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Liberal Arts Degreed Fast-Food Workers Are Crying About Trump's Labor Secretary Nominee Today
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It Takes A Village
May 17, 2017, 4:50:04 AM5/17/17
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With a billionaire controlling the White House and union
membership still tumbling to record lows nationwide, the labor
movement might be recoiling in despair in Washington. But as
workers across the country protest the nomination of a fast-food
magnate as labor secretary today, they’re working to seize power
on the local level.
? Fair-scheduling regulations—which protect against companies’
erratically changing the schedules of workers—paid sick days and
minimum-wage ordinances are all emerging as keystones of a
nationwide push to restore labor rights locally. Progressive
cities like Seattle, Los Angeles, and New York have already
implemented or introduced policies that can help Trump-proof
their jurisdictions.
Meanwhile, as the fastest-growing service sectors are non-union,
often based on part-time, precarious jobs, alternative forms of
worker empowerment have emerged locally as a way to enhance
workers’ leverage.
? The Fast-Food Worker Empowerment Act, one of several labor
bills recently introduced in New York City, would enable fast-
food workers to exercise more collective power at work without
an official union. The act evolved out of the Fast Food Forward
movement that has, since it was founded in New York, mushroomed
into the nationwide Fight for 15 low-wage-worker campaign—the
campaign now leading protests in various cities to oppose the
nomination of fast-food magnate Andy Puzder as labor secretary.
The act doesn’t offer a specific benefit. Instead, it offers a
structure for collective financial and institutional support for
a movement.
Many corporations have effectively gutted or beat back unions by
deploying sophisticated union-busting campaigns, pushing through
“right to work” policies that constrain funding for collective
bargaining and organizing efforts, and taking advantage of an
extremely complex and bureaucratic majority-voting process under
the National Labor Relations Act. But the overarching barrier to
unionization in this sector is the legal loophole that enables
McDonald’s (and other franchises) to define workers as
“nonemployees” in the legal sense; the vast majority are
considered employees of individual franchise operators, making
it near impossible to set up a collective bargaining unit larger
than a single restaurant. The issue is under litigation before
the National Labor Relations Board but there’s little hope under
the Trump administration for spurring any full-scale
unionization in fast food.
More powerless lefty whining at the link.
https://www.thenation.com/article/fast-food-workers-are-
protesting-trumps-labor-secretary-nominee-today/
membership still tumbling to record lows nationwide, the labor
movement might be recoiling in despair in Washington. But as
workers across the country protest the nomination of a fast-food
magnate as labor secretary today, they’re working to seize power
on the local level.
? Fair-scheduling regulations—which protect against companies’
erratically changing the schedules of workers—paid sick days and
minimum-wage ordinances are all emerging as keystones of a
nationwide push to restore labor rights locally. Progressive
cities like Seattle, Los Angeles, and New York have already
implemented or introduced policies that can help Trump-proof
their jurisdictions.
Meanwhile, as the fastest-growing service sectors are non-union,
often based on part-time, precarious jobs, alternative forms of
worker empowerment have emerged locally as a way to enhance
workers’ leverage.
? The Fast-Food Worker Empowerment Act, one of several labor
bills recently introduced in New York City, would enable fast-
food workers to exercise more collective power at work without
an official union. The act evolved out of the Fast Food Forward
movement that has, since it was founded in New York, mushroomed
into the nationwide Fight for 15 low-wage-worker campaign—the
campaign now leading protests in various cities to oppose the
nomination of fast-food magnate Andy Puzder as labor secretary.
The act doesn’t offer a specific benefit. Instead, it offers a
structure for collective financial and institutional support for
a movement.
Many corporations have effectively gutted or beat back unions by
deploying sophisticated union-busting campaigns, pushing through
“right to work” policies that constrain funding for collective
bargaining and organizing efforts, and taking advantage of an
extremely complex and bureaucratic majority-voting process under
the National Labor Relations Act. But the overarching barrier to
unionization in this sector is the legal loophole that enables
McDonald’s (and other franchises) to define workers as
“nonemployees” in the legal sense; the vast majority are
considered employees of individual franchise operators, making
it near impossible to set up a collective bargaining unit larger
than a single restaurant. The issue is under litigation before
the National Labor Relations Board but there’s little hope under
the Trump administration for spurring any full-scale
unionization in fast food.
More powerless lefty whining at the link.
https://www.thenation.com/article/fast-food-workers-are-
protesting-trumps-labor-secretary-nominee-today/
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