PAME Extends Solidarity to Bangladesh Garment Workers

Roofers Local 36 Sends Support and Solidarity to Human Rights Activists

WFTU on the side of GE Peterborough Workers

WFTU North America Transport Update

In Italy: USB Mobilization for Freedom of Huber Ballesteros

Una mañana sin colectivos, subtes ni trenes

La huelga es una reacción de los gremios ante el incumplimiento
 de la promesa de Macri. 

En rechazo a la aplicación a los sueldos del Impuesto a las Ganancias y en reclamo de su modificación, los gremios del transporte realizan hoy medidas que afectarán hasta el mediodía los servicios de colectivos, trenes, subterráneos y aviones, como así también la recolección de basura y el suministro de combustible. La Confederación Argentina de Trabajadores del Transporte (CATT), que conduce Juan Carlos Schmid, ratificó que entre las 4 de la madrugada y las 12 del mediodía realizarán asambleas informativas en los lugares de trabajo en todas las empresas y medios de transporte del país. La eliminación del impuesto fue “un compromiso del presidente (Mauricio) Macri durante la campaña electoral”, recordó Schmid. Roberto Fernández, de la Unión Tranviarios Automotor, agregó que “todo es una molestia pero acá lamentablemente un poco de  presión tenemos que hacer. No nos negamos a pagar, pero no de esta manera”.

La jornada de protesta es una respuesta sindical al freno de la Casa Rosada al proyecto opositor de reforma del impuesto y se realizará mientras continúan las negociaciones del Gobierno con la CGT y los gobernadores. 

El ministro de Trabajo, Jorge Triaca, se reunió ayer con dirigentes cegetistas y aseguró que el debate continuará “el lunes (por hoy), el martes y miércoles”. El objetivo del Gobierno es que el Senado no sancione este miércoles el proyecto que recibió con media sanción de Diputados.

Triaca buscó mostrarse conciliador con los gremios. “Entendemos que los trabajadores de transporte son los más perjudicados por el Impuesto a las Ganancias”, admitió. Sin embargo, insistió en pedirles que “no 

afecten el normal funcionamiento de la vida de los trabajadores argentinos y la economía en general”.

Respecto de la posibilidad de que la discusión por Ganancias se resuelva antes de fin de año, el funcionario dijo que “es difícil” estimar eso pero aseguró que “si uno tuviera que evaluar la voluntad de todos los sectores, hay un alto entendimiento”.

Las protestas confirmadas anoche anticipaban el siguiente panorama: 

• Colectivos: no saldrán entre las 5 y las 7 de la mañana. “Hoy el 90% de los trabajadores de la UTA paga Ganancias”, dijo el titular de la Unión Tranviarios Automotor (UTA), Roberto Fernández. El dirigente no descartó que la medida se extienda hasta más tarde. 
• Subtes: no funcionarán entre las 5 y las 12, ya que adhieren a la medida tanto la UTA como los metrodelegados. 
• Trenes: el titular de La Fraternidad, Omar Maturano, anticipó que “de 4 a 12 no va a salir ningún tren”. En esta línea, sostuvo que las “conversaciones” con el gobierno nacional las van a concretar “después de la protesta”.

A partir de las 8 de la mañana, la CATT realizará una asamblea central en el Puerto de Buenos Aires, en la entrada de Terminal Río de la Plata (en Retiro), donde confluirán portuarios, marítimos y camioneros con la presencia de Schmid y de Pablo Moyano.

Simultáneamente, habrá asambleas de trabajadores en todos los medios de transporte como terminales ferroviarias, aeropuertos y cabeceras de colectivos. “Estas asambleas implican que en ese lapso, nuestra gente se presentará a sus trabajos pero no prestará servicios, ya que se interiorizarán por sus dirigentes acerca de las negociaciones que se están llevando adelante para escuchar nuestros genuinos reclamos en las modificaciones al Impuesto a las Ganancias, que hoy nos afectan sensiblemente”, explicó Schmid al anunciar las medidas. 

A partir de las 10, en Aeroparque, Juan Pablo Brey (Aeronavegantes), secretario de prensa de la CATT, hará la evaluación de las asambleas en el sector aeroportuario para los medios de comunicación. “Vamos a debatir con los compañeros en asambleas, comentar cómo son los dos proyectos y cuáles son los tres puntos que la CATT quiere incluir, es decir, las deducciones de viáticos, feriados y horas extra”, explicó Brey.

De esta manera, por las asambleas se afectarán todos los servicios de usuarios de subterráneos, trenes, colectivos y aviones, como también la recolección de basura, suministro de combustible, entre otros rubros. No habrá tampoco transporte de carga, como movimiento de contenedores portuarios, ni flota marítima y fluvial, operativa.

La CATT está integrada por una veintena de sindicatos del transporte terrestre, aéreo, portuario, fluvial y marítimo. Entre ellos se cuenta a La Fraternidad, Camioneros, Fempinra, UTA, Aeronavegantes, Guincheros y Grúas Móviles, Supeh Flota, Dragado y Balizamiento, UPSA, UALA, Capitanes y Patrones de Pesca, Señaleros Ferroviarios, y Marina Mercante.

El presidente de la cámara de Diputados, Emilio Monzó, admitió que el Gobierno tuvo un mal manejo del tema Ganancias, una de las promesas de campaña incumplidas  del presidente Macri. “La semana pasada banquineamos. Exageramos nuestras posiciones, todos”, sostuvo, y manifestó que “esta semana volvimos al diálogo”. También aseguró que para frenar la reforma de Ganancias “no hubo látigo ni chequera. Hubo diálogo y conversación y cierta firmeza del Poder Ejecutivo junto a los gobernadores en la responsabilidad de gobernar”.

WFTU Statement on the Occasion of the International Migrants Day

We express our deep class solidarity with the millions of immigrant workers, the millions of refugees who are facing double exploitation, as part of the working class, but also as immigrants.

All workers, whether they are foreigners or locals are class brothers and our struggles are common, no matter the nationality, race, color of skin or religion are.

The WFTU calls upon the international working class, to keep expressing its solidarity with immigrants and refugees, especially now, when imperialist wars and aggression have created huge waves of refugees.

Racial discrimination and other types of discrimination are created and kept alive by the monopolies, the transnational corporations, the imperialist mechanisms and the reactionary governments in order to divide workers and safeguard the interests of the capital, maintaining class exploitation.

The WFTU and its affiliates and friends in every corner of the world will keep fighting for the interests of the working class, against racial discrimination created by capitalist barbarism.
Based on this the WFTU calls for:

• The abolishment of the Dublin and the Schengen Treaty, the Frontex and all repressive mechanisms.
• Stopping the measures of the European Union for the repression in the borders.
• End now the imperialist interventions of EU-USA-NATO.
• Direct transfer of the refugees from the islands and the entry points to the countries of their final destination.
• Increase of the personnel and the infrastructure for the rescue, the record-identification, the housing, feeding, medical care and the safe transfer of the people.
• Creation of dignified centers of welcoming and hospitality

Escalate the protests of the railway

A new 24-hour strike after a two-day strike action was held last Tuesday and Wednesday by hundreds of workers in the railway company "Southern Rail" in the south of England, to demand the satisfaction of labour demands and improve safety of passengers.

The development was launched after the new round of the long hours of negotiation between representatives of the company and the unions ASLEF and Southern, which have decided to escalate their struggle and in the next few weeks. As announced, the new 24-hour strikes will take place on Monday 19 January and Tuesday 20 December. Will be repeated on Saturday 31 December to 2 January and Monday 9 January to the 14th of the same month.

Nick Brown, a representative of the employers, tried to tarnish the struggle of the unions, saying that the strike "is not necessary, nor based on serious reasons". He claimed that cares supposedly for the "suffering" of hundreds of thousands of Londoners using rail transport, claiming that the strikes are causing chaos and serious problems". He accused the unions of "extortion".

Rate of black lung disease among miners may be 10 times higher than reported

JUDY WOODRUFF: Black lung disease is well known for causing the deaths of thousands of American coal miners over decades. Now, a new report finds that miners may be suffering from the most advanced form of the disease at a rate ten times higher than what the U.S. government has reported.

Hari Sreenivasan in our New York studios has the story.

HARI SREENIVASAN: For the past five years, the government has reported just under 100 cases of complicated black lung disease, which is also called progressive massive fibrosis. But a new NPR investigation found nearly 1,000 cases in nearly the same time from clinic reports in four states — Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Ohio.

The extent of the problem has stunned a number of researchers and experts who work with miners as well. One of the miners diagnosed with black lung and profiled in the NPR stories — Mackie Branham — spoke of just how difficult it is for him to breathe and his ill health. But he said mining was in his blood.

MACKIE BRANHAM, Diagnosed With Black Lung: Takes a lot of pressure in my chest at all times. I’ve never been scared to death. It don’t bother me a bit. It’s just I won’t see my kids grow up. But if I had it to do over, I would do it again. If that’s what it took to provide for my family.

HARI SREENIVASAN: Howard Berkes has been uncovering this in a two- part series that concludes tonight on “All Things Considered” and he joins me now from Salt Lake City.

Howard, it is so difficult to hear that man struggling to breathe, and it’s also hard to reconcile how he says he would do this again because this is what he would do for his family, even though the health challenges that he and so many people in this community are facing.

HOWARD BERKES, NPR: It’s so common to hear that. Miners want to go back to work. Mackie Branham told me if he could get a lung transplant tomorrow, he hopes he could go back to work, which is not going to happen. But mining, as he said, is in his blood. It’s part of the local culture, local history. Generations of families mine and it really is about the only decent job in most parts of Appalachia.

HARI SREENIVASAN: All right. Let’s talk about the gap between the numbers here, the numbers the government documented and the numbers you’re able to uncover in your investigation. What accounts for this?

HOWARD BERKES: Well, first of all, it’s the limitations on government researchers. This is the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and they track black lung disease by bringing in miners for x-rays. But they’re limited by law to only testing working miners, number one, and the x-rays are voluntary, number two.

So, they miss non-working miners, people who’ve retired, and they’re also missing a huge segment, most miners, really, who avoid getting tested because they fear if there’s a positive test for black lung, somehow their mining company will figure out and they will lose their jobs.

HARI SREENIVASAN: But that’s illegal.

HOWARD BERKES: It’s illegal, but miners widely believe it. Every single miner I’ve talked to in Appalachia in the last five years has said the same thing. What they fear is just even going to the NIOSH Vans that come into their communities with x-ray equipments and being seen going into the vans, just that could cause the mining company to say this guy might have black lung.

And mining — the last mining company you worked for is the mining company that saddled with your black lung benefits and your healthcare. And so, you could have worked for another mining company for 20 years, but if you worked for the last one for a year, they’re the ones that pay. And so, miners believe that if the mining company finds out, they’ll lose their jobs, so they don’t get tested.

HARI SREENIVASAN: This is also one of the worst forms of black lung. Is there something different that’s happening in the mining that’s happening now that’s increasing the likelihood they get the worst form of it?

HOWARD BERKES: Well, for at least a decade or so, the big coal mining seams in Appalachia have played out and there are thinner seams now, and those thinner seams have coal mixed in with rock. That rock contains silica, and they mine the rock and coal together, and so, their silica dust mixed in with the coal dust, with the coal dust, and silica is especially toxic and that is believed to be the cause of this very more serious stages of disease that are affecting these miners.

It’s also causing them to get black lung a lot younger than what was typically used to be when you would see miners maybe in their 60s and 70s. We’ve talked to miners in their 30s and 40s who are now getting this most serious stage of black lung.

HARI SREENIVASAN: All right. So, what happens to a miner with this sort of the disease? I mean, who pays for it especially when so many small coal companies are going bankrupt because the energy markets are favoring natural gas now?

HOWARD BERKES: Well, it’s also very large coal companies going bankrupt. If the coal company is self-insured and they don’t have enough assets, then they’re not going to have enough money to pay for the benefits, and the coal company is first in line to pay the benefits. If the coal company can’t pay the benefits then it shifts to the Federal Black Lung Trust Fund, a federal program.

And the problem is if you have all the miners coming into the system requiring black lung benefits, coal companies are unable to pay, then that shifts to taxpayers.

HARI SREENIVASAN: And there’s an Affordable Care Act twist to this as well? These are pre-existing conditions if they went to a different plan, but if the Affordable Care Act is repealed, would these miners lose these benefits?

HOWARD BERKES: Well, not only that, there is in the Affordable Care Act a specific benefit for coal miners with black lung that makes it easier for them to get black lung benefits. So, if the Affordable Care Act is repealed, it will be back to the old days when it was much more difficult to get benefits in the first place.

HARI SREENIVASAN:  All right. Howard Berkes is joining us from Salt Lake with NPR. Thanks so much.

HOWARD BERKES: Thank you.

Dramatic Showing at MTA Board Meeting Underscores Union's Demand for "Fair and Equitable" Wage Increases

Union Members Hold Photos of Assaulted Transit Workers as MTA Board Members Hear Testimony from Union Leadership and the rank and file.

TWU Local 100 brought its campaign for a fair contract in dramatic fashion to the MTA's December Board meeting today (Dec. 14, 2016). With a little more than a month left before expiration of the union's contracts for TA/OA and MTA Bus members, the Local's top leadership and more than 250 rank-and-file members packed the MTA Board's meeting room to capacity, with an even larger overflow crowd in the lobby of MTA headquarters at 2 Broadway. Many members carried intense poster sized images of co-workers who were beaten and slashed on the job into the Board meeting and held them high so Board members would see the kind of daily pressures and dangers facing transit workers. Members also produced a TWU version of the Union Square Subway Therapy Wall (where New Yorkers stuck thousands of post-its to express their post election feelings) by taping letter-sized "post-its" on the lobby wall at 2 Broadway.  The "post-its" contract demands included messages like, COLA's Don't Cut It, Don't Touch My Health Benefits, Improve Our Longevity, and many more. The Local 100 action was bolstered by a powerful show of national TWU solidarity, as TWU International President Harry Lombardo, the entire International Transit Division staff, and numerous officers from other TWU Locals in the the tri-state region stood side-by-side with Local 100 President John Samuelsen, Secretary Treasurer Earl Phillips, Recording Secretary LaTonya Crisp-Sauray, Vice Presidents Tony Utano, Pete Rosconi, JP Patafio, Kia Phua, Nelson Rivera and Richard Davis, and numerous Division officers. International President Lombardo addressed the MTA Board affirming: "I stand with Local 100 and its bargaining team in solidarity today. I have pledged to them the International's support as well: financial, legal, political, and of course our moral support. Their fight is our fight; their goals for this contract are our goals." Local 100 President Samuelsen, who is also a member of the MTA Board, made it clear that transit workers expect and deserve raises that exceed inflation, and that go beyond the 2 percent annual increases recently accepted by one of the state's largest public sector unions. Samuelsen said that  there is a "disconnect" between transit workers who really move NY and the policy making members on the MTA board, the policies they set, and the "hard work performed by the people in this room" as he pointed toward the assembled transit workers just a few feet away. Samuelsen also prevailed on the MTA Board to support "fair and equitable raises" for transit workers "that will allow us to continue to live in the City we serve." Samuelsen concluded to applause from the rank-and-file, stating: "This issue is going to come to a head in a month, and I hope we can get to a spot that's not ugly." Five Local 100 members also addressed the Board to put faces to the union's messaging throughout the contract campaign that the dangerous, pressure filled jobs transit workers perform warrant a fair contract. TAS Bus Operator John Browne, who was viciously slashed on the neck in 2014, asked for a fair wage increase and better safety for Bus Operators while saying that he puts his MTA uniform on "with pride" every day. Hero CTA Darren Johnson told the Board how a normal day recently turned chaotic when he chased down a pervert who had just groped a young a female passenger with a small child.  "I don't consider myself a hero," he modestly told the Board.  "These kind of things happen every day on the job." Train Operator and Executive Board member Janice Carter talked about the importance of a transit worker's job.  "We move New York City," she said to shouts of "Yes we do," from the crowd. Conductor Warren Cox eloquently told of how he intervened after spotting a distraught and possibly suicidal woman with a young child on a station platform edge. Finally, Bus Operator Clarence Jackson held up a bloody emergency room photo of himself and his grotesquely slashed right after being assaulted by a teen on his Bronx bus on July 3, 2013.  Jackson said that he and his co-workers deal with these sorts of dangers every day.  He asked that the MTA Board simply treat the transit workforce "as family." After the final speaker, Samuelsen led the large TWU crowd back down to the lobby where they joined up with a waiting assembly of transit workers.  He held a spirited "shopgate" meeting asking the rank-and-file to be ready for "further actions" in the weeks leading up to the contract expiration on Jan. 15, 2017. He then wished everyone a happy, health holiday season to raucous cheers of "TWU, TWU, TWU."

Metrovías and Sbase responsible for another dead

Autonomous city of Buenos Aires, 

December 07, 2.016.-

In this sad day for the workers, the Union Association of Workers of the Subway and Premetro highlights the responsibility of the Subways of Buenos Aires Society of the State and Metrovías for the death of a colleague by electrocution in the Workshop at the Colony of the Line H. For this reason, the subway shut down for 24 hours.

In recent years, the subway took the lives of six companions, four of them by electrocution. Throughout this year the AGTSyP, along with professionals of the hygiene and labour health, prepared a protocol for workplace safety based on the Protocol of the General Procedure in electrical matters, was presented to the company and to SBASE several months ago without any response to its discussion and application. Yesterday there was a hearing between the employer and union for this same issue and no progress was made due to the refusal of Metrovías. Early this morning, a companion die for a serious security flaw.

The AGTSyP want in the first place, to bring the condolences to the family and friends of the partner. In the second place, it requires SBASE and Metrovías to stop ignoring the security terms and sit down to discuss immediate security protocols and hygiene. The workers of the subway should carry out their tasks in an environment suitable and insurance, not out of fear of facing death every day.

THE EXECUTIVE SECRETARIAT UNION ASSOCIATION OF SUBWAY WORKERS AND PREMETRO

Enrique O. Rositto - Sec. Press and Communication - AGTSyP
Email prensa@sindicatodelsubte.com.ar
Twitter @prensadelsubte | Facebook /prensadelsubte

TWU Local 100 today ramped up its campaign for a fair contract with a powerful new advertisement running on television and being distributed widely on social media. The 30-second piece features photos of transit workers doing a range of duties to ensure New Yorkers get to their jobs, homes and other destinations safely - 24 hours a day, seven days a week. "You've heard 'it's a tough job but somebody's got to do it,' " the video's narrator states. "Well, that somebody is the Transport Workers Union here in New York City. Whether it's blizzard, blackout or bomb scare, they get out and do their jobs so you can get to yours. Still, every 36 hours a transit worker is assaulted on the job, and chances are pretty good while you're rushing to work a transit worker is receiving medical attention. They deserve a fair increase for their dedication to the dangerous work they do." The video also features still photographs of transit workers who were brutally assaulted while serving the riding public - including photos the MTA refused to post in its system, making the bogus claim that workers demanding raises is "political." The television ad is the latest "six-figure" installment in Local 100's multi-pronged campaign to secure raises greater than the 2% budgeted by the MTA. "We want the public to know that we are proud of the service we provide, but also that these are not easy jobs," TWU Local 100 President John Samuelsen said. "They are physically and mentally stressful. They are dirty and dangerous. Too-often, they are straight-up deadly. Transit workers, and their families, deserve for this reality to be recognized in their paychecks. We are turning up the heat, and will continue to escalate our fight, until that happens." Last week, 10 privately-owned buses wrapped with an ad featuring transit workers who were brutally beaten while serving the riding public began looping through Manhattan - passing MTA headquarters dozens of times a day. The wrapped-buses mimic the ad the MTA rejected for its bus and subway system. TWU Local 100 has slapped the MTA with a federal lawsuit for violating the First Amendment and the rock-solid American right to free speech. Local 100 also is running radio ads in the NYC area.

MANAGEMENT AND MUSICIANS AGREE TO A NEW CONTRACT

Miguel Harth-Bedoya will conduct a New Year’s Eve Concert

On December 3, 2016, the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra Association and the American Federation of Musicians, Local 72-147 representing the musicians of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra agreed upon terms of a new four-year contract. You can read the entire joint press release here. The Musicians of the FWSO ratified the agreement on December 7, 2016.

Because of overwhelming public support, the Musicians were able to find a generous donor who stepped forward with a gift of $700,000, leading to a breakthrough in negotiations.  “We are ​incredibly​ moved by the generosity which has made this agreement possible,” said Dan Sigale, FWSO Violist and Chair​man​ of the Musicians​’ ​Negotiating Committee. “​W​e ​also​ thank all ​our​ supporters who have stood by us​ during these past several months​. ​We look forward to​ returning​ to our regular performances​ and ​sharing great music with our great city.”

4 YEARS AGO: The racist roots of 'right to work' laws

By Chris Kromm      December 13, 2012     

This week, Republican lawmakers in Michigan -- birthplace of the United Auto Workers and, more broadly, the U.S. labor movement -- shocked the nation by becoming the 24th state to pass "right-to-work" legislation, which allows non-union employees to benefit from union contracts.

While Michigan's momentous decision has received widespread media attention, little has been said about the origins of "right-to-work" laws, which find their roots in extreme pro-segregationist and anti-communist elements in the 1940s South.

The history of anti-labor "right-to-work" laws starts in Houston. It was there in 1936 that Vance Muse, an oil industry lobbyist, founded the Christian American Association with backing from Southern oil companies and industrialists from the Northeast.

As Dartmouth sociologist Marc Dixon notes in his fascinating history of the period [pdf], "The Christian American Association was the first in the nation to champion the 'Right-to-Work' as a full-blown political slogan."

Muse was a fixture in far-right politics in the South before settling into his anti-labor crusade. In his 1946 book "Southern Exposure," crusading journalistStetson Kennedy wrote:

The man Muse is quite a character. He is six foot four, wears a ten-gallon hat, but generally reserves his cowboy boots for trips Nawth. Now over fifty, Muse has been professionally engaged in reactionary enterprises for more than a quarter of a century.

As Kennedy described, these causes included opposing women's suffrage, child labor laws, integration and growing efforts to change the Southern political order, as represented in the threat of Roosevelt's New Deal.

Muse's sister and associate at the Christan American Association, Ida Darden, openly complained about the First Lady's "Eleanor Clubs" saying they (as related by Kennedy):

...stood for "$15 a week salary for all nigger house help, Sundays off, no washing, and no cleaning upstairs." As an afterthought, she added, "My nigger maid wouldn’t dare sit down in the same room with me unless she sat on the floor at my feet!"

Allowing herself to go still further, the little lady went on to say, "Christian Americans can’t afford to be anti-Semitic, but we know where we stand on the Jews, all right.

The Association also suspected Catholics -- which Dixon notes caused the downfall of their crusades in neighboring Louisiana.

But for far-right conservatives like Muse, as well as industry groups like the Southern States Industrial Council, labor -- including black labor -- posed an especially dangerous threat in Texas. Thanks to a burgeoning wartime economy, along with labor organizing drives spearheaded by the Congress of Industrial Organizations and, to a lesser extent, the American Federation of Labor, unions were rapidly growing in Texas. After hovering around 10 percent of the workforce during the 1930s, union membership exploded by 225 percent during the next decade.

Muse and the Christian American Association saw danger. Not only were the unions expanding the bargaining power -- and therefore improving the wages and working conditions -- of working-class Texans, they also constituted a political threat. The CIO in particular opposed Jim Crow and demanded an end to segregation. Unions were an important political ally to FDR and the New Deal. And always lurking in the shadows was the prospect of a Red Menace, stoked by anti-communist hysteria.

Working in concert with segregationists and right-wing business leaders, Muse and the Association swiftly took action. Their first step in 1941 was to push an "anti-violence" bill that placed blanket restrictions on public union picketing at workplaces. The stated goal was to ensure "uninterrupted" industrial production during World War II, although Texas had the fewest number of strikes in the South, and the law applied to all industries, war-related or not.

Their success with the "anti-violence" bill spurred Muse and the Christian American Association to push for -- and pass -- similar laws throughout the South. Mississippi adopted an anti-violence statute in 1942; Florida, Arkansas, and Alabama passed similar laws in 1943. It also emboldened them to take on a much bigger prize: ending the ability of labor groups to run a "closed shop," where union benefits extend only to union members.

In 1945, the Christian American Association -- along with allies cemented in earlier anti-union legislative battles, including the Fight for Free Enterprise and the vehemently anti-union Texas Lt. Gov. John Lee Smith -- introduced a right-to-work bill in Texas. It passed the House by a 60 to 53 margin, but pro-New Deal forces stopped it in the state senate. Two years later, thanks to a well-funded campaign from the Association and industry -- and internal divisions between the craft-oriented AFL and the more militant CIO -- Texas' right-to-work bill was signed into law.

While working to pass right-to-work legislation in Texas, Muse and the Association took their efforts to Arkansas and Florida, where a similar message equating union growth with race-mixing and communism led to the passage of the nation's first right-to-work laws in 1944. In all, 14 states passed such legislation by 1947, when conservatives in Congress successfully passed Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act, enshrining the right of states to pass laws that allow workers to receive union benefits without joining a union.

Civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr., who saw an alliance with labor as crucial to advancing civil rights as well as economic justice for all workers, spoke out against right-to-work laws; this 1961 statement by King was widely circulated this week during Michigan's labor battles:

In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, such as ‘right to work.’ It is a law to rob us of our civil rights and job rights. Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining by which unions have improved wages and working conditions of everyone…Wherever these laws have been passed, wages are lower, job opportunities are fewer and there are no civil rights.

Interestingly, 11 years later, Kansas also passed a right-to-work law, with the support of Texas-born energy businessman Fred Koch, who also viewed unions as vessels for communism and integration. Koch's sons Charles and David went on to form the Tea Party group Americans for Prosperity, which pushed for the Michigan right-to-work measure, and is now advocating for states that already have such laws, like North Carolina and Virginia, to further enshrine them in their state constitutions.

And what about Muse? According to the Texas State Historical Association:

Muse died on October 15, 1950, at his Houston home, where his efforts with the Christian Americans had originated. At the time of his death he was working on a right-to-work amendment to the federal Constitution.

UPDATE: An earlier version of this story inadvertently cut off two important credits. IMAGE: Map of states with right to work laws (Wikipedia). HAT-TIP:Mark Ames at NSFWCorp who wrote about the same issue, especially for quotes from Stetson Kennedy's Southern Exposure (the inspiration behind the Institute's award-winning journal of the same name.) Other valuable sources on the civil rights/labor connection include Michael Honey'sSouthern Labor and Black Civil Rights, Michael Boston's Labor, Civil Rights and the Hughes Tool Company and Barbara Griffith's The Crisis of American Labor: Operation Dixie and the Defeat of the CIO.                                                            

The ITUC's Provocative Statement to the Workers Of Greece

"Hands off Medicare"

There is still time to Sign Petition to Save Medicare and
 Social Security from Paul Ryan and company.
(Please note: You don't have to donate in order to sign the petition and you will not be added to any fundraising lists.)
 

"The November election results did not give anyone a mandate to dismantle one of the most popular public programs in U.S. history, Medicare. As nurses we are absolutely opposed to Rep. Paul Ryan's schemes to destroy it by converting it into a program that further enriches the insurance industry and denies care to seniors because they can't afford it.  

Medicare works and that's why we think it should be expanded so that everyone in our nation has access to quality care regardless of their ability to pay. Nurses will make our voices heard across the country in the face of the threat of privatization and profiteering off sickness which is at the heart of the Ryan proposal.” ----- Jean Ross, Co-President, National Nurses United who will speak at the press conference.

The press conference will be live-streamed at a link from this FB events page on Dec. 7, 11 a.m. EST. https://www.facebook.com/events/1637648376535371/?ti=icl

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell may use a parliamentary procedure called reconciliation to bring Speaker Ryan’s plan to destroy Medicare to a vote – and it could happen as soon as this January. Reconciliation would allow this devastating bill to pass by a simple majority, without the opportunity for a filibuster.

But the American people will not take this lying down.

Please take a moment now to sign the petition! Tell the Republicans "Hands off Medicare!" 

WFTU statement for the health and safety protective measures in Asia – Pacific region

\

29 Nov 2016

ASIA

The WFTU expresses its strong condemnation for the serial “accidents” at the workplaces, particularly to many countries in Asia – Pacific region. On an almost daily basis we learn about a new work accident that took the lives of more workers who die while struggling to make a living in miserable working conditions. In the vast majority, the industrial accidents are caused by the criminal negligence and the lack of health and safety protective measures at the workplaces.

There is no doubt that the employers and the owners of the industries and plants know very well the lack of safety measures. They also know the dangers that exist in their enterprises because of the lack of the safety protective measures. According to this fact we can easily conclude that the “accidents” are nothing else than conscious murders.

The protection of the life of the working class is a main task of the trade union movement. Orientated by the resolution “platform 2016 – 2020” of the 17th World Trade Union Congress we demand the implementation immediate and adequate measures that would actually protect the workers lives. In this direction the WFTU and its affiliated members in Philippines and in Indonesia had already plan 2 joint events that will include discussion on that topic. The WFTU calls the class oriented trade unions to take initiatives for continuing and strengthening of our action and struggles:

– for health and safety measures in the workplace that will protect the short and long term health of the workers.

– we fight so that no workers life is sacrificed for profit, and for full reparation of workers or their families in the case of work related incident or illness.

– Adequate and sufficient leaves towards health issues. Under the responsibility of the special committee of Health and Safety:

– We should prepare special materials in various languages that will inform workers on health and safety.

– Organize seminars in cooperation with other WFTU affiliates for informing and educating the workers and union leaders.

– Organize International Conference on the role of the trade unions on issues of “Health and Safety”

– Strengthen international outcry against employers’ unaccountability and strengthen international solidarity for achieving goals in this sector.

The Secretariat

PAME Calls for National General Strike December 8!

ALL IN THE STRUGGLE !
We demand rights at work and life, based on our needs and our time - the 21st
century!
Colleagues, unemployed, self-employed, scientists, farmers, pensioners, young men and
women in flexible working conditions and wages-crumbs, do not accept the new barbarity!
PAME calls on all unions, each Federation, Labour Centre, each association, all the
workers to decide on a Nationwide General Strike In Both The Public And Private sector on
December 8. We shall not waste any more time!
No more blackmails, lies and deception. The new round of attack that has started is
predetermined a long time ago by the government, the EU and IMF, SEV (Hellenic
Federation of Enterprises)and the other employers associations, the parties that voted in
favour of the 3rd Memorandum, the compromised trade union leaderships (ETUC
affiliates). They want at all costs even cheaper workforce. They want to eliminate every
labor right that is left.
The negotiation between the Greek Government and the EU, IMF, ECB started in the wellknown
common basis of blackmails and threats to workers. The results either they take as
a basis the finding of the Commission of "experts" or the "Joint Declaration" of the social
partners, or the "best European practices", lead to: The making bigger the sweatshop
conditions for the workers, for the benefit of the business groups. The legalization of
massive layoffs, the undermining of the –already cut- minimum salary, the legalization of
lockout, the limitation or the prohibition of trade union rights and freedoms and new heavy
taxation to the people. Also to allow poor people’s homes to be seized and auctioned.
They will not stop unless we stop them!
Our life every day moves backwards so that the profits and privileges of the monopoly
groups, of the few, can be increased. The more than 530, so far, workers’ Federations,
Labour Centres, Trade Unions, who stepped forward and participated in rallies on October
17 against the anti-people policy and the fight for Collective Contracts, show the way of
organization and confrontation that must be opened before us.
We demand:
• The cancelation of all the anti-workers and anti-social insurance laws of the last years.
• The restoration of the basic salary, the abolition of the anti-workers’ framework for the
Collective Labour Agreements and the reintroduction of the sectoral collective bargaining.
• The abolition of the new payroll and reactionary assessment in the public sector, the
reestablishment of the 13th and 14th salary, the coverage of the losses of the public sector
employees.
• Sectoral Collective Contracts with wage increases on the basis of the huge losses in the
workers’ income in each sector and workplace.
• The reestablishment of cut pensions and benefits.
• The protection of the unemployed with an increase of the unemployment benefit.
• To put a brake on the taxation of the workers.
• To make the industrialists, bankers and ship-owners pay.
Colleagues, workers, unemployed,
Ignore the voices of compromise and subjugation that are being grown together by the
government, the big employers, the parties who signed the 3rd Memorandum and the
compromised leaderships in the GSEE and ADEDY(ETUC Affiliates in Greece) that attend
the prearranged “social dialogues”, they sign "joint findings" and "joint statements" with the
butchers of the working class.
We have nothing good to expect from the "negotiation", the "compassion" of employers
that does not exist, the capitalist growth that they preach. Their "development" will be
watered with the blood of the children of the working class, who are condemned to
unemployment, to cheap work and to flexible working conditions!
No Waiting, No Delay!
We Respond: December 8 - National General Strike!
Athens, November 7, 2016

Tentative agreement reached in Ft. Worth Symphony Orchestra strike

Happy Holidays to you all! As 2016 draws to a close, we are so grateful to all of our supporters - old and  new.  Our music-making has even more meaning when we are connected with you, our enthusiastic audiences, advocates, and friends.  We wish you peace and joy in the new year.

As you may have heard by now, a tentative agreement has been reached between the Musicians and Management. The Musicians will be voting on this proposed contract in the next few days, and we will let you know the results as soon as we are able. Thank you for your patience...and, as always, thank you for your support!

Upcoming Performances December 13: A Baroque Christmas Broadway Baptist Church, 7:00pm 305 W Broadway Ave, Fort Worth, Texas 76104 The Symphony Musicians of Fort Worth present A Baroque Christmas, highlighting compositions of Bach and Corelli. Featured soloists are Jennifer Corning Lucio, oboe; Michael Shih, violin; Pam Adams, flute; and Kyle Sherman, trumpet. View the Facebook event here. Donations gratefully accepted for the Musicians of the FWSO Fund. December 22: Baroque Holiday Concert White's Chapel United Methodist Church, 7:00pm 185 S White Chapel Blvd, Southlake, Texas 76092 Principal violinist Laura Bruton will perform Telemann's Viola Concerto. This concert is presented by the Apex Arts League.

MTA slapped with suit for refusing to display ad highlighting how often transit workers are assaulted

The union representing transit workers slapped the MTA on Monday with a federal lawsuit for blocking bus and subway ads with graphic images highlighting how often they are assaulted on the job, the Daily News has learned.

Transport Workers Union Local 100 claims the MTA’s refusal to sell the advertising space violates the free speech provisions of the U.S. Constitution.

The ads are part of Local 100’s campaign to secure raises for the 38,000 men and women who operate and maintain the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s bus and subway system.

“We want the public to have a better understanding of what it’s like to be a transit worker,” TWU Local 100 President John Samuelsen said.

De Blasio defers to MTA on subway fare cuts for low-income riders

“We move over 8 million rides each day, providing this vital service to New Yorkers, but we pay a heavy price in blood.”

The rejected ad shows a female bus driver in a neck brace, and a male driver with a battered face in a bloody uniform shirt.

The two other photos show the bruised face of another worker, and the arm of a second with two deep slash wounds dripping with blood

“Every 36 hours, a transit worker is assaulted on the job,” the advertisement states.

Union, MTA to talk safety at hearing after worker's death

“We deserve a wage increase for our sacrifices.”

About 250 bus and subway workers are assaulted a year, according to MTA data.

The MTA did not immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday.

The MTA rejected the ad in November. Outlook, which manages advertising for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, said the ad was political, and barred it under agency rules, MTA spokesman Kevin Ortiz said on Nov. 21.

That policy, adopted in April 2015, prohibits ads which “express a political message, including…an opinion, position or view point regarding disputed economic, political… or social issues.”

A spokesman for the union said Sunday that they disagree that the ad is political in nature.

He pointed out that after the Nov. 8 presidential election, the MTA allowed hundreds, if not thousands of people, to post all kinds of political opinions and messages on the walls of the Union Square station at E. 14th St.

“The subway is clearly a public forum where political content is protected by the U.S. Constitution,” the spokesman said.

“The MTA said as much in the weeks following the election of President-elect Donald Trump.”

The contract between the MTA and Local 100 expires Jan. 15.