Surprise! Corporations lie about unions

Big corporations, bailed-out banks and various right-wing zanies have put millions of dollars into bogus front groups, pretending to care about worker rights and 'secret ballots.' Of course they really just hate the idea that workers might win a little bargaining power over working conditions, wages and benefits.

One of their big lies is that allowing workers the free choice to form a union once a majority have signed up will lead to 'union thugs' intimidating workers into signing union cards.

The Economic Policy Institute published a report on over a thousand campaigns where workers used majority sign-up to form a union (which has always been an option, but current law allows the company, not the workers, to decide whether to recognize the majority sign-up). Out of those 1,073 organizing campaigns, there were five complaints filed by workers alleging misconduct by the union. None of those complaints was found to have merit.

To sign on as an endorser of the Employee Free Choice Act, add your name by clicking here.

Bankrupt Tribune Execs want $70 Million in Bonuses

The union of workers at the Baltimore Sun has filed an objection to the Tribune Company's plan to give its executives about $70 million in bonuses. The Tribune Company owns the Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, LA Times and 23 TV stations, among other things.

Apparently, the execs feel bad about how they've made a hash of things and plunged the company into bankruptcy, so they need some morale boosting and motivating -- to the tune of $70 million in bonuses.
Apparently the employees -- who write articles, sell the ads and do the other work of newspapering -- don't need 'incentivizing'; they are getting nothing but pink slips.
Apparently, executives that can drive a company bankrupt are so hard to find in this economy that the Tribune feels the need to give big bonuses to keep them.

Due to being in bankruptcy court, a judge will decide on the objection, which probably couldn't have been filed if the employees didn't have a union.

Hmmmm ... maybe that's one of the reasons the Tribune Company is so adamantly anti-union?

Another 247,000 jobs lost last month

247,000. That's a lot of jobs to be lost in only a month.

Only in a massive economic crisis could anyone call it positive that there were 247,000 fewer jobs available than a month ago, but that loss is smaller than it has been for the past six months. The economic stimulus bill was part of what made the news less bad.

But it's still bad, and a bigger, better jobs plan is still needed.

In baseball, if you're outscored by 9 runs in each of the first 5 innings, do you cheer when you're outscored by 'only' 4 runs in the 6th? You're still losing ground.

There are about 6 people looking for every job opening in the country. That's only counting the people that are registered as looking. If we count the underemployed and those that have given up (which is how unemployment rate was calculated in the 1930s), the unemployment rate would be about 16% - much higher in communities of color.

Even if the first stimulus saves or create all 3.5 million jobs as planned, the economy will still be 4 million jobs short of what is needed to maintain the same (too high) unemployment rate of mid-2008.

And yet, the banks got their bailout, are using our money to gamble, pay bonuses, buy other banks and lobby against reform.

As the anniversary of the Wall Street Bailout approaches, Action for Justice is working in a coalition to put the bailout bandits on trial, and launch a campaign for Jobs & Housing for All.
September 24, 12 noon, downtown. Stay tuned for details.