workers should form a union for the same reason that workers have always formed unions: together we have more power to improve the terms and conditions of our employment than we do as individuals. This is an announcement and a call to action to the world-wide IT worker community to become involved in the development of a new resource — The International I.T. Workers Union that will represent the interests of I.T. Workers around the world.

Global sweatshop lobby

Abiezer — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 05:55:54 -0800

"In a historically unprecedented visit, the influential Chinese scholar and labor law expert Liu Cheng arrived in Washington, D.C. this week to garner support from US legislators and labor leaders for a law that is pending not before the US Congress but before the National People’s Congress in China."
Global Labor Strategies' recent report Undue Influence has prompted comment that US corporate advocacy in China is retarding democracy. The US-China Business Council rejects this characterization of their lobbying efforts (China Law Blog broadly agrees). Their European counterparts think better compliance and implementation are key to improving protection for Chinese workers.

Commies Need Art Too

stavrosthewonderchicken — Sat, 19 Jun 2004 17:19:44 -0800

Labor Arts. "Images that help us understand the past and present lives of working people."

vacapinta — Mon, 02 Sep 2002 11:11:33 -0800

Sebastiao Salgado, author of Workers and Migrations (a beautiful book to share with others) and Earl Dotter, author of The Quiet Sickness: A Photographic Chronicle of Hazardous Work in America. Photographers of Labor.