by Mike Hall, Jan 6, 2010

UNITEHERE! President John Wilhelm (left) and AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka were among the 140 arrested at a San Francisco hotel sit-in for justice.

More than 100 union members, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and UNITEHERE! President John Wilhelm were arrested at a sit-in demanding justice and a fair contract for San Francisco hotel workers last night. The workers have been without a contract since August.

The sit-in in front of the Hilton San Francisco followed a march by nearly 1,000 members of UNITEHERE! Local 2, other union members and community and political supporters. Says Ingrid Carp, a cook for 29 years at the Hilton:

“We’re determined as ever to win a good contract. It’s wrong for corporations to position themselves to make billions with the coming economic recovery, and expect us to go backward.”

The action is part of a campaign to win fair contracts at several national hotel chains, including Hilton, Hyatt and Starwood. The profitable chains are using the recession as an excuse to demand health care benefit cuts in contract talks with more than 16,000 workers at dozens of hotels in San Francisco, Chicago and other cities.

Continue reading One for All, All for One – Fighting for a Contract in San Francisco →

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Continue reading CBS 60 Minutes: The Coming Second Wave of Mortgage Defaults →

Labor Campaign for Single-Payer Healthcare

Healthcare Is A Right — Not A Privilege

www.laborforsinglepayer.org

SENATE HEALTHCARE BILL: A STEP IN THE WRONG DIRECTION

An analysis by the Labor Campaign for Single Payer

In a last minute flurry of pork barrel deals and capitulation to powerful corporate interests, the U. S. Senate finally passed its version of healthcare reform on December 24.  The final bill was roundly condemned by nearly every labor organization in the country.

“The health care bill being considered by the U. S. Senate is inadequate and too tilted toward the insurance industry,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka.  Karen Higgens, RN, Co-President of the 150,000 member National Nurses Union, concurred.  “Sadly, we have ended up with legislation that fails to meet the test of true healthcare reform…further locking into place a system that entrenches the chokehold of the profit-making insurance giants on our health.”

Continue reading The Labor Campaign for Single Payer Calls for National Conference to Plan New Healthcare Campaign →

Nation’s Largest RN Organization Blasts Bid to Tax Benefits,

Urges Other Reforms to Protect Patients, Families

In Final Talks on Healthcare Reform Legislation 

“We ask and expect members of the House of Representatives to vote no on any bill providing for an excise tax on health care benefits.”

The nation’s largest union and professional organization of registered nurses today called on House members to hold the line in opposing a tax on workers’ healthcare benefits, and called for other changes in the final healthcare legislation to expand affordability and crack down on insurance industry abuses.

Continue reading National Nurses Union Calls for Defeat of Healthcare Bill if Workers Healthcare Benefits are Taxed →

Health Care Bill Must Drop Abortion Language, Include Public Option

Tell Congress After taking action, please support our work!

Action Needed:

Please send a message to your senators and House member asking them to assure that restrictive abortion language in health care reform legislation be withdrawn, that a strong public plan is included, that age discrimination is removed, that better cost control measures are included and insurance is made truly more affordable for everyone.

Continue reading National Organization for Women Calls for Improvement to Final Healthcare Bill →

– AFL-CIO NOW BLOG – http://blog.aflcio.org –

Tax on Health Care Will Erode Coverage for Middle Class

Posted By Tula Connell On January 4, 2010 @ 10:02 am In Corporate Greed, Legislation & Politics | 13 Comments

A new year brings with it lots of hope.

Let’s hope 2010 brings a health care reform bill that does not penalize working families with a tax on their coverage. Because right now, as New York Times columnist Bob Herbert aptly [1] describes it, there is a ”middle-class tax time bomb ticking in the Senate’s version” of the health care reform legislation.

The bill that passed the Senate with such fanfare on Christmas Eve would impose a confiscatory 40 percent excise tax on so-called Cadillac health plans, which are popularly viewed as over-the-top plans held only by the very wealthy. In fact, it’s a tax that in a few years will hammer millions of middle-class policyholders, forcing them to scale back their access to medical care.

Continue reading AFL-CIO: Senate Healthcare Tax will hurt millions of working people →

U.S. ITC Rules For US Steelmakers Vs Chinese Imports

By Henry J. Pulizzi
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)–The U.S. International Trade Commission sided with U.S. steelmakers in a case over Chinese steel Wednesday, opening the door to new duties of up to 16% on steel pipes from China.

Continue reading U.S. International Trade Commission Votes to Protect U.S. Steel Pipe Manufacturing →

Labor chief moves on job safety, workers’ rights
By SAM HANANEL, Associated Press Writer Sam Hananel, Associated Press Writer
Fri Jan 1, 8:12 pm ET

WASHINGTON – Soon after she became the nation’s labor secretary, Hilda Solis warned corporate America there was “a new sheriff in town.”

Continue reading US Government Resumes Enforcement of Worker Safety Laws →

by Randy Shannon

Treas. PA 4th CD Chapter, PDA

Gas drillers have been concentrating on the Marcellus Shale deposit in New York as they work with the Pennsylvania Republicans to gain a free hand to exploit our resources. The bought Republican majority in the PA Senate and the minority in the House used the budget crisis as leverage to force Democrats to back down on the gas severance tax.

All the states with a history of gas drilling impose a severance tax on the gas so that the citizens recover a share of the treasure taken from their land. This is in addition to the local lease that the drillers pay to set up operations on a piece of property. The Republicans blocked the severance tax in this year’s budget even though it is estimated that Pennsylvania would receive over $500 million a year in gas severance revenues. The Republicans claimed that the lease income to the state for drilling on gamelands and state forests would be a bonanza. The real bonanza was the lobbyist payoffs to the Republicans.

Continue reading Republicans Christiana, Marshall, Vogel Take Corruption to a New Level – Selling out our natural resources for their personal gain →