Entries by Paul Becker

STARBUCKS WORKERS TALKING UNION AROUND COUNTRY

Buoyed by the victory of a newly organized union at one Starbucks store in Buffalo to gain collective bargaining rights, and in the face of intense anti-union pressure from the company, Starbucks workers at other facilities are also talking union. Workers at a second store in the Buffalo area won union rights after the National Labor […]

COLUMBIA GRAD SCHOOL WORKERS WIN STRONG GAINS AFTER10-WEEK STRIKE

Striking graduate school student workers at Columbia University ended their labor action Jan. 7 with an agreement that includes a 7 to 11 percent raise for workers with annual contracts based upon the length of their appointments and an hourly wage boost from the previous $15/hour to $21/hour. The annual salaries of doctoral candidates on […]

DC BOOKSTORE GROUP RECOGNIZES UNION

The Washington DC bookstore group, Politics and Prose, which has 54 employees in three locations in the Capital, has voluntarily recognized Local 400 of the United Food and Commercial Workers as the bargaining agent for its employers, the union and owners announced in a joint statement. “We look forward to working with the union,” said […]

AMAZON, UNDER MOUNTING PRESSURE, AGREES TO END ANTI-LABOR PRACTICES

After repeated and determined efforts to unionize its warehouse workers in the face of stubborn intimidating tactics by the company, Amazon has finally come to a settlement with the National Labor Relations Board to keep its hands off workers attempts to freely organize into unions. In the settlement, reached just before Christmas, Amazon agreed to […]

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FILM, TV WORKERS REACH “LANDMARK AGREEMENT” WITH MAJOR STUDIOS

In what the union described as a landmark agreement, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employers (IATSE) reached a three-year agreement with motion picture and television producers in October. The agreement affects 60,000 film and television workers in 36 IATSE locals across the country. IATSE member posting a message on the car of a union […]

KELLOGG WORKERS OK NEW CONTRACT AFTER LONG STRIKE

After a prolonged strike that lasted 2 ½ months, workers at four Kellogg cereal plants ratified a new contract just a few days before Christmas and voted to return to work. The contract, negotiated through the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers Union, will sharply limit the “unfair two-tier wage system” that had only […]

UNIONS: GOOD FOR WORKERS AND GOOD FOR THE COUNTRY

Most people think of unions as benefitting their members with higher pay and better working conditions. But it has long been known that the benefit of unions go far beyond that – affecting the well-being of their communities and the entire country. A recent report by analysts at the Economic Policy Institute documents the benefits […]

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BUFFALO STARBUCKS STORE BECOMES FIRST IN CHAIN TO UNIONIZE

Despite the very small number of workers involved, the Starbucks store in Buffalo, NY made history Dec. 9 when it became the first one in the Starbucks chain to vote to unionize. The workers voted 19-8 to be represented by Workers United in an election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board. Starbucks, the biggest […]