Labor Update: Week of January 22, 2018

Jeremy Sprinkle

22 Jan, 2018

From our Blog

North Carolina Unions Added 16,000 Members in 2017

“The growth in union membership shows that working people understand the power we have when we join together,” said MaryBe McMillan, President of the North Carolina State AFL-CIO.

Twitter Power Academy FREE Intro Webinar Rescheduled for Feb. 13th

Sign up for a free 30-minute intro session at 6:00 pm ET on Wednesday, February 13th that will highlight the past effectiveness and future utility of Twitter organizing in North Carolina. Read more.

News & Observer Editorial: Time to Raise the Wage!

“North Carolina’s refusal to increase its minimum wage is beginning to look as heartless and thoughtless as its refusal to expand Medicaid,” says The News & Observer in an editorial that rejects as unfounded the canard that raising the wage will hurt businesses or employment and says keeping it at $7.25 “doesn’t improve the state’s economy and only protects jobs barely worth having.” Read more.

North Carolina Labor History Exhibit Available for Show

The North Carolina State AFL-CIO produced and unveiled this exhibit at its 60th Annual Convention in September 2017 and is making it available to libraries, museums, union halls, and other public spaces so people today can learn about the struggles and victories their fellow North Carolinians encountered on the road to secure our freedom to join together in the workplace for a better life. Read more.

News that Works

Consumer protection bureau changes direction, will reconsider rule that sets stricter limits on payday lending [Washington Post]. The Center for Responsible Lending tweeted that the plan by Mick Mulvaney, President Trump's choice to lead the CFPB despite having ties to payday lenders and despite repeatedly trying to kill the bureau, amounted to "chumming for payday loan sharks to kill the rule." Ten actions that hurt workers in President Trump's first year [Economic Policy Institute]. Number 2 on the list is the Trump administration's rescinding of overtime rules updated during the Obama administration, an action that EPI estimates "deprived 12.5 million workers of automatic overtime protection and will cost workers an estimated $1.2 billion a year." In a Landslide Vote, the LA Times Just Unionized, Upending a Long Anti-Labor History [In These Times]. The vote of 248 to 44 to join the NewsGuild - Communications Workers of America and is the first big union organizing victory of 2018. Republicans Are Taking Voter Suppression to the Workplace [In These Times]. The new Republican majority on the National Labor Relations Board is moving quickly to undo recent reforms to speed up the union election process and may even move to overturn the 52-year old rule requiring employers to provide organizers with lists of the names and addresses of eligible bargaining unit members.

Take Action

Alumni of Carolina Labor School can now register for the next session of Advanced Labor School, March 21-23 in Raleigh. Register online at http://bit.ly/apply4advcls. There's still time to for Central Labor Councils to register for the 2018 CLC Leadership Training. The rescheduled training will now be held February 2nd from 10am-3pm at the NC State AFL-CIO Office in Raleigh. There is no cost for the training. Lunch will be provided. Register online at http://bit.ly/ncclct18.