On The Air: Missed last week's Your Rights At Work radio show? Listen here: Play ball! Sportswriter Dave Zirin on three major labor sports stories: the Major League Baseball Players Association affiliates with the AFL-CIO, minor league ball players organize, and U.S. Soccer signs equal pay agreements. Plus: Isa Salazar, one of the Politics and Prose Workers Union organizers, about how workers there won a union and a first contract in just 10 months. Catch it on your fav podcast app (search for Your Rights At Work) or catch it live every Thursday at 1p on WPFW 89.3FM.
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THIS JUST IN: The DC COPE will resume meeting on October 5 at 2:00 P.M. via Zoom. In the meantime, at the request of the COPE Chair, please let us know what your legislative and future budgetary priorities are for the rest of 2022 and 2023. To access the legislative agenda form, click here. In addition, the Metro Washington Council will be launching its Labor to Labor Program this Saturday, September 17th at 9:00 a.m. We hope that you will join us as we come out in full force for Councilmember Elissa Silverman, to sign-up, please click here. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the DC COPE or this year’s Labor to Labor Program, please contact Déjah Désirée Williams at [email protected].
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Workers at Metropolitan Meat, Seafood & Poultry ratify new contract
UFCW Local 400 members working at Metropolitan Meat, Seafood & Poultry in Hyattsville, MD have voted overwhelmingly to ratify a new four-year contract. The new contract includes several key improvements, including better pay and additional paid sick/personal days. The starting hourly pay rate was increased from $15.30 to $16.60 for lowest paid worker. Voting took place on September 2nd and members voted 19–1 in favor of ratifying the agreement. |
UnionTweet: #RedForEd Banneker @WTUTeacher are #RedForEd and looking for a #faircontract @MayorBowser @DCPSChancellor - Washington Teachers' Union @WTUTeacher
Congratulations to the Stewards in Action fall class for successful completion. #afscmestrong #afscme67 - AFSCME MD Council 67 @AFSCME67
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Labor Day with the Commanders
Click here to order your tickets for the CSA Labor Union Day at FedEx Field on September 25, when the Washington Commanders take on the Philadelphia Eagles. More info/details: CSA Executive Director Letycia Pastrana: [email protected] or call/text 678-429-8174.
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Haiti Garment Workers Need Four Times Their Wages to Get By
Haiti garment workers should be paid four times their current salaries just to keep pace with the cost of living, a new Solidarity Center study finds. The study recommends the Haiti government increase the minimum wage to a living wage and ensure that “workers’ rights to freedom of association and collective bargaining are fully respected, so that workers are empowered to negotiate wage increases and improve working conditions with employers.” Find out more at Solidarity Center.
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Labor Quote: Merle Travis
You load sixteen tons, whattaya get? Another day older and deeper in debt St. Peter don'cha call me, 'cause I can't go I owe my soul to the company store
From Merle Travis' song "16 Tons." The line "You load sixteen tons and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt" came from a letter written by Travis's brother John. Another line came from their father, a coal miner, who would say: "I can't afford to die. I owe my soul to the company store. On this date in 1897, some 75,000 coal miners in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia ended a ten-week strike after winning an eight hour day, semi-monthly pay, and the abolition of overpriced company-owned stores, where they had been forced to shop.
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This week’s Labor History Today podcast: A miasma of metals. Last week’s show: NC Labor History Revealed!.
Eugene V. Debs, labor leader and socialist, sentenced to 10 years for opposing World War I. While in jail Debs received 1 million votes for president - 1918
Jobless workers march on grocery stores and seize food in Toledo, Ohio - 1932
New York City’s Union Square, the site of the first Labor Day in 1882, is officially named a national historic landmark. The square has long been a focal point for working class protest and political expression - 1998
- David Prosten |
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