In the face of fierce corporate opposition, the California Senate on Monday passed a landmark bill aimed at giving the state’s roughly 550,000 fast food workers a say over their working conditions, hours, and wages in an industry rife with abuse. If Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom signs it into law, the Fast Food Recovery Act (AB 257) would make California the first state in the U.S. to establish a council tasked with setting industrywide workplace standards for the fast food sector. The 10-member council would include workers and worker advocates as well as business representatives and state officials. Newsom has…
working conditions
Resident Physicians Are Unionizing. They Must Challenge For-Profit Health Care.
Resident physicians are unionizing around the country. Most recently, residents at University of Vermont Medical Center (UVM), Stanford Medical Center, and Keck School of Medicine of USC all voted to join the Committee of Interns and Residents (CIR), which is part of the larger Service Employees International Union (SEIU). These wins come despite ongoing pushback from the hospital bosses. This resistance is coming because hospitals know unionized resident physicians will be harder to exploit. More residents should fight to unionize to protect themselves and the care of patients, and in the process of winning unions, they should extend their fight…
Nearly Half of All Warehouse Injuries in 2021 Happened at Amazon Warehouses
If a warehouse worker was injured on the job in 2021, there was about a 50 percent chance that they worked for Amazon, a new report highlighting dangerous working conditions at the company has revealed. Though Amazon employed only about 33 percent of warehouse workers in 2021, it was responsible for 49 percent of warehouse injuries that year, according to a damning new report from the Strategic Organizing Center (SOC), a coalition between four major labor unions. The report analyzes data from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Overall, workers sustained nearly 40,000 injuries at Amazon facilities last year,…
Instead of More Support, Schools Have Upped Demands on Teachers During Pandemic
In June 2020, when schools across the U.S. remained closed due to the pandemic, Bettina Love, author of We Want to Do More Than Survive, noted how much became possible when the system was forced to prioritize the lives of students, teachers and families. Laptops were distributed and internet access was provided. High-stakes, standardized tests were canceled. In many cases, grades were removed. She quoted a letter from a superintendent in Georgia who told teachers, “We want compassion over compliance.” Now, Love concluded, “We have to say that we’re not going back. The managing of inequalities, we’re not going back.”…
Apple Workers Held Christmas Eve Walkout for Their Safety Amid Holiday Shopping
A group of Apple employees organized a Christmas Eve walkout, demanding better working conditions and calling on customers to not shop in the tech giant’s retail or online stores. “We are Apple,” Apple Together, the group organizing the walkout, tweeted Thursday. “We deserve a respectful workplace. We deserve paid sick time. We deserve protection on the frontlines. We deserve proper mental healthcare.” The workers are also asking for protective measures against Covid-19, including N-95 masks, sanitizer stations, a ban on loitering in stores, and appointment-only shopping. “Demand that Apple upholds its image with your wallet,” the walkout organizers said. “Don’t…