 Workers in Peru this week succeeded in rolling back a law that targeted workers under age 25. Meanwhile, Bangladesh garment workers at five factories, part of East-West Industrial Park Ltd., stood strong in the face of a difficult struggle and won first-ever collective bargaining agreements. The new pacts increase the food allowance, improve canteen facilities and enable union leaders to assist members. Find out more at the Solidarity Center.
 On Super Bowl Sunday, some of our larger and faster union brothers—members of the NFL Players Association (NFLPA)—will be battling it out in Glendale, Ariz., at Super Bowl XLIX (49 for those of us who are shaky on Roman numerals). While the Super Bowl carries a union label, from players to broadcast crews to stadium workers—your Super Bowl party spread can, too, with union-made in America food and drinks. Check out these union-made Super Bowl party products, compiled by our friends at Labor 411, the union business directory. Also, the Metro Council’s Chris Garlock on Thursday morning showed Channel 8 NewsTalk’s Bruce DePuyt some of the union-made Super Bowl party products; click here to see the segment. - AFL-CIO Now blog  Inhumanly long hours, cruelty, frayed nerves. And that’s just behind the cameras at reality shows. “It’s scary and nerve-wracking,” said Sevita Qarshi, a producer walking the line Thursday outside the Realscreen conference at the Washington Hilton. Qarshi has worked on a number of reality TV shows, and says that the working conditions for the men and women producing the popular programs are just as dramatic as those in front of the cameras. “It’s just awful,” she said, “incredibly long hours, many of them unpaid, no sick days, no health insurance, no job security and constant stress.”
photo by Chris Garlock The long-running dispute between DC fire fighters and the city over overtime (DC Fire Fighters Win OT Ruling 12/16/2014) hit local headlines again this week. The $47 million owed to fire fighters after a 14-year legal battle would “add to a budget gap of $83 million in the current fiscal year that Mayor Muriel E. Bowser’s fledgling administration is already contending with,” reported the Washington Post on Monday. “The reality is that the city has turned a blind eye toward this problem and lost at every level,” said D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D). “There are no options left. It’s time to deal with it.” Said Fire Fighters Local 36 president Ed Smith, “there needs to be more focus on fully staffing the department so there isn't such an impact to the budget going forward.”
|
