Today in Labor History
July 18
The Brotherhood of Telegraphers begins an unsuccessful three-week strike against the Western Union Telegraph Co. - 1883
35,000 Chicago stockyard workers strike - 1919
Hospital workers win 113-day union recognition strike in Charleston, S.C. - 1969
Could the Radical Left Win in Greece?
Many Greek unionists feel betrayed by their traditional political ally, the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (Pasok), which has agreed to layoffs, hiring freezes and wage and pension cuts since the crisis began in 2010. With Pasok a diminished minority ally in the ruling coalition led by conservative New Democracy (Pasok has thirty-three seats, compared with Syriza’s seventy-one in opposition), it would seem that there is little choice for unions other than mass mobilization. Kostas Koutsodimas, a vice president of the General Federation of Employees (Genop, representing electricity workers), told me, “The major problem is collecting taxes. It’s not the salaries,” pointing to the Greek ruling class’s infamous tradition of evading taxes and the government’s unwillingness to collect them. Another labor leader pointed out that imposing additional regressive consumption taxes while diminishing wages, in the midst of deep depression, only freezes the economy more.
And yet, the unions here have failed to take two available, and possibly overlapping, courses: link up with Syriza to fight austerity through parliamentary channels, and step up strike activity to force the ruling parties to acknowledge their demands or, better yet, force a government collapse. Labor leaders promise to use the strike weapon in the future, and some observers believe this is the calm before the storm that will be brought about by a fresh round of privatizations. Other activists believe the rank and file is simply too exhausted to engage in more action. Another theory is that just as decades of overt corruption—bribery in the public sector and widespread tax evasion—have drained the government of money, a more insidious political corruption keeps union leaders from making such a dramatic political break.
Today in labor history, July 14, 1921: Italian immigrants, labor activists, and anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti are convicted in Massachusetts of murder and payroll robbery after a two-month trial, and are eventually executed, despite the efforts of the IWW and other unions to save them. Fifty years after their deaths the state’s governor issued a proclamation saying they had been treated unjustly and that “any disgrace should be forever removed from their names.”
On Woody Guthrie’s Centennial, Celebrating the Life, Politics & Music of the “Dust Bowl Troubadour”
Today a Democracy Now! special on the life, politics and music of Woody Guthrie, the “Dust Bowl Troubadour.” Born a hundred years ago on July 14, 1912, in Oklahoma, Guthrie wrote hundreds of folk songs and became a major influence on countless musicians, including Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Pete Seeger and Phil Ochs. While Guthrie is best remembered as a musician, he also had a deeply political side, speaking out for labor and civil rights at the height of McCarthyism.
Colleges not adequately supporting their teaching force
[to be filed under: statements of the extremely obvious]
Colleges and universities are relying ever more heavily on part-time faculty while failing to support them adequately. The extent of that failure—and its impact on the majority of the higher education instructional workforce—is documented in a new survey released this week by the Coalition on the Academic Workforce. Currently, according to data from the U.S. Department of Education, 1.3 million of the 1.8 million faculty providing instruction in two- and four-year institutions are part-time or adjunct faculty, teaching off the tenure track.
The survey’s key findings include:
- The median pay per course, standardized to a three-credit course, was $2,700 in fall 2010, and ranged from a low of $2,235 at two-year colleges to a high of $3,400 at four-year doctoral or research universities.
- Part-time faculty respondents saw little, if any, wage premium based on their credentials.
- Professional support was minimal for part-time faculty members’ work outside the classroom and for their inclusion in academic decision-making. “Clearly, part-time faculty are undersupported,” says Bonnie Halloran, president of the Lecturers’ Employee Organization at the University of Michigan. “Part-time faculty [at the University of Michigan] have phones, offices and access to support staff through our collective bargaining agreement. But we have less access to professional development opportunities, even though we make up 33 to 50 percent of the faculty across the University of Michigan’s three campuses.”
- Part-time teaching is not necessarily temporary employment, and those teaching part time do not necessarily prefer a part-time to a full-time position. More than 80 percent of respondents reported teaching part time for more than three years, and more than half, for more than six years. And 75 percent of respondents said they have sought, are now seeking, or will be seeking, a full-time tenure-track position.
- In addition to gathering information about their academic background and other personal characteristics, the survey asked part-time faculty respondents to provide data for each course they taught—a total of 19,615 courses. Course loads varied significantly among respondents. Slightly more than half taught one or two courses during the fall 2010 term, while slightly fewer than half taught three or more courses.
Lucy Eldine Gonzalez Parsons (born c. 1853 – March 7, 1942) was an American labor organizer and radical socialist. She is remembered as a powerful orator. Described by the Chicago Police Department as “more dangerous than a thousand rioters” in the 1920s, Parsons and her husband had become highly effective anarchist organizers primarily involved in the labor movement in the late 19th century, but also participating in revolutionary activism on behalf of political prisoners, people of color, the homeless and women.
Stop US Contractors from Using Slave Labor in Iraq and Afghanistan
- Target: United States Senate
- Sponsored by: Walk Free
U.S. contractors have made billions from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But now, several - including big names like KBR, formerly part of Halliburton - are being investigated for slave labor.
More than 250,000 people who were promised good jobs with decent pay ended up in conditions of modern slavery.
Their passports were taken away, they were held in tents and shipping containers, and many were subject to brutal physical abuse.
Meanwhile, the contractors kept lining their pockets with the taxes of ordinary American families.
Our tax dollars were never meant to fund slavery.
Tell the US Senate to IMMEDIATELY pass the bipartisan End Trafficking in Government Contracting Act and stop taxpayer funded modern slavery.
