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Also, if you miss our live show – or want to hear a past show – Your Rights At Work is now available as a podcast! Just search for Union City Radio on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts; subscribe and you’ll get our shows right on your phone! On today’s show: SEIU 32BJ Vice President Jaime Contreras on why airport workers need a union, even after winning a wage increase yesterday. Chaumtoli Huq producer of “Sramik Awaaz (Worker Voices),” about the lives, work, and organizing efforts of Bangladesh’s garment workers. Screening April 24 at 6:30p at the Institute for Policy Studies 1301 Connecticut Ave NW 6th Floor Washington, DC 20036 Labor Song: Buffalo Springfield - For What It’s Worth (1967; 50th anniversary!). CREDITS: Produced by Sid Dawson, engineered by Mike Nasella; Union City Radio is supported by UnionPlus. UnionPlus is committed to improving the quality of life of working families. Find out more at unionplus.org. And we’re supported by you, our listeners: call 202-588-9739 or 1-800-222-9739 or pledge online at wpfwfm.org.
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Local airport workers won a huge victory yesterday when their two-year campaign for a living wage finally paid off. The Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority approved a new policy ensuring that airport contractors pay their employees a living wage. The airport workers -- including wheelchair and checkpoint agents, terminal cleaners, cabin cleaners, sky caps and baggage handlers, many of whom now earn as little as minimum wage -- could see hourly wages increase to $12.75. "I never thought I'd live to see the day," said DCA airport worker David Tucker, who's worked at the airport for fifty years. While SEIU 32BJ Vice President Jaime Contreras called the move “a step in the right direction," he said that workers still need $15 an hour "to reach the light at the end of a long tunnel of poverty. These men and women," Contreras said, "continue to face intimidation and retaliation by employers and need the protection that only a union can provide."
On today's labor calendar: Our guests on "Your Rights At Work" today at 1 o'clock here on WPFW are SEIU 32BJ Vice President Jaime Contreras, on why airport workers need a union, and filmmaker Chaumtoli Huq (Sham-toe-lee Huck), director of "Worker Voices," a new film about the lives, work, and organizing efforts of Bangladesh’s garment workers. Plus your calls about worker rights. Full details are on our website at dclabor.org, click on Calendar. Here’s today's labor history: On this date in 1912, nearly 10,000 demonstrators celebrated textile workers’ win of a 10-percent pay hike and grievance committees after a one-month strike in Lowell, Massachusetts. In 1914, the Ludlow massacre took place when Colorado state militia, using machine guns and fire, killed about 20 people—including 11 children—at a tent city set up by striking coal miners. And in 1948, an unknown assailant shot through a window at United Auto Workers President Walter Reuther as he was eating dinner at his kitchen table, permanently impairing his right arm. It was one of at least two assassination attempts on Reuther. He and his wife later died in a small plane crash under what many believe to be suspicious circumstances. Today’s labor quote is by Walter Reuther, who said "There is no power in the world that can stop the forward march of free men and women when they are joined in the solidarity of human brotherhood." Union City Radio is supported by UnionPlus, which is committed to improving the quality of life for all working families; find out more at unionplus.org. Growing up in a union family in a small town in the Northern Neck of Virginia, Terry “TSoul” Pinkard learned early in life that through dedication and hard work, you can make a significant impact on those around you.
That’s exactly what TSoul is doing as he embraces his journey on the NBC singing talent show, “The Voice,” where he made it through the first night of live playoffs Monday night. The son of UFCW Local 400 member and representative Kenny Pinkard, who works for Omega Protein, TSoul’s journey has been shaped by his father’s dedication to union activism and changing his community for the better. “Music is my way of serving people, just as my dad and those he’s worked with at Local 400 have done for countless others,” said Tsoul, who advanced to the next round next Monday night at 8pm on NBC. On today's labor calendar: Pulitzer Prize-Winning Journalist Amy Goldstein discusses "Janesville: An American Story, When Jobs Disappear" today at 5 pm at Georgetown University. And at 5:30pm Thomas Shapiro discusses his new book “Toxic Inequality: Race, Mobility, Wealth and Politics in Today’s America” at New America. Full details are on our website at dclabor.org, click on Calendar. Here’s today's labor history: On this date in 1911, more than 6,000 immigrant workers in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the nation’s “Furniture City” —Germans, Dutch, Lithuanians and Poles—put down their tools and struck 59 factories for four months in what was to become known as the Great Furniture Strike. In 1995, an American domestic terrorist’s bomb destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, 99 of whom were government employees. Today’s labor quote is by George Meany, the longtime American labor union leader who was the key figure in the creation of the AFL-CIO and served as the AFL-CIO's first president, from 1955 to 1979. George Meany, who said “Greed to make the last dollar of profit led those employers to use violence, the courts and blacklists as weapons against unionism. They sought to deny workers their First Amendment rights-to act together and to speak freely to encourage others to join their cause. Those rights endangered their profits, and they felt-and some still feel-money to be important than rights.” Union City Radio is supported by UnionPlus, which is committed to improving the quality of life for all working families; find out more at unionplus.org. If you’re catching the Metro at the Silver Spring station this morning, keep an eye out for Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin, who will join Metro workers to give away $10 SmartTrip cards as a thank you to Metro riders for using the system, starting at 8am.
This is the first in a series of SmartTrip Card giveaways being sponsored by the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689, Metro’s largest union, representing nearly 10,000 active WMATA front-line employees. On today's labor calendar: Don’t miss the DC LaborFest Preview tonight from 6-8 pm at the Takoma Busboys and Poets. We'll show trailers for the upcoming DC Labor FilmFest, plus we'll have LaborFest Save the Date cards, a raffle for free LaborFest scarves and hats and free LaborFest shirts for volunteers. Full details are on our website at dclabor.org, click on Calendar. Here’s today's labor history: On this date in 1912, West Virginia coal miners struck, defending themselves against the National Guard. In 1941, after a four-week boycott led by Reverend Adam Clayton Powell Jr., bus companies in New York City agreed to hire 200 Black drivers and mechanics. Today’s labor quote is by Adam Clayton Powell Jr, who said “Unless man is committed to the belief that all mankind are his brothers, then he labors in vain and hypocritically in the vineyards of equality.” Union City Radio is supported by UnionPlus, which is committed to improving the quality of life for all working families; find out more at unionplus.org. |
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