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Today’s Teamster News For May 19, 2016

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TEAMSTERS

Teamsters at International Paper Hold Unfair Labor Practice Strike  Teamster.org  …Members of Teamsters Local 284 employed at International Paper Corporation’s Delaware, Ohio, plant have gone on an unfair labor practice (ULP) strike. The ULP strike was caused by International Paper’s decision to unilaterally implement what it called its “last, best and final offer”…

Hoffa: New Projection in TPP Report Should Be Taken with a Grain of Salt  Teamster.org  …Hoffa on the U.S. ITC’s review of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The USITC is predicting the TPP will only result in an economic impact of an average annual GDP growth of .01 percent over 15 years: “The numbers coming out of the U.S. ITC about the economic benefits that it says would result from the implementation of this 12-nation Pacific Rim trade deal are typical”…

60 Con Edison contractors vote to authorize strike over wages, lack of proper safety training  NY Daily News  …Verizon workers on strike may soon get some company. On Thursday, workers at Allstate Power Vac — a Con Edison contractor-voted unanimously to authorize a strike. “It is unacceptable that workers are risking their lives and maintaining this essential infrastructure for near minimum wage salaries,” said Sean Campbell, president of Teamsters Local 813, which Allstate Power Vac workers voted to join in November 2015…

DHL contractor pilots sign off on a strike  Logistics Mgmt  …United States-based contract pilots flying for DHL elected to move forward with a strike this week. Earlier this month, LM reported that nearly 2,000 pilots working at four of DHL’s five North American network carriers are voting this week to authorize the union to call a strike. The pilots are represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters…

 

GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE

Zimbabwe Migrant Farm Workers See Dawn of Justice  Solidarity Center  …Some of the 245 Zimbabwe migrant farm workers brutalized and evicted last September from a large farm in South Africa, where many had toiled for years, have now been vindicated in court. In a recent court hearing in South Africa, a judge rejected the farm owner’s argument that the workers were on extended strike and should not be compensated or reinstated…

Brazil sea strike on hold as Superior Labour Court upholds right to strike  Hellenic Shipping  …Brazilian seafarers have decided to suspend their strike action while they vote on a possible agreement worked out at conciliatory hearings at the country’s Superior Labour Court. The court acted after the seafarers’ confederation, CONTTMAF, alerted it to threats to crew and anti-union actions by oil carrier Transpetro aimed at breaking the strike..

France hit by rail strike, demo by weary police  Reuters  …Strikes by French railway and port workers halved train services and prompted cancellation of ferry links to Britain on Wednesday as labor unions sought to force President Francois Hollande’s government into retreat on labor law reforms. After weeks of protests in which hundreds of their number have been hurt, police held a rally of their own to vent frustration over the stresses of near daily clashes…

Report Says Trade Deal Would Boost U.S. Economy, But Opponents Say No  NPR  …If Congress were to approve the Trans-Pacific Partnership, it would help the economy, though not by all that much, the U.S. International Trade Commission said Wednesday. By 2032, TPP would be increasing real GDP by nearly $43 billion annually, and supporting an additional 128,000 full time jobs…

Economist Dean Baker on the TPP and Latest USITC Report  CEPR  …“The United States International Trade Commission (USITC) report on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was far closer in its assessment of the impact of the TPP on the U.S. economy to the earlier report from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) than the recent report produced by the Peterson Institute for International Economics. The USITC has not done well in projecting winning and losing sectors from trade agreements”…

Trade ministers working to implement Pacific deal  The Hill  …Top trade officials said Tuesday that they are committed to implementing a sweeping Asia-Pacific agreement in their home countries. The ministers from the 12 Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) countries said in a statement that they “are working diligently to complete their respective domestic processes”…

 

STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES

Witnesses detail difficulties obtaining IDs in Wisconsin voter ID case  Cap Times  …A federal judge heard testimony Tuesday from Wisconsin residents who have faced difficulties obtaining photo IDs for themselves or family members on the second day of a trial challenging several of the state’s voting laws. Witnesses for the plaintiffs included a son who faced difficulties getting an ID for his mother in 2011…

Senate panel’s bill hikes R.I. proposed minimum wage to $10.10 by 2017  Providence Journal  …A Senate committee is expected to vote Wednesday on a proposal to raise Rhode island’s $9.60 an hour minimum wage by 50 cents to $10.10 an hour on Jan. 1, 2017, according to a Senate spokesman. The bill scheduled for a vote by the Senate Labor Committee would go further…

$15 Minimum Wage, Strike Relief Bills Released from New Jersey Labor Committee  AFLCIO  …The release of a $15 minimum wage bill from New Jersey’s Senate Labor Committee is being hailed by the New Jersey State AFL-CIO and other advocates as a powerful step toward lifting an estimated one million New Jersey residents out of poverty. The bill cleared the committee in a party line vote on Monday, along with a measure that would extend unemployment benefits to workers during a strike…

States’ Republicans Scramble to Halt Minimum Wage Initiatives  Newsweek   …Faced with a likely statewide ballot measure that would raise Arizona’s minimum wage to $12 by 2020 and guarantee paid sick time for workers if passed by voters in November, opponents tried recently to place an alternative measure on the ballot by legislative fiat. At the behest of the Arizona Restaurant Association, a group of Republican state legislators proposed a countermeasure that would raise the minimum wage to only $9.50…

NH Senate Passes HB1697 To Better Regulate On-Demand Ridesharing Services  NH Labor News  …The New Hampshire Senate passed HB 1697, relative to the operation and insurance of transportation network companies, that would impose much needed regulations on this fast growing industry.  HB 1697 is a laundry list of regulations that bring the new on-demand taxi service in line with current taxi cab regulations…

 

U.S. LABOR

Verizon, union leaders agree to mediator in ongoing contract talks  Philly.com   …After meeting in Washington with U.S. Labor Secretary Thomas Perez Tuesday, management and union leaders involved in the Verizon labor dispute agreed to accept the assistance of federal mediator Allison Beck in ongoing contract negotiations. Discussions will continue in Washington under the auspices of the Labor Department…

Mission Foods Workers Choose UFCW Representation with Local 1776  UFCW.org  …On May 12, nearly 450 workers at the Mission Foods plant in Mountain Top, Pa., voted to join UFCW Local 1776. Mission Foods workers make a full line of Mexican food products, including tortillas, wraps and salsas used in restaurants and sold in supermarkets on several continents…

In Silicon Valley, Outsourcers Top the List of Companies Seeking High-Skill Guestworkers  Jobs with Justice  …One of the tech industry’s more pernicious employment trends is the way companies frequently use the U.S. immigration system to make permanent work insecure and to routinely facilitate the outsourcing of good, skilled jobs to lower wage labor markets. New analysis of U.S. Department of Labor data by Jobs With Justice and the Economic Policy Institute suggests that this practice is commonplace in Silicon Valley…

The new overtime rule will directly benefit 12.5 million working people  EPI  …12.5 million workers will be newly eligible for overtime protections: they are currently ineligible for overtime pay because they are classified, or wrongly classified, as having job duties that preclude receiving overtime. The rest will have their rights strengthened (they are currently at risk of being classified or misclassified as ineligible for overtime)…

Paul Ryan Commits To Fighting Rule That Extends Overtime Protection To Millions Of Workers  Think Progress   …Hours after the White House announced a final rule that will change overtime protection so that it covers millions more Americans, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-WI) vowed to fight it. But just months ago, Ryan was calling for the very sort of raises that the new rule will ensure…

UFW files for speedy union election as strike by 400-plus blueberry workers in McFarland enters its third day  UFW  …After an overwhelming majority of the 450 blueberry workers at Klein Management signed petitions asking to be represented by the United Farm Workers on the third day of their strike, the UFW filed for a union representation election to be conducted by the state Agricultural Labor Relations Board at the McFarland-based company…

Reagan National Airport workers come to Maryland Heights to protest wages  STL Today  …The group is pushing for workers to be paid a mandatory minimum wage of $15 an hour and be able to unionize, which has prompted strikes recently at several airports. Two clergy members and three workers came from Washington and explained their concerns to Peggy Hohl, company vice president, in a brief meeting in a hallway, said Julie Karant, an SEIU spokeswoman…

 

SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS

The Wealthiest, Most Democratic Countries Are Taking in Only a Fraction of the World’s Refugee Population  The Nation   …All around us, borders are broken more often than they are enforced, but the political moment has nevertheless become about building new walls. Trump’s call for a wall at the US-Mexico border—however unrealistic and buffoonish it sounds on the stump—echos the frenzied cries in Europe’s borderlands to erect wire fences and shut the gates…

Donald Trump Promises To ‘Dismantle’ Wall Street Reform  Think Progress  …In an interview with Reuters published on Wednesday, presumptive Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said he will release an economic plan in two weeks that will undo nearly all of the financial reforms that went into effect in 2010. “I would say it’ll be close to a dismantling of Dodd-Frank,” he said, naming the financial reform package…

He Killed Two FBI Agents. Or He Was Framed. After 40 Years, Will Obama Free Leonard Peltier?  Mother Jones  …Leonard Peltier, a member of the Lakota tribe who was convicted of murdering two FBI agents in 1977, has spent 40 of his 71 years in federal prison. During that time, some have come to view him as an international symbol of the mistreatment of Native Americans by the US criminal justice system…

North Carolina’s ‘Bathroom Law’ Is Invigorating The Push For Criminal Justice Reform  Think Progress  …Despite legal protections that prohibit police from profiling Americans based on their gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation, trans people are still targeted by cops — especially if they’re people of color. Oftentimes, trans people are verbally harassed, sexually abused, physically assaulted, and entrapped by arresting officers…

Inside the Koch’s chilling economics curriculum  Salon  …In recent years, student activists and investigative journalists have exposed another of Koch’s hats: mega-donor to hundreds of colleges and universities, often funding free-market-focused academic centers housed at public and private schools alike. One Koch-funded program is advocating cutthroat economics to grade school students, even sacrificing lives for profits…