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☆ Amazon Labor Union faces next showdown in upstate New York
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-12 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

The next month, that same group, the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), fell short at a smaller facility across the street. On Wednesday, workers at an Amazon facility near Albany, New York, will begin voting on whether to join the ALU and become the second unionized Amazon warehouse in the United States. It also comes as Amazon has still not formally recognized the union in Staten Island or come to the bargaining table. Chris Smalls, a leader of the Amazon Labor Union, leads a march of Starbucks and Amazon workers and their allies to the homes of their CEOs to protest union busting on Labor Day, September 5, 2022, in New York City, New York. “I think they have an uphill battle ahead,” Kochan said of the union vote at the ALB1 facility.

☆ U.S. government back and forth on 'gig' workers, contractors
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-11 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

A DOL proposal in September 2020 made it easier for companies to classify workers as independent contractors if they operated an independent business and had opportunities for profit or loss. BIDEN ADMINISTRATIONThe administration of Democrat Joe Biden blocked the Trump rule in May 2021. A U.S. district judge in Texas in March 2022 blocked the Biden administration withdrawal and ordered the Trump rule to take effect. In June 2022, the DOL said it would develop a proposed rule on determining employee or independent contractor status. It held forums in June to hear from workers and companies.

☆ Being in a union means you could make $1.3 million more over your lifetime
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-11 | by ( Juliana Kaplan | Madison Hoff | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

The authors found that being in a union means a $1.3 million bump to lifetime earnings. "We find that a person who spent the entirety of their career in a labor union were predicted to earn about a million dollars more over the course of their career compared to somebody who was never in a labor union," VanHeuvelen told Insider. The result was the $1.3 million premium for workers who spent their whole careers in unions, even though those workers were more likely to retire earlier. Workers who are never in a union were projected to earn around $2.1 million their whole careers, while those who were in unions for their whole careers were estimated to make $3.4 million. The number of union representation petitions filed in fiscal year 2022 increased by 53%, according to the National Labor Relations Board.

☆ Amazon workers at Southern California warehouse file for union election in potential first for the state
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-11 | by ( Annie Palmer | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Workers stand in line to cast ballots for a union election at Amazon's JFK8 distribution center, in the Staten Island borough of New York City, U.S. March 25, 2022. Amazon workers at a warehouse in Southern California have filed a petition to form a union with the National Labor Relations Board. Employees at the warehouse, located in Moreno Valley, California, are seeking to be represented by the Amazon Labor Union, a grassroots group of current and former Amazon workers that successfully unionized a Staten Island warehouse, referred to as JFK8, earlier this year. The move adds to a recent upswing of labor organizing among Amazon workers. Workers at a major Amazon air hub in nearby San Bernardino recently held walkouts to demand pay increases and highlight safety concerns.

☆ Waymo workers form union in the latest push to organize Silicon Valley
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-10 | by ( Eli M. Rosenberg | Eli Rosenberg Is An Investigative Tech Reporter For Nbc News. | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +6 min

Food service employees at the autonomous driving company Waymo are forming a union, the latest push by support workers to organize at Silicon Valley's most prominent companies. The workers are employed by Sodexo, which contracts service work for Google and other companies. "We are confident this one will also reach an amicable agreement for workers, the union, and our client very soon." The workers are part of Silicon Valley's ranks of contractors who support and supplement the work at tech companies. Her team unionized in 2020, and some of them have been joining meetings with the Waymo workers to show them the ropes of organizing and talk up the union.

☆ North Hollywood strippers set to vote on joining a union
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-09 | by ( Natasha Chen | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

Los Angeles CNN —Strippers at the Star Garden topless dive bar in North Hollywood will soon receive ballots to hold an election for collective bargaining, which may result in the first stripper union in the US in more than a decade. On Nov. 7, the NLRB will count the votes from Star Garden dancers, entertainers and DJs, determining if they will join the Actors Equity Association, a union of performers and other show business professionals. The facts are clear: The workers at Star Garden are entitled to a union election,” said Andrea Hoeschen, assistant executive director and general counsel for Actors’ Equity Association. “Most of the purportedly eligible voters have never been employees of Star Garden; they were in fact, and in law, merely lessees with no employment relationship,” Gaylord and Linker wrote. Since then, the dancers have been picketing most weekends outside the Star Garden, dressed in themed costumes, urging patrons to go to different clubs.

☆ Amazon suspends 50 workers who refused to work after warehouse fire
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-05 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

CNN —Amazon suspended dozens of workers at its only unionized warehouse on Tuesday, one day after they organized a work stoppage following a fire at the facility. About 50 workers at the facility in Staten Island, New York were suspended with pay, according to Connor Spence, one of the suspended workers. Spence is a picker at the warehouse, known as JFK8, and the secretary treasurer for the Amazon Labor Union, the grassroots workers group behind the successful union push. The incident in Staten Island also comes about a week ahead of a separate union election – also organized by the Amazon Labor Union – at an Amazon facility near Albany, New York. According to Spence, the roughly 50 workers at JFK8 have been suspended with pay until Amazon conducts an investigation into what happened.

☆ Tensions rise in West Coast port labor battles, with unions and management trading accusations
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-28 | by ( Lori Ann Larocco | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

Tensions are rising in West Coast port labor battles as unions and port management trade accusations about worker productivity and the awarding of job assignments. Jerome Roberts, GVP of marketing at supply chain consulting company Blume Global, told CNBC the one shift protest had no lasting productivity impact. Logistics companies fear the latest round of accusations will only increase tensions for a supply chain and national port infrastructure already dealing with multiple labor concerns. Project44, which also collects and analyzes port productivity for the CNBC Supply Chain Heat Map, has tracked some recent issues at Seattle operations. Container dwell times at the Port of Oakland have been improving over the month of September, according to Josh Brazil, vice president of supply chain insights at Project44.

☆ Why does work feel so dysfunctional right now? A psychologist, labor expert and CEO weigh in
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-26 | by ( Jennifer Liu | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +7 min

"I'm not sure that work is any more dysfunctional now for many workers than it's been in the past," she tells CNBC Make It. Work has always been dysfunctional, our tolerance for it just got lowerWorkers are still quitting in droves during the Great Resignation. The discord we're seeing, then, is vocal pushback from employees — emboldened by a tight market and, yes, social media fervor — not wanting to return to traditional models of work, Klotz says. "Everyone is making money off of their work, and they're not getting return on the investment of their labor. To call that out and say, you know what, I don't necessarily need to go above and beyond if that effort isn't going to be valued — that's not quiet quitting.

☆ Workers at Home Depot in Philadelphia file for union vote
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-23 | by ( Chris Isidore | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

New York CNN Business —Workers at an Home Depot store in Philadelphia have filed to have a vote to be represented by a union. in Philadelphia, has about 275 employees, according to the filing by an independent union, Home Depot Workers United, which is seeking the vote. Home Depot issued a statement saying it will work with the union vote process, but that it doesn’t support the union’s organizing efforts. Only 4.4% of retail workers are members of a union, according to Labor Department data, compared to 6.1% of private sector workers overall, and 10.3% of all US workers. There are more than five times as many private sector workers than there are workers in the public sector.

☆ Almost 300 Home Depot workers vote to unionize in Philadelphia
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-20 | by ( Áine Cain | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

Home Depot employees based in Philadelphia have filed a petition to unionize. The union is listed as "Home Depot Workers United." A National Labor Relations Board filing stated that the 274 workers are all based around Philadelphia. —Daily Union Elections (@UnionElections) September 20, 2022The union is listed as "Home Depot Workers United." According to the Teamsters, those workers were "the first Home Depot employees to join the union."

☆ Port Labor Talks Stall as Worker Disruptions Grow
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-19 | by ( Paul Berger | ) www.wsj.com time to read: +5 min

West Coast port labor talks are stalled as dockworker disputes hit the region’s big trade gateways, according to shipping industry officials who fear the negotiations could take months to resolve. “What you are starting to hear is people are losing faith,” said one shipping industry official. In August 40,000 containers were diverted from the Port of Los Angeles to the neighboring Port of Long Beach because of one labor dispute. The concerns over the progress of the talks comes as labor disputes around the U.S. are growing. Shipping industry officials say they also want the government to get more involved in the port labor talks.

☆ Dozens of TikTokers are quietly discussing forming a creator union, but legal experts say it would be difficult
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-19 | by ( Tanya Chen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

TikTok creators are discussing forming a union to try and create more protection for their jobs. The National Labor Relations Act, for example, could not force a company like TikTok to negotiate a creator union. Sunderji said that even without a union, TikTokers coming together as a collective or an association could affect change. In 2019, a group of YouTubers formed FairTube, an unofficial YouTube "union," to ask for similar demands, like more transparency around its pay and penalties. "TikTok is a great place to be discovered, but a terrible place to be a professional creator," Valkai said.

☆ Workers are getting bolder. The number of strikes tripled from last year as Americans see their wages shrink and bosses profit.
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-17 | by ( Jason Lalljee | Juliana Kaplan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

More workers have gone on strike in the first half of 2022 than in all of 2021. In short, more workers have gone on strike in 2022 than in 2021 — and that's still with six months of data left to track. Post-vaccine 2021 into 2022 has marked an uptick in organizing and increasing pushback from workers on the previous status quo. They reached an agreement with railroad companies, avoiding the immediate possibility of strikes that could have crippled the US economy. Workers at companies like Starbucks, Trader Joe's, and Amazon are seeing historic union wins.

☆ 72 TikTokers are using a private Discord to talk about forming a creator union, but it's an uphill legal battle
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-16 | by ( Tanya Chen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

TikTok creators are discussing forming a union to try and create more protection for their jobs. The National Labor Relations Act, for example, could not force a company like TikTok to negotiate a creator union. Sunderji said that even without a union, TikTokers coming together as a collective or an association could affect change. Multiple TikTokers in the Discord pointed to YouTube as an example of the kinds of changes that could be made. "TikTok is a great place to be discovered, but a terrible place to be a professional creator," Valkai said.

☆ Starbucks’s high-octane plan has warm impact
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-14 | by ( Amanda Gomez | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

NEW YORK, Sept 14 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Starbucks (SBUX.O) is brewing up a high-octane solution for a low-impact problem. The $101 billion coffee chain spent a chunk of its investor day on Tuesday discussing ways to help its restless U.S. workforce. A judge in Tennessee last month ordered the company to rehire employees who supported unionizing – an order Starbucks plans to appeal, Reuters reported. The National Labor Relations Board, a federal agency tasked with protecting employees’ rights, is fielding complaints against the coffee chain. CONTEXT NEWSStarbucks held its investor day on Sept. 13.

☆ Howard Schultz tells Cramer: China will overtake U.S. as Starbucks' biggest market by 2025
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-13 | by ( Kevin Stankiewicz | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

"The future of Starbucks," the outgoing interim CEO Schultz told Jim Cramer, "has never been brighter. All in all, what Starbucks had to say Tuesday validated our decision to invest in the company in late August. China is going to come back, and the equity of the brand has never been stronger at Starbucks Coffee Company," Schultz said. We will be more convenient, but we want to create the experience you've known Starbucks to be," Schultz said. Schultz acknowledged to CNBC that Starbucks has failed to meet the expectations lately of some cafe employees, which the company calls "partners."

☆ New York City sues Starbucks on claims the company illegally fired a Queens barista for union organizing
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-03 | by ( Bethany Biron | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

New York City is suing Starbucks for allegedly firing an employee and union organizer in Queens. "Starbucks continues to wrongfully fire pro-union workers nationwide in retaliation for union organizing," the fired employee said in a statement. In a statement, Locke urged Starbucks to "rehire all illegally fired workers and put an end to their illegal union-busting campaign." "It's been a year since the campaign with Starbucks Workers United began at a Starbucks in Buffalo, NY," Locke said. Starbucks continues to wrongfully fire pro-union workers nationwide in retaliation for union organizing."

☆ Labor board rejects Amazon's push to overturn its workers' historic union victory
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-02 | by ( Matthew Loh | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Amazon is about to lose its bid to overturn its workers' vote to form their first labor union. With the objections cleared, the labor union would be free to pursue certification with the NLRB. The warehouse workers had been the first in the e-commerce company's history to successfully form a union, voting in April to join the newly founded Amazon Labor Union. With Thursday's decision, the Amazon Labor Union is now cleared to pursue certification as the first recognized labor unit in the logistics giant — four months after workers voted to do so. Amazon and the Amazon Labor Union did not immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment.

☆ A judge ordered Starbucks to reinstate 7 workers in Tennessee who say they were fired over union activity
▼ + stars: | 2022-08-19 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A judge ordered Starbucks to reinstate the "Memphis Seven," who say they were fired over union activity. The union Starbucks Workers United said that the company fired the workers – known as the "Memphis Seven" – in retaliation for organizing and speaking to the media. Among other things, the NLRB asked Starbucks to give the fired workers their jobs back. "The Court agrees with the Board that reinstatement of the Memphis Seven is just and proper," District Judge Sheryl Lipman wrote in a filing Thursday. Workers at a store on Elmwood Ave, Buffalo voted to form a union, the first-ever at a corporate-owned Starbucks store in the US, in December.

☆ A group of strippers from Los Angeles is seeking to join one of the largest actors' unions
▼ + stars: | 2022-08-18 | by ( Beatrice Nolan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Dancers who work in a topless bar in California are seeking to join the Actors' Equity Association. The dancers had already been seeking to unionize, as Insider reported in May, but Wednesday's press release specifically linked their bid to the Actors' Equity Association. President of the Actors' Equity Association, Kate Shindle, said in the press release that the dancers approached the organization for support. "We like what we do," a Star Garden dancer named Velveeta said in the press release. Wednesday's press release claimed that the club's security guards repeatedly failed to protect dancers from "threatening and abusive behavior from patrons."

☆ Fear and loathing on Wall Street: Inside the paranoid, hyper-competitive onslaught to prevent quant traders from defecting to rivals
▼ + stars: | 2022-07-31 | by ( Alex Morrell | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +23 min

Current and former employees at prominent quant trading operations spoke to Insider anonymously for this story, citing fear of legal reprisals. "At the NSA, the penalty for leaking is twenty-five years in prison," Simons liked to tell employees, according to Gregory Zuckerman's book "The Man Who Solved the Market." In the early 2000s, quant noncompetes were narrower and shorter — six to nine months was industry standard, quant recruiters who had to navigate these obstacles told Insider. But it has aggressively pursued employees it believes have crossed the firm, according to court filings and media reports. Absent such changes, quant noncompetes will likely continue to proliferate with little resistance from employees.

Persons: Ken Griffin, they'd, It's, Matt Moye, they've, David Marshall, Jim Simons, George Soros, John Paulson, Philip Falcone, Jonathan Ernst, RenTech, Simons, Gregory Zuckerman's, Moye, quant, Pavel Volfbeyn, Alexander Belopolsky, spooked, Eric Wepsic, Shaw, —, Izzy Englander, Rick Wastrom, Smith Hanley, Jane Street burgeoned, Peter Friedman, Brennan Hughes, Griffin —, They've, Friedman, Chase Lochmiller, Ray Dalio, Jane Street, Hughes, Samuel Estreicher, Estreicher, I'm, David, Wastrom, Marshall, noncompetes Organizations: Citadel Securities, Renaissance Technologies, Citadel, St John's Law School, Center for Labor, Employment, REUTERS, NSA, Fund, RenTech, Millennium Management, Millennium, D.E, Trading, Integra Advisors, Wall, Google, Sigma, Polychain, Getty, Bridgewater Associates, National Labor Relations Board, Schonfeld Strategic Advisors, Group, New York University, school's Center for Labor, John's Law, —, New Locations: America, Bridgewater, New York, Hudson, Riker's Island, Houston, Chicago, Connecticut, — California, St, New York , Illinois

☆ Starbucks is using 'illegal tactics' to stop workers in New York state from unionizing, the NLRB claims
▼ + stars: | 2022-06-24 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

The NLRB has accused Starbucks of using "illegal tactics" to deter workers from unionizing. Starbucks also "repeatedly" closed the Buffalo stores early "to hold anti-union meetings," which reduced staff's earnings, the NLRB wrote. Workers United – the union that the Starbucks stores are organizing with – previously said Starbucks' actions were affecting staff's stance on unionizing. Starbucks workers in Buffalo first announced plans to unionize last August, citing understaffing, product shortages, and their experiences working during the pandemic. In May, the NLRB also petitioned for injunctive relief for seven former Starbucks employees in Memphis, Tennessee it said were "unlawfully fired" for organizing.

☆ Apple agrees to "make improvements" to its NDAs after whistleblower documents showed evidence the company used the agreements to silence employees
▼ + stars: | 2021-11-23 | by ( Matt Drange | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

A year later, Apple reversed course, agreeing to "not enforce" strict NDAs regarding instances of harassment, discrimination or potentially illegal conduct in the workplace. "Apple has in the past simply given a statement and let things sweep under the rug," Scarlett told Insider on Friday. Citing her own experience receiving NDAs from Apple, Scarlett filed a whistleblower complaint with the SEC on October 25. In reviewing dozens of confidential NDAs shared by tech workers, the investigation revealed the broad language frequently used to silence employees, including at Apple. In reporting on nondisclosure agreements at Apple, Insider asked the company if it had ever pursued legal action against a former employee over an alleged breach of their NDA.

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