Labor department sloooooooolwy writing anti-child labor laws

From Unions.org:

This week the U.S. Department of Labor proposed revisions to federal laws aiming to protect children from working in dangerous agricultural occupations. The urgent need for tightened regulation was highlighted by the deaths of two 14-year-old girls who were electrocuted on an Illinois farm this summer. “Children employed in agriculture are some of the most vulnerable workers in America,” Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis said. “Ensuring their welfare is a priority of the department…”

The return of child labor to the United States

You can thank for Tea Party for this:

Much of the current pressure for loosening the restrictions is coming from businesses that employ young people, especially the fast-food industry. They want more freedom to schedule high school students on long shifts and late at night. And they would like to pay minors less than the minimum wage.

When they argue for the changes, they talk about the great advantages that looser rules would have for young people — giving them “greater flexibility” in their work lives and valuable work experience. Of course, it is not clear how valuable the experience of handing burgers out of a drive-through window after 10 p.m. on a school night actually is.

Not surprisingly, research shows that working interferes with children’s ability to get an education. Studies have found that the more students work, the lower their grades. Working more than 20 hours a week has been tied to academic and behavioral problems, and to increased dropout rates. Minors, who do not have to pay rent or support a family, can afford to work for less — and will, if the state creates a lower-tier minimum wage for them. In many cases they are also more malleable workers, less eager to challenge working conditions or join unions.

 

 

Anti-labor Gov. Scott Walker facing recall vote in Wisconsin

From Progress Illinois:

Now that six Republican State Senators are facing a recall election this summer, Wisconsin Democrats have begun focusing on an effort to recall embattled Gov. Scott Walker in early 2012.

That was the consensus among Democrats that gathered in Milwaukee over the weekend for the state party’s annual convention. “Scott Walker must be stopped,” said Mike Tate, chairman of the Wisconsin Democratic Party. “It will be the Democratic party that does it.”

Since becoming Wisconsin’s governor in Jan. 2011, Walker has pushed and promoted an arch-conservative agenda that targets organized labor and has drastically cut funding for public education. Meanwhile, Walker has cut business taxes by about $67 million over two years. In six months, Walker will have served long enough to become eligible for recall. Already, a group has formed to promote the recall of Gov. Walker by asking Wisconsin voters to sign a pledge. About 190,000 voters have signed a petition, party officials said.

 

Jobs moving back to the United States

From American Manufacturing:

Coleman Co. reports that it is moving production of its 16-quart, wheeled plastic coolers to Wichita, Kansas from China.  The company reports rising costs in China are changing the cost-benefit calculation enough for them to bring production of some goods back to North America.

Elsewhere, Arnette Pattern Co. Inc., a manufacturing firm in Granite City, Illinois, is expanding its plant and expects to grow its workforce by 50 percent over the next several years.  The expansion is expected to give the company the ability to work on larger projects when complete next year.

Hat tip: LABOR Paper.

AFTRA Members Escalate Fight for Fair Contract in Central Illinois

Posted at AFTRA Wall on Facebook:

PEORIA (May 17, 2011) – The American Federation of Radio and Television Artists, AFL-CIO – a national union of more than 70,000 professional performers, artists and broadcasters – today distributed flyers and a petition to the neighborhood homes surrounding Peoria’s WEEK/WHOI-TV local station headquarters.  The union also passed out flyers to the Darien, Conn., residence and neighbors of Granite Broadcasting’s CEO Peter Markham.  The flyers and petition call on the community to support professional AFTRA journalists in their stalled negotiations with station owners of WEEK/WHOI-TV, which is owned by Connecticut-based Granite Broadcasting.

The flyers and petition state that the “Professional News Team at Central Illinois’ WEEK/WHOI is standing up for their professions, their communities and decent jobs by fighting back against Granite Broadcasting’s attacks on local and professional news. Granite Broadcasting management is threatening to possibly outsource local news, degrade working conditions for your neighborhood news team and allow amateurs to inform your community!” AFTRA members are calling on Peoria’s WEEK-WHOI-TV and Markham’s neighbors to “join your news team and your community in their efforts to save local news.”

Members of the AFTRA Peoria Local who work at WEEK/WHOI-TV have been in contract negotiations with station owners since November 2010. Negotiations stalled on Feb. 18, 2011 and since then AFTRA members have been working without a contract. Despite months of good faith bargaining, concessions to company proposals in recognition of the WEEK/WHOI-TV’s challenged financial operations and repeated requests by AFTRA negotiators and unit members for the company to return to the negotiating table, to date, the company has flatly refused.

“We have tried over and over again to successfully bargain a contract that provides for our members and honors their commitment and duty to their community in Central Illinois,” said J.D. Miller, Chief Negotiator and AFTRA Kansas City and St. Louis Local Executive Director. Our efforts to reach a fair contract have been ignored, so we are now escalating our approach. By reaching out to these executives’ friends and neighbors, we hope to make them realize that local journalism is important to this community.”

As outlined in the flyers and petition, AFTRA members’ chief concern is not wages or benefits. Instead, they consider the company’s proposal to outsource local news reporting a threat to their commitment to provide their community with quality, locally reported news. So far, the pleas of the 30 professional journalists represented by AFTRA have been ignored by the station’s General Manager Mark Desantis, who lives in Peoria, as well as by executives at Granite Broadcasting, including Markham who lives almost 1,000 miles away in Darien, Conn.

WEEK/WHOI-TV is owned by Connecticut-based Granite Broadcasting which in turn is owned by Silver Point Capital (www.silverpointcaptial.com) whose website describes it as a “distressed debt and credit-focused private investment firm based in Greenwich, Connecticut.” Silver Point Capital has been previously reportedly as a $6 billion private hedge fund under the leadership of two former Goldman Sachs executives, Robert J. O’Shea and Edward Mulé. The fund focuses on the mid-sized distress market, and it is one of the most profitable and active private hedge funds in the financial sector.

While American middle-class broadcast journalists in Central Illinois are fighting for dignity in their professions and to keep news reporting local in their community, Silver Point Capital has recently purchased millions of dollars of Lehman Brothers’ debt and the company is also working to build a $4 billion casino in Macau, China. The deal is currently in the courts due to funding issues between Silver Point Capital and other partners in the deal.

Along with owning Granite Broadcasting, Silver Point Capital has holdings in various industries in the United States. In 2005 Silver Point acquired a controlling interest in FiberMark, an upstate New York company. Shortly after Silver Point took over the operations of FiberMark, the firm implemented devastating changes for the workforce including cutting wages and benefits for working families.  A few years later, Silver Point Capital sold FiberMark for a profit. The firm also has an account, through Silver Point Capital Offshore Fund, in the Cayman Islands and offices in the United Kingdom.

The flyers and petition urge neighbors to call Destantis and Markham at their homes to express support for AFTRA members in Peoria who are working to provide their community with quality local news reporting. For more information, please visit the AFTRA Peoria website at http://www.aftra.com/peoria.htm or the AFTRA Peoria Facebook page at www.facebook.com/peoriaaftra.

 

I am shocked, I tell you, SHOCKED that Sarah Palin is anti union

Yeah, about what I would expect:

Sarah Palin defended Wisconsin’s governor at a tea party tax day rally Saturday, telling hundreds of supporters that his polarizing union rights law is designed to save public jobs.

Braving snow showers and a frigid wind outside the state Capitol building, the former Alaska governor and GOP vice presidential candidate told tea partyers she’s glad to stand with Gov. Scott Walker. Hundreds of labor supporters surrounded the rally, trying to drown Palin out with chants of “Hey-hey, ho-ho, Scott Walker has got to go!” and “Recall Walker!”

“Hey, folks! He’s trying to save your jobs and your pensions!” Palin yelled into the microphone. “Your governor did the right thing and you won! Your beautiful state won! And people still have their jobs!”

Folks, when you vote for Tea Baggers, you get what you deserve.