From federal agencies like the National Labor Relations Board to lawmakers in Washington and state capitals, government at all levels makes decisions that affect workers' lives. Throughout U.S. history, employers have attempted to use government as a tool against workers, while unions have mobilized their members on behalf of many significant improvements, including abolition of child labor and passage of minimum wage, workplace safety, overtime pay, Social Security, health care and many other laws.
Common ground between Gov. Mark Dayton and the Republican-controlled Legislature was in short supply at the Capitol this year, but lawmakers were able to compromise on two bills that union members lobbied hard for during the recently ended session.
Ezekiel “Zeke” Caligiuri remembers learning that inmate labor built St. Cloud Correctional Facility. Upon that discovery, he began seeing the walls of his cell in a different hue. Zeke observed that he “lived in a space that had been lived in for 100 years.” He grappled with the sobering reality that countless men before him had labored to sustain their own confinement and would continue to do so long after he was gone.
The Department of Corrections (DOC) has a monopoly over an inmate’s shelter, work opportunities, and medical care. Since inmates live in their workplace, their living conditions are also their working conditions.
Today, independent, nonprofit think tank Economic Policy Institute (EPI) released a study arguing that by virtually every metric, Minnesota’s economy has performed far better for working families than Wisconsin’s since governors Mark Dayton and Scott Walker were elected in 2010.
Sexual harassment, income inequality and the viability of the food service industry are central topics when it comes to the debate on the minimum wage and tips.
ST. PAUL – By all accounts, the U.S. economy is recovering from the “Great Recession” of nine years ago and Minnesota is leading the way in job growth. But not all people are benefitting – and that is where the state’s Dislocated Worker Program steps in.
“We are constantly being notified of layoffs” despite the economic recovery, said Liz McLoone, the program’s liaison with organized labor.
The U.S. unemployment rate finished 2017 at 4.1 percent, unchanged for the third straight month and the lowest since the recession that began in 2007, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has reported. That marks a continued improvement with 6.576 million people unemployed at the end of 2017 compared to 7.502 million jobless at the end of 2016.
More than 5,000 U.S. workers – 14 every day -- were fatally injured on the job in 2016, a 7 percent increase from the year before, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. The AFL-CIO attributes the rise to cuts in OSHA funding.
The state’s union leaders reacted positively to Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton’s appointment of Lieutenant Governor Tina Smith to fill the vacant U.S. Senate seat created by Al Franken’s resignation.
Teachers and parents marched to the corporate offices of US Bank, Wells Fargo, Securian and Ecolab in downtown Saint Paul calling for corporations to pay their fair share of taxes to fund public schools.
Workers are organizing through unions and other organizations to improve their lives. Union representation provides a voice on the job and the opportunity to improve wages, benefits and working conditions.
Labor still lacks coordinated approach to organizing the South