Health care disputes bedevil labor relations
Lines of battle drawn over cuts in coverage
San Francisco Chronicle
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/08/31/BU147900.DTL&;type=printable
Victoria Colliver, Chronicle Staff Writer
August 31, 2003

When a new owner took over the nursing home where Shirley Griffin has worked for seven years, she eliminated health care benefits last month for all the employees. That left Griffin, a 62-year-old nurse assistant who makes $11 an hour, with no way to pay for the medications she must take to control her diabetes and high cholesterol. But she is poised to fight.

"I'll do whatever it takes," said Griffin, a member of Service Employees International Union Local 250 who is set to walk off her job at La Mariposa Care and Rehabilitation Center in Fairfield on Labor Day. "I'm scared to death. But I'm angry enough to fight back for my medical (coverage)."

Health care, the cost of which has been rising by double digits for the past couple of years, has replaced salaries as the No. 1 issue in labor negotiations. In the past four months, 10 labor disputes in the Bay Area have centered on health care benefits, according to the INSTITUTE FOR LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT AT UC BERKELEY. Nine of those negotiations have led to work stoppages and, according to the institute, half the work stoppages in the state this past year were focused on health benefits. "In case after case, health has been at the center of labor conflicts,"said KEN JACOBS, LABOR SPECIALIST AT UC BERKELEY'S CENTER FOR LABOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATION....

Full story at http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/08/31/BU147900.DTL&;type=printable

4:55:46 PM    comment []

Report on textile industry job losses

Whatever the reason, according to the Labor Department, about 270,000 textile and apparel workers, or about a quarter of the industry, have lost their jobs over the last two years.

See full article at http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FA0914FE385B0C768EDDAE0894DB404482

Thanks to Maxim Osinovsky, UCB,  for sending in this resource.

3:56:53 PM    comment []

Labor photo exhibit documents women's organizing

Union Women's Alliance to Gain Equality - Union WAGE (1971-1982)
Exhibit of photographs by Cathy Cade, UC Berkeley Institute of Industrial Relations
2521 Channing Way, Berkeley (near Telegraph) call for hours (510) 643-8140
August 20, 2003 - January 16, 2004
Reception Thursday, October 2, 5:30-7
On-line exhibit http://www.iir.berkeley.edu/exhibit/

Union Women's Alliance to Gain Equality (Union WAGE) was an organization of socialist and progressive women from 1971 through 1982. It supported women organizing in the work place and included struggles for democratic rank and file unions. Most of its work was in the San Francisco Bay Area, although chapters formed in Seattle, Indiana and New York. Growing out of a NOW conference at UC Berkeley in 1971, Union WAGE was distinctive in connecting older women who had been activists since the 1930s with a new generation of women labor activists, feminists and lesbian feminists.

WAGE members shared their hard-won organizing skills, taught each other parliamentary procedure, and collectively engaged in laying out newspapers and creating newsletters. They lobbied for an Equal Rights Amendment that would not only retain existing legislation protecting women but would extend these standards to men. WAGE members fought for, and successfully organized, the first California union women's conference sanctioned by the AFL-CIO. WAGE supported the United Farm Workers Union, and in coalition with other groups, worked against the Bakke decision (anti-affirmative action), the Briggs initiative (anti-gay) and San Francisco's Proposition L (anti-clerical workers).

Union WAGE members distributed their newspaper at work places and union meetings. In addition to articles on current actions, the newspaper profiled women activists of the past, and discussed health and safety issues, family issues, and the rights of lesbians and older women workers. A complete set of the newspaper and other materials are available at S.F. State University's Labor Archives and Research Center. Some of these newspapers are available at the IIR LIbrary.

Source: UC Berkeley Institute of Industrial Relations Library

3:46:32 PM    comment []

From the Congressional Budget Office (CBO)

The Budget and Economic Outlook:  An Update 
http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=4493&;sequence=0&from=7
or
ftp://ftp.cbo.gov/44xx/doc4493/08-26-Report.pdf
[full-text, 87 pages]

[excerpt]
The economy now seems poised for a more sustained recovery. CBO anticipates that gross domestic product (GDP) will rise by nearly 4 percent in calendar year 2004 after growing by less than 2 percent in the first half of this year. Signs of faster growth in consumer and business spending, rapid growth in federal purchases, tax cuts for businesses, and a slightly more accommodative monetary policy have improved the economic outlook for the rest of 2003 and for 2004.

Partly because of that economic growth, CBO’s baseline projections show deficits that diminish and then give way to surpluses near the end of the 2004-2013 period— under the assumption that no policy changes occur.

Source: IWS Documented News Service, School of Industrial & Labor Relations, Cornell University

3:43:56 PM    comment []

News from the U.S. Census Bureau

2002 Data Release!  Check out the latest data products in the
Data Tables section
http://www.census.gov/acs/www/Products/index.htm
and the
Ranking Tables section
http://www.census.gov/acs/www/Products/Ranking/index.htm

The U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS) revealed today that America now has 33 million residents who are natives of other countries.

   "These data provide a moving picture of one of the fastest growing population segments in the United States, and they give leaders in government and business the knowledge they need to plan for the changes that population growth brings," said Census Bureau Director Louis Kincannon.

   The ACS, which surveyed more than 742,000 American households in 2002, will expand to 3 million households nationwide next year and is slated to replace the census long form in 2010.

   Among states, California (26.9 percent) ranked first in the proportion of its population who were foreign-born. It was followed by New York (20.9 percent), New Jersey (18.9 percent) and Florida and Hawaii (17.9 percent each).  States with some of the lowest foreign-born percentages included Mississippi (1.1 percent), West Virginia (1.2 percent) and Montana (1.6 percent).

Source: IWS Documented News Service, School of Industrial & Labor Relations, Cornell University

3:41:35 PM    comment []