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Tag: Labor issues

  • As new data shows inflation rose in January, here’s what consumers can expect next

    As new data shows inflation rose in January, here’s what consumers can expect next

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    Shoppers look at items displayed at a grocery store in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 15, 2023.

    Stefani Reynolds | AFP | Getty Images

    A new U.S. government reading showing persistent high inflation rattled Wall Street on Friday.

    Consumers can expect the rate of price growth will likely stay higher than average through 2023.

    “Inflation is going to come down gradually, if the Fed conducts policy the way it says it intends to,” said William Luther, director of the American Institute for Economic Research’s Sound Money Project.

    “We’re looking at higher than normal price increases, certainly through 2023 and probably through much of 2024, as well,” Luther said.

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    The Federal Reserve’s preferred measure for inflation, the personal consumption expenditures price index, showed headline inflation rose 5.4% from a year ago as of January and 0.6% for the month. Core inflation excluding volatile food and energy prices increased 4.7% and 0.6% for the month.

    Declines in inflation that have happened since June actually reversed in January.

    “It’s possible that this is just a blip, that we had more price increases in January and fewer price increases in December,” Luther said.

    Earlier this month, the consumer price index, a separate government measure, also showed higher than expected inflation for January, with a 6.4% gain over 12 months and a 0.5% increase for the month.

    While the inflation rate is poised to subside this year, “it will not be a straight line,” Raymond James chief economist Eugenio Aleman told CNBC.com at the time.

    The Federal Reserve is tasked with getting inflation under control, while trying to avoid a deep economic recession.

    What the latest inflation measure shows

    The personal consumption expenditures price index, or PCEPI, is the central bank’s preferred measure as it seeks to bring inflation down to a 2% target.

    There are two reasons why the PCEPI may be a better measure than the CPI, according to Luther.

    First, the PCEPI measures all consumption expenditures, including those that are not coming directly out of consumers’ discretionary income, such as those made on their behalf by the government or employers.

    “It puts more accurate weights on the categories of expenditures that are being made in the economy by consumers,” Luther said.

    We’re looking at higher than normal price increases, certainly through 2023 and probably through much of 2024, as well.

    William Luther

    director of the American Institute for Economic Research’s Sound Money Project

    The CPI, on the other hand, only looks at a basket of goods purchased from individuals’ discretionary incomes. Moreover, the basket of goods the CPI tracks is updated every year, while the PCEPI gets updated each month.

    That really matters in cases where you have some individual prices that are changing a lot, according to Luther.

    More interest rate hikes ‘almost a certainty’

    The Federal Reserve has undertaken a series of interest rate hikes to tamp down inflation.

    Based on Friday’s data, it’s “almost a certainty” the central bank will raise rates by 25 basis points in March, and maybe even higher, Luther said.

    “If we continue getting these high inflation readings, it will have little choice [but] to go even further,” Luther said.

    Prices will not come down

    Organic eggs were priced at more than $11 per dozen at a store in Walnut Creek, California, on Feb. 10, 2023.

    Smith Collection/gado | Archive Photos | Getty Images

    As the Federal Reserve brings inflation down to a 2% target, prices will still continue to grow, albeit at a lower rate, Luther noted.

    However, prices that have risen during high inflation will not return to where they were before.

    A period of below 2% inflation would be needed to see prices subside back to where they were, Luther said.

    Why wage growth is uneven

    Even amid the highest inflation in 40 years, things could have been much worse for the typical household, Luther noted.

    Median real wages are more or less where they were prior to both the pandemic and record high inflation kicking in, he said.

    As prices shot up, many employees who saw their real wages decline were likely able to get new jobs or renegotiate with their current employers to push up their nominal wages, Luther said.

    However, there may have been a lag between the price and wage increases, which may have hurt those households.

    To be sure, not every household may have been able to negotiate for higher nominal wages, which means their income has not kept up with inflation, Luther noted.

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  • Global survey: workplace violence, harassment is widespread

    Global survey: workplace violence, harassment is widespread

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    UNITED NATIONS — The first attempt to survey the extent of violence and harassment at work around the globe has found that workplace abuse is widespread, and particularly pronounced among young people, migrants, and wage earners, especially women.

    More than 22% of the nearly 75,000 workers in 121 countries surveyed last year reported having experienced at least one type of violence or harassment, according to the report released Monday by the U.N. International Labor Organization, the Lloyds Register Foundation and Gallup.

    “Violence and harassment in the world of work is a pervasive and harmful phenomenon, with profound and costly effects ranging from severe physical and mental health consequences to lost earnings and destroyed career paths to economic losses for workplaces and societies,” the three organizations said in the 56-page report.

    According to the findings, one-third of the people who experienced violence or harassment at work said they had experienced more than one form — and 6.3% said they had faced all three forms: physical, psychological, and sexual violence and harassment during their working life.

    Psychological violence and harassment was the most common form, reported by both men and women, with 17.9% of workers experiencing it at some point during their employment, the report said.

    Some 8.5% of those surveyed said they experienced physical violence and harassment at work, with men more likely than women, the report said, and some 6.3% experienced sexual violence and harassment, 8.2% of them women and 5% of them men.

    More than 60% of the victims of violence and harassment at work “said it has happened to them multiple times, and for the majority of them, the last incident took place within the last five years,” according to the report.

    The research also found that people who experienced discrimination at some point in their life based on gender, disability status, nationality, ethnicity, skin color or religion were more likely to experience violence or harassment at work than those who didn’t face such discrimination.

    The three organizations said “statistics on violence and harassment in the world of work are sporadic and scarce” so the ILO joined forces with Lloyd’s and Gallup to carry out “the first global exploratory exercise to measure people’s own experiences.” The survey used data from the 2021 Lloyd’s Register Foundation World Risk Poll, which was part of the Gallup World Poll.

    The results pave the way for further research, the organizations said.

    “Ultimately, stronger evidence will help forge more effective legislation, policies and practices that promote prevention measures, tackle specific risk factions and root causes, and ensure that victims are not left alone in handling these unacceptable occurrences,” the ILO, Lloyds and Gallup said.

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  • Reformers take 6 of 14 UAW board seats, could win majority

    Reformers take 6 of 14 UAW board seats, could win majority

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    DETROIT — Reform-minded candidates won several races as members of the United Auto Workers union voted on their leaders in an election that stemmed from a federal bribery and embezzlement scandal involving former union officials.

    In unofficial results posted early Sunday on a federal court-appointed monitor’s website, challengers took six of 14 seats on the union’s International Executive Board. They could win as many as eight, including the presidency, and control a majority, depending on the outcome of three runoff elections.

    The reform candidates, most part of a slate called UAW Members United, campaigned on taking a more confrontational stance in bargaining with Detroit’s three automakers. They want to rescind concessions made to companies in previous contract talks, restoring cost-of-living pay raises and eliminating a two-tier wage and benefit system.

    The adversarial stance is likely to raise costs for General Motors, Ford and Stellantis, which almost certainly would be passed on to consumers. Even without the election, costs likely would have gone up as workers seek a bigger share of billions of dollars in profits.

    In the race for president, incumbent Ray Curry defeated challenger Shawn Fain by 614 votes. Curry had 38.2% of the vote to Fain’s 37.6%. But neither got a majority in the five-candidate field, so there will be a runoff election in January.

    Mike Booth and Rich Boyer, both from Members United, took two of three vice president slots. Two vice president candidates from Curry’s Solidarity Team slate, incumbent Chuck Browning and Tim Bressler, will compete in a runoff for the third vice president slot.

    Members United candidate Margaret Mock ousted current Secretary-Treasurer Frank Stuglin. Reform-minded candidates took three regional director slots, with another headed for a runoff.

    Winners will be sworn in on Dec. 12. Ballots for the runoff elections will be mailed Jan. 12 with a Feb. 28 deadline to return them. Votes will be counted starting March 1, according to the website of Monitor Neil Barofsky.

    In an interview, Fain said the election puts the companies on notice “to get ready. We’re coming for you.” He said companies are making billions of dollars and have closed or spun off plants and failed to give the Stellantis plant in Belvidere, Illinois, a new vehicle to build after it stops making its current model.

    “It’s just a fact that over the years our leadership has become way too close to management,” he said.

    Curry’s slate said in a statement that it is fighting for all active and retired members. “Our member expectations are high, and our team has the experience and proven track record to both build coalitions for the fight and deliver results,” it said.

    Curry, elected by a vote of the International Executive Board in 2021 to replace retiring Rory Gamble, said at a September candidates’ forum that he has put financial safeguards and reforms in place and has plans to bring union members “back into greater days.” He said the union also has plans to recruit new members.

    “We don’t just make false demands and deliver false hopes,” he said.

    Turnout in the election for the 372,000-member union was low. Of about 1 million ballots mailed to active members and retirees, only 10.5% were returned.

    The 2023 contract talks come at a critical juncture for the union, which faces a transition from internal combustion vehicles to those that run on batteries. With fewer moving parts, fewer people will be needed to make electric vehicles, and jobs making engines and transmissions could be shifted to battery assembly plants that might not be unionized.

    The election came after union members last December decided to directly vote on leaders for the first time instead of having them picked by delegates to a convention.

    Under the old system, convention delegates were picked by local union offices. But the new slate of officers was selected by the current leadership, and there was rarely any serious opposition.

    The voting happened after 11 union officials and a late official’s spouse pleaded guilty in the corruption probe, including the two former presidents, Gary Jones and Dennis Williams. Both were sentenced to prison. The first criminal charges in the probe were filed in 2017.

    To avoid a federal takeover, the union agreed to reforms and Barofsky’s appointment to oversee the UAW and elections of the executive board.

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  • Antisemitic celebrities stoke fears of normalizing hate

    Antisemitic celebrities stoke fears of normalizing hate

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    A surge of anti-Jewish vitriol, spread by a world-famous rapper, an NBA star and other prominent people, is stoking fears that public figures are normalizing hate and ramping up the risk of violence in a country already experiencing a sharp increase in antisemitism.

    Leaders of the Jewish community in the U.S. and extremism experts have been alarmed to see celebrities with massive followings spew antisemitic tropes in a way that has been taboo for decades. Some said it harkens back to a darker time in America when powerful people routinely spread conspiracy theories about Jews with impunity.

    Former President Donald Trump hosted a Holocaust-denying white supremacist at Mar-a-Lago. The rapper Ye expressed love for Adolf Hitler in an interview. Basketball star Kyrie Irving appeared to promote an antisemitic film on social media. Neo-Nazi trolls are clamoring to return to Twitter as new CEO Elon Musk grants “amnesty” to suspended accounts.

    “These are not fringe outliers sending emails from their parents garage or idiots no one has ever heard of. When influential mainstream cultural, political and even sports icons normalize hate speech, everyone needs to be very concerned,” said Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber, a leader in South Florida’s Jewish community.

    Northwestern University history professor Peter Hayes, who specializes in Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, said normalizing antisemitism is a “real possibility” when there is a “public discussion of things that used to be beneath contempt.”

    “I’m very concerned about it,” Hayes said. “It’s one of the many ways in which America has to get a grip and and stop toying with concepts and ideas that are potentially murderous.”

    Trump hosted Ye — the rapper formerly known as Kanye West — and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes for dinner at his Florida home on Nov. 22.

    Fuentes was a Boston University student when he attended a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that erupted in violence in 2017. He became an internet personality who used his platform to spread white supremacist and antisemitic views. Fuentes leads a far-right extremist movement called “America First,” with supporters known as “Groypers.”

    On Thursday, Fuentes joined Ye in appearing on the Infowars show hosted by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. Ye praised Hitler during the interview, ratcheting up the rhetoric that already cost him a lucrative business deal with Adidas.

    Jonathan Greenblatt, national director and CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, said it is astonishing and alarming that two of the nation’s leading purveyors of antisemitism were “breaking bread with the erstwhile head of the GOP.”

    “I would characterize this as the normalization of antisemitism. It has now become part of the political process in a way we hadn’t seen before,” Greenblatt said. “And that is not unique to Republicans. It is not just a Republican problem. It is a societal problem.”

    Most Americans knew it was “beyond the pale” when torch-toting white supremacists marched through the University of Virginia’s campus on the eve of the 2017 rally, said Amy Spitalnick, executive director of Integrity First for America, a group that backed a lawsuit against organizers of the Charlottesville rally.

    “What’s even more dangerous than Nazis with torches chanting, ‘Jews will not replace us,’ is when we have political leaders and others espousing those same conspiracy theories in increasingly normalized ways,” she said.

    Spitalnick said the virulent hatred that Ye has been spewing can make diluted expressions of antisemitism seem more normal in contrast.

    “It’s crucial that we hold Kanye and Irving and these other public figures accountable for their antisemitism. But it means nothing if we’re not also recognizing and holding accountable the ways in which this antisemitism and extremism has seeped into the mainstream of one of our major political parties and become commonplace in our political discourse,” she said.

    Trump’s critics and even some of his allies condemned the former president for hosting Fuentes at Mar-a-Lago. Trump claimed that he knew nothing about Fuentes before the dinner and defended his decision to host Ye at his club.

    Twitter suspended Ye’s account this week after he tweeted a picture of a swastika merged with the Star of David. Musk tweeted that Ye had violated a rule against inciting violence.

    Musk announced last week that his “amnesty” plan applied to accounts that haven’t “broken the law or engaged in egregious spam.” Online safety experts predict that the move will lead to a rise in harassment and hate speech.

    Groups that monitor Twitter for racist and antisemitic content say toxic speech already has been on the rise in the month since Musk took over the platform and fired thousands of employees. Content moderators were among those who lost their jobs.

    Watchdogs also have rebuked Musk for some of his own tweets, including posting a meme featuring Pepe the Frog, a cartoon character that was hijacked by far-right extremists.

    In April, the Anti-Defamation League announced that its annual tally of antisemitic incidents reached a record high last year. The organization counted 2,717 incidents of assault, harassment and vandalism in 2021, a 34% increase over the previous year and the highest number since the ADL began tracking the events in 1979.

    Generations ago, famous Americans including Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh unapologetically expressed antisemitic sentiments in a way that would have shocked Americans in more recent decades. Now, the internet and social media make it easy for world-famous celebrities to normalize anti-Jewish hate.

    For somebody of Ye’s status to praise Nazis and Hitler is “escalating from ugliness to a kind of incitement,” Greenblatt said. He noted that Jewish institutions already have to beef up security to protect against attacks such as the one in which a gunman killed 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018.

    “Our community still has to brace for the consequences of those ideas going mainstream,” Greenblatt said.

    ———

    Associated Press Writer Freida Frisaro in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, contributed to this report.

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  • Thousands protest in South Korea in support of truckers

    Thousands protest in South Korea in support of truckers

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    SEOUL, South Korea — Thousands of demonstrators representing organized labor marched in South Korea’s capital on Saturday denouncing government attempts to force thousands of striking truckers back to work after they walked out in a dispute over the price of freight.

    There were no immediate reports of injuries or major clashes from the protests near the National Assembly in Seoul. The marchers, mostly members of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, accused President Yoon Suk Yeol’s conservative government of labor oppression and ignoring what they described as the truckers’ harsh work conditions and financial struggles, worsened further by rising fuel costs.

    The government on Tuesday issued an order for some 2,500 drivers of cement trucks to return to work, saying that their walkout is rattling the national economy. It wasn’t immediately clear how many truckers returned to their jobs following the order as their union vowed to continue the strike.

    Thousands of members of the Cargo Truckers Solidarity union have been striking since last week, calling for the government to make permanent a minimum freight rate system that is to expire at the end of 2022.

    While the minimum fares are currently applied to shipping containers and cement, the strikers also call for the benefits to be expanded to other cargo. That would include oil and chemical tankers, steel and automobile carriers and package delivery trucks under the broader agreement.

    Container traffic at ports recovered to 81% of normal levels as of Saturday morning after dropping to around just 20% earlier this week, according to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. It said more than 5,000 truckers were actively participating in the strike on Saturday.

    Tuesday’s order marked the first time a South Korean government exercised its controversial powers under a law revised in 2004 to force truckers back to their jobs.

    A failure to comply without “justifiable reason” is punishable by up to three years in jail or a maximum fine of 30 million won ($22,400). Critics say the law infringes on constitutional rights because it doesn’t clearly define what qualifies as acceptable conditions for a strike.

    Officials say they issued the “work start order” to cement truckers first because the construction industry was hit hardest by shipment delays. They say they are considering expanding the order to drivers transporting fuel as a second step, citing concerns about possible shortages at gas stations.

    The strike’s impact has so far been mostly limited to domestic industries and there has been no immediate reports of major disruptions to export industries such as semiconductors.

    Yoon’s government has offered to temporarily extend the minimum freight fares for another three years but balked at the demand to widen the scope of such payments.

    The truckers say the minimum-rate system is crucial for their finances and personal safety, saying that without it they are forced to increase their deliveries and drive dangerously to make ends meet.

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  • EXPLAINER: 5 key takeaways from the November jobs report

    EXPLAINER: 5 key takeaways from the November jobs report

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    WASHINGTON — For nearly nine months, the Federal Reserve has relentlessly raised interest rates to try to slow the U.S. job market and bring inflation under control.

    And for just as long, the job market hasn’t seemed to get the message.

    The November employment report the government issued Friday was no exception. Employers added 263,000 jobs — a substantial gain that was far above economists’ expectations. Wages rose robustly, too, further intensifying the inflationary pressures the Fed has been struggling to contain.

    And the unemployment rate remained at 3.7%, barely above the half-century low of 3.5%.

    Friday’s hiring data left economists scratching their heads over the job market’s resilience and the continuing need of many employers for more workers.

    “The Fed is tightening monetary policy, but somebody forgot to tell the labor market,’’ said Brian Coulton, chief economist at Fitch Ratings.

    The Fed’s inflation challenge began after the economy roared back from the pandemic recession two years ago, causing vast shortages of goods and sending prices soaring. After assuming — falsely — for months that high inflation would prove short-lived, the Fed finally began raising its key short-term rate in March this year.

    Since then, its rate hikes have been recurrent and aggressive. The Fed has raised its benchmark rate six times, including four straight increases of three-quarters of a point — far larger than the usual quarter-point hikes. Later this month, it’s expected to raise its key rate by an additional half-point.

    Because the Fed’s rate affects borrowing rates across the economy, its hikes have had the effect of making loans much costlier for consumers and businesses. The idea is that individuals and companies would then cut back on borrowing and spending, and employers would slow their hiring.

    But the economy — and especially the job market — have proved surprisingly durable in the face of the Fed’s anti-inflation campaign, a fact underscored by Friday’s strong jobs numbers.

    The central bank’s goal is to achieve 2% annual inflation. It has a long way to go, to say the least: The most recent inflation report showed consumer prices up 7.7% from a year earlier.

    Here are five takeaways from the November jobs report:

    ———

    TOO HOT FOR THE FED

    Last year, the economy added a record 6.7 million jobs, and it tacked on an average of 457,000 a month more from January through July this year. Since then, hiring has cooled, to a monthly average of 277,000 from August through November. Yet it’s still running way too hot for the Fed’s inflation fighters and is consistently beating forecasters’ expectations.

    With nearly two job openings for every unemployed American, companies are struggling to find workers and retain the ones they have. A tight job market tends to keep upward pressure on wages and to feed into inflation.

    “This is another solid report that shows just how difficult it is going to be for the Fed to get inflation back to target,’’ economists Thomas Simons and Aneta Markowska of the investment banking firm Jefferies wrote in a research note Friday.

    ————

    RISING WAGES

    Average hourly earnings rose 0.6% from October to November — the strongest month-to-month gain since January. And measured over the past 12 months, average pay was up a more-than-expected 5.1%,

    “We had been hoping to see a clear softening,’’ said Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics.

    Hourly pay gains were especially strong in November for workers in retail, transportation and warehousing and “information,’’ a category that includes some technology jobs.

    “Wage growth is likely to continue to remain elevated until we see a meaningful normalization in labor demand,’’ said Thomas Feltmate, senior economist at TD Economics.

    ————

    HELP WANTED: RESTAURANTS AND BARS

    Restaurants and bars added 62,000 jobs last month. The healthcare industry took on a net 45,000 new workers in November. That sector has been adding 47,000 jobs a month this year, up from an average of just 9,000 a month in 2021.

    Factories added 14,000 jobs in November. That gain occurred even though an index issued by the Institute for Supply Management showed that U.S. manufacturing activity fell last month for the first time since May 2020, when the economy was reeling from the COVID-10 outbreak.

    Last month, the economy also added 20,000 construction workers. But in a sign that higher interest rates are squeezing the housing market, the number of employees at homebuilding companies actually fell in November by 2,600.

    ————

    MISSING WORKERS

    The number of people who either have a job or are looking for one — the total labor force — declined by 186,000 in November. It was the third straight monthly drop.

    The figure remains slightly below where it stood in February 2020, just before COVID slammed into the U.S. economy. The proportion of the adult population in the labor force — the participation rate — amounted to 62.1% last month, well below the pre-pandemic 63.4%.

    The shortfall in available workers has been caused by a combination of early retirements, reduced immigration, COVID-19 deaths and a shortage of affordable child care. The shortage represents a setback in the fight against inflation: If employers had more workers to choose from, they would be under less pressure to bid up wages and thereby contribute to inflation pressures.

    ————

    TWO SURVEYS, TWO STORIES

    Friday’s report sent some mixed signals about the level of employment in the United States.

    The Labor Department’s survey of businesses delivered the headline number of 263,000 added jobs. But the department also surveyed households, and they told a different story: The number of people who said they had a job fell by 138,000 in November after having dropped by 328,000 in October.

    The survey of businesses, called the “establishment survey,” tracks how many jobs are added across the economy. The separate survey of households is used to calculate the unemployment rate.

    The two surveys sometimes tell different tales, as they did in October and November, though the disparities tend to even out over time.

    For its establishment survey, the department asks mostly large companies and government agencies how many people they had on their payrolls.

    For its household survey, it asks households whether the adults living there have a job. Those who don’t have a job but are looking for one are counted as unemployed. Those who aren’t working but aren’t seeking work are not counted as unemployed.

    Unlike the establishment survey, the household survey counts farm workers, the self-employed and people who work for new companies. It also does a better job of capturing small-business hiring.

    But the results of the household survey are likely less precise. The government surveys just 60,000 households. By contrast, it surveys 131,000 businesses and government agencies for the establishment survey.

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  • Reform candidates lead in UAW races with 68% of vote counted

    Reform candidates lead in UAW races with 68% of vote counted

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    DETROIT — Members of the United Auto Workers union appeared on Thursday to favor replacing many of their current leaders in an election that stemmed from a federal bribery and embezzlement scandal involving former union officials.

    Reform-minded candidates, many part of the UAW Members United slate, are leading or close in multiple key races with about 68% of the vote counted. Many challengers campaigned on rescinding concessions made to companies in previous contract talks, including cost-of-living pay raises, elimination of a two-tier wage and benefit system, and other items.

    That could raise costs for Detroit’s three automakers — General Motors, Ford and Stellantis — and almost inevitably will drive up already expensive auto prices.

    With tallies from six of nine UAW regions counted, incumbent President Ray Curry had a slim lead over Shawn Fain, an international union official who started at a Stellantis plant in Kokomo, Indiana, in a five-candidate race.

    Curry had 38.6% of the vote, while Fain was second with 38%. There likely will be a runoff election early next year between Fain and Curry since neither had a majority of the votes.

    In the race for three vice presidents, Rich Boyer and Mike Booth, both Members United candidates, are first and second in an eight-candidate field, followed by incumbent Vice President Chuck Browning. A runoff could happen there, too.

    Margaret Mock, the Members United candidate for secretary-treasurer, had 62.6% of the vote to lead incumbent Frank Stuglin at 37.4%. Where tallies have been completed, candidates who campaigned on reforming the union also won three of nine regional director positions, with another heading to a runoff.

    It wasn’t clear when the vote count would be finished. The ballots are being counted by a company hired by a court-appointed monitor who is overseeing the election and the union.

    Fain led the Members United ticket, which campaigned on reforming the 372,000-member UAW after the scandal. The election also has broad implications for contract talks with the Detroit auto companies that start next year.

    Fain has advocated for more of a confrontational stance and has accused union leadership of complacency. He has said the UAW has had a philosophy for 40 years of viewing automakers as partners rather than adversaries.

    He said it’s too early to declare a winner but said in an interview Thursday that the early vote totals are “a loud and clear message to the companies and the businesses to get ready, we’re coming for you.”

    The automakers, he said, are making making the best profits in their history, yet are closing factories and costing union jobs. He gave General Motors’ 2019 closure of its Lordstown, Ohio, assembly plant as an example, plus a lack of new vehicles for Stellantis’ Belvidere, Illinois, plant, which he said has lost 3,000 workers.

    At a candidates’ forum in September, Fain said union leaders should have reversed concessions made starting in 2007 and should have won job security guarantees.

    “We’ve had at least 10 years with perfect conditions for regaining and improving what was lost during the Great Recession,” he said.

    The contract talks come at a critical juncture for the union, which faces a transition from internal combustion vehicles to those that run on batteries. With fewer moving parts, fewer people will be needed to make electric vehicles, and jobs making engines and transmissions could be shifted to battery assembly plants that might not be unionized.

    The election came after union members last December decided to directly vote on leaders for the first time instead of having them picked by delegates to a convention.

    Under the old system, convention delegates were picked by local union offices. But the new slate of officers was selected by the current leadership, and there was rarely any serious opposition.

    A company hired by Monitor Neil Barofsky mailed out about 1 million ballots to active and retired union members. But only 106,790, roughly 10.7%, were returned.

    The voting happened after 11 union officials and a late official’s spouse pleaded guilty in the corruption probe since 2017, including the two former presidents, Gary Jones and Dennis Williams. Both were sentenced to prison.

    To avoid a federal takeover, the union agreed to reforms and Barofsky’s appointment to oversee elections of the 14-member executive board.

    Curry, appointed in 2021 to replace retiring Rory Gamble to lead the union, said he has put financial safeguards and reforms in place and has plans to bring union members “back into greater days.” He said at the candidates’ forum that the union also has plans to recruit new members.

    “We don’t just make false demands and deliver false hopes,” he said.

    ————

    This story has been corrected to show that 68% of the vote has been counted, not 73%.

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  • Reform candidates lead in UAW races with 73% of vote counted

    Reform candidates lead in UAW races with 73% of vote counted

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    DETROIT — Members of the United Auto Workers union appeared on Thursday to favor replacing many of their current leaders in an election that stemmed from a federal bribery and embezzlement scandal involving former union officials.

    Reform-minded candidates, many part of the UAW Members United slate, are leading or close in multiple key races with about 73% of the vote in. Many challengers campaigned on rescinding concessions made to companies in previous contract talks, including cost-of-living pay raises, elimination of a two-tier wage and benefit system, and other items.

    That could raise costs for Detroit’s three automakers — General Motors, Ford and Stellantis — and almost inevitably will drive up already expensive auto prices.

    With tallies from six of nine UAW regions counted, incumbent President Ray Curry had a slim lead over Shawn Fain, an international union official who started at a Stellantis plant in Kokomo, Indiana, in a five-candidate race.

    Curry had 38.6% of the vote, while Fain was second with 38%. There likely will be a runoff election early next year between Fain and Curry since neither had a majority of the votes.

    In the race for three vice presidents, Rich Boyer and Mike Booth, both Members United candidates, are first and second in an eight-candidate field, followed by incumbent Vice President Chuck Browning. A runoff could happen there, too.

    Margaret Mock, the Members United candidate for secretary-treasurer, had 62.6% of the vote to lead incumbent Frank Stuglin at 37.4%. Where tallies have been completed, candidates who campaigned on reforming the union also won three of nine regional director positions, with another heading to a runoff.

    It wasn’t clear when the vote count would be finished. The ballots are being counted by a company hired by a court-appointed monitor who is overseeing the election and the union.

    Fain led the Members United ticket, which campaigned on reforming the 372,000-member UAW after the scandal. The election also has broad implications for contract talks with the Detroit auto companies that start next year.

    Fain has advocated for more of a confrontational stance and has accused union leadership of complacency. He has said the UAW has had a philosophy for 40 years of viewing automakers as partners rather than adversaries.

    He hasn’t declared victory but said in an interview Thursday that the early vote totals are “a loud and clear message to the companies and the businesses to get ready, we’re coming for you.”

    The automakers, he said, are making making the best profits in their history, yet are closing factories and costing union jobs. He gave General Motors’ 2019 closure of its Lordstown, Ohio, assembly plant as an example, plus a lack of new vehicles for Stellantis’ Belvidere, Illinois, plant, which he said has lost 3,000 workers.

    At a candidates’ forum in September, Fain said union leaders should have reversed concessions made starting in 2007 and should have won job security guarantees.

    “We’ve had at least 10 years with perfect conditions for regaining and improving what was lost during the Great Recession,” he said.

    The contract talks come at a critical juncture for the union, which faces a transition from internal combustion vehicles to those that run on batteries. With fewer moving parts, fewer people will be needed to make electric vehicles, and jobs making engines and transmissions could be shifted to battery assembly plants that might not be unionized.

    The election came after union members last December decided to directly vote on leaders for the first time instead of having them picked by delegates to a convention.

    Under the old system, convention delegates were picked by local union offices. But the new slate of officers was selected by the current leadership, and there was rarely any serious opposition.

    A company hired by Monitor Neil Barofsky mailed out about 1 million ballots to active and retired union members. But only 106,790, roughly 10.7%, were returned.

    The voting happened after 11 union officials and a late official’s spouse pleaded guilty in the corruption probe since 2017, including the two former presidents, Gary Jones and Dennis Williams. Both were sentenced to prison.

    To avoid a federal takeover, the union agreed to reforms and Barofsky’s appointment to oversee elections of the 14-member executive board.

    Curry, appointed in 2021 to replace retiring Rory Gamble to lead the union, said he has put financial safeguards and reforms in place and has plans to bring union members “back into greater days.” He said at the candidates’ forum that the union also has plans to recruit new members.

    “We don’t just make false demands and deliver false hopes,” he said.

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  • Some University of California striking workers reach deal

    Some University of California striking workers reach deal

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    LOS ANGELES — Postdoctoral scholars and academic researchers on Tuesday reached a tentative labor agreement with the University of California but will remain on strike in solidarity with thousands of graduate student workers at all 10 of the university system’s campuses.

    The union representing the scholars and researchers hailed the deal as a major victory and said it would provide “substantial wage increases that address cost of living.”

    In addition to pay hikes of up to 29%, the agreement would provide increased family leave, childcare subsidies and lengthened appointments to ensure job security, according to a statement from United Auto Workers Local 5810.

    The agreement must be ratified in a vote by members.

    Letitia Silas, executive director of UC’s labor relations, said the university system was pleased to have reached a deal that honors the workers’ contributions.

    “These agreements also uphold our tradition of supporting these employees with compensation and benefits packages that are among the best in the country,” Silas said in a statement.

    The postdoctoral employees and academic researchers make up about 12,000 of the 48,000 union members who walked off the job and onto picket lines three weeks ago. About 36,000 graduate student teaching assistants, tutors and researchers are bargaining separately and remain on strike, calling for increased pay and benefits.

    Union leaders have said the strike could be the largest work stoppage the prestigious public university system has ever faced.

    The academic workers say with their current salaries they can’t afford to live in cities such as Los Angeles, San Diego and Berkeley, where housing costs are soaring.

    Organizers from the United Auto Workers, which represents the employees involved, have said there is no end date for the strike.

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  • South Korea orders striking cement truckers back to work

    South Korea orders striking cement truckers back to work

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    SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea’s government issued an order Tuesday for some of the thousands of truck drivers who have been on strike to return to work, insisting that their nationwide walkout over freight fare issues is hurting an already weak economy.

    Despite facing the threat of delicensing or even prison terms, the strike’s organizers said they would defy the order and accused President Yoon Suk Yeol’s conservative government of suppressing their labor rights and ignoring what they described as worsening work conditions and financial strain caused by rising fuel costs and interest rates.

    The order was approved in a Cabinet meeting called by Yoon and targeted the drivers of cement trucks among a broader group of truckers participating in the walkout. It marked the first time a South Korean government has exercised controversial powers under a law revised in 2004 to force truckers back to their jobs.

    A failure to comply without “justifiable reason” is punishable by up to three years in jail or a maximum fine of 30 million won ($22,400). Critics have denounced the law as unconstitutional, saying it doesn’t clearly define what qualifies as acceptable conditions for a strike.

    Yoon said the truckers’ strike is threatening to “devastate the foundation of our industries,” citing delays in deliveries of materials such as cement and steel to construction sites and factories. He accused the strikers of illicit activities such as disrupting the work of colleagues who have refused to participate in the strike.

    “There’s no way to justify the act of taking the lives of people and the national economy as hostage to accomplish their own interest,” Yoon said in the Cabinet meeting. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the government was planning to expand the order to drivers transporting steel and other supplies if the strike continues.

    Thousands of members of the Cargo Truckers Solidarity Union have been striking since last Thursday, in their second nationwide walkout since June, calling for the government to make permanent a minimum freight rate system that is to expire at the end of 2022.

    While the minimum fares are currently applied to shipping containers and cement, the striking truckers are calling for the benefits to be expanded to other cargoes including oil and chemical tankers, steel and automobile carriers and package delivery trucks.

    Yoon’s government has offered to temporarily extend the minimum freight fares for another three years but balked at the demand to widen the scope of such payments. Officials say the truckers’ strike is threatening to inflict serious damage to the country’s economy and logistics systems.

    According to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, nearly 8,000 truckers participated in the strike on Monday, and container traffic at ports was at 21% of normal levels as of 10 a.m. It said the strike slowed shipments and deliveries of cement, steel and refined oil products. Lee Sang-min, minister of the interior and safety, said Monday that the strike is estimated to cost the economy 300 billion won ($224 million) each day but didn’t specify how the government calculated that amount.

    The strike’s damage so far has been largely limited to domestic industries such as construction and there have been no reports of substantial disruptions of key exports such as computer chips and automobiles.

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  • Biden calls on Congress to head off potential rail strike

    Biden calls on Congress to head off potential rail strike

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    OMAHA, Neb. — President Joe Biden on Monday asked Congress to intervene and block a railroad strike before next month’s deadline in the stalled contract talks, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said lawmakers would take up legislation this week to impose the deal that unions agreed to in September.

    “Let me be clear: a rail shutdown would devastate our economy,” Biden said in a statement. “Without freight rail, many U.S. industries would shut down.”

    In a statement, Pelosi said: “We are reluctant to bypass the standard ratification process for the Tentative Agreement — but we must act to prevent a catastrophic nationwide rail strike, which would grind our economy to a halt.”

    Pelosi said the House would not change the terms of the September agreement, which would challenge the Senate to approve the House bill without changes.

    The September agreement that Biden and Pelosi are calling for is a slight improvement over what the board of arbitrators recommended in the summer. The September agreement added three unpaid days off a year for engineers and conductors to tend to medical appointments as long as they scheduled them at least 30 days in advance. The railroads also promised in September not to penalize workers who are hospitalized and to negotiate further with the unions after the contract is approved about improving the regular scheduling of days off.

    Hundreds of business groups had been urging Congress and the president to step into the deadlocked contract talk and prevent a strike.

    Both the unions and railroads have been lobbying Congress while contract talks continue. If Congress acts, it will end talks between the railroads and four rail unions that rejected their deals Biden helped broker before the original strike deadline in September. Eight other unions have approved their five-year deals with the railroads and are in the process of getting back pay for their workers for the 24% raises that are retroactive to 2020.

    If Congress does what Biden suggests and imposes terms similar to what was agreed on in September, that will end the union’s push to add paid sick time. The four unions that have rejected their deals have been pressing for the railroads to add that benefit to help address workers’ quality of life concerns, but the railroads had refused to consider that.

    Biden said that as a “a proud pro-labor president” he was reluctant to override the views of people who voted against the agreement. “But in this case — where the economic impact of a shutdown would hurt millions of other working people and families — I believe Congress must use its powers to adopt this deal.”

    Biden’s remarks and Pelosi’s statement came after a coalition of more than 400 business groups sent a letter to congressional leaders Monday urging them to step into the stalled talks because of fears about the devastating potential impact of a strike that could force many businesses to shut down if they can’t get the rail deliveries they need. Commuter railroads and Amtrak would also be affected in a strike because many of them use tracks owned by the freight railroads.

    The business groups led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers and National Retail Federation said even a short-term strike would have a tremendous impact and the economic pain would start to be felt even before the Dec. 9 strike deadline. They said the railroads would stop hauling hazardous chemicals, fertilizers and perishable goods up to a week beforehand to keep those products from being stranded somewhere along the tracks.

    “A potential rail strike only adds to the headwinds facing the U.S. economy,” the businesses wrote. “A rail stoppage would immediately lead to supply shortages and higher prices. The cessation of Amtrak and commuter rail services would disrupt up to 7 million travelers a day. Many businesses would see their sales disrupted right in the middle of the critical holiday shopping season.”

    A similar group of businesses sent another letter to Biden last month urging him to play a more active role in resolving the contract dispute.

    On Monday, the Association of American Railroads trade group praised Biden’s action.

    “No one benefits from a rail work stoppage — not our customers, not rail employees and not the American economy,” said AAR President and CEO Ian Jefferies. “Now is the appropriate time for Congress to pass legislation to implement the agreements already ratified by eight of the twelve unions.”

    Business groups that have been pushing for Congress to settle this contract dispute praised Biden’s move.

    “The Biden administration’s endorsement of congressional intervention affirms what America’s food, beverage, household and personal care manufacturers have been saying: Freight rail operations cannot shut down and imperil the availability and affordability of consumers’ everyday essentials,” said Tom Madrecki, vice president of supply chain for the Consumer Brands Association. “The consequences to consumers if a strike were to occur are too serious, especially amid continued supply chain challenges and disruptions.”

    Clark Ballew, a spokesman for the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division, which represents track maintenance workers, said before Biden’s announcement that the union was “headed to D.C. this week to meet with lawmakers on the Hill from both parties. We have instructed our members to contact their federal lawmakers in the House and Senate for several weeks now.”

    The U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Neil Bradley said Biden was correct in advocating for the deal already reached. “Congress must do what it has done 18 times before: intervene against a national rail strike,” Bradley said in a statement, and he called Congress enforcing the deal agreed to by railroads and union leaders the “only path to avoid crippling strike.”

    The railroads, which include Union Pacific, BNSF, Norfolk Southern, CSX and Kansas City Southern, wanted any deal to closely follow the recommendations a special board of arbitrators that Biden appointed made this summer that called for the 24% raises and $5,000 in bonuses but didn’t resolve workers’ concerns about demanding schedules that make it hard to take a day off and other working conditions. That’s what Biden is calling on Congress to impose.

    ———

    Associated Press writer Colleen Long in Washington contributed to this report.

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  • Biden calls on Congress to head off potential rail strike

    Biden calls on Congress to head off potential rail strike

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    OMAHA, Neb. — President Joe Biden on Monday asked Congress to intervene and block a railroad strike before next month’s deadline in the stalled contract talks, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said lawmakers would take up legislation this week to impose the deal that unions agreed to in September.

    “Let me be clear: a rail shutdown would devastate our economy,” Biden said in a statement. “Without freight rail, many U.S. industries would shut down.”

    In a statement, Pelosi said: “We are reluctant to bypass the standard ratification process for the Tentative Agreement — but we must act to prevent a catastrophic nationwide rail strike, which would grind our economy to a halt.”

    Pelosi said the House would not change the terms of the September agreement, which would challenge the Senate to approve the House bill without changes.

    The September agreement that Biden and Pelosi are calling for is a slight improvement over what the board of arbitrators recommended in the summer. The September agreement added three unpaid days off a year for engineers and conductors to tend to medical appointments as long as they scheduled them at least 30 days in advance. The railroads also promised in September not to penalize workers who are hospitalized and to negotiate further with the unions after the contract is approved about improving the regular scheduling of days off.

    Hundreds of business groups had been urging Congress and the president to step into the deadlocked contract talk and prevent a strike.

    Both the unions and railroads have been lobbying Congress while contract talks continue. If Congress acts, it will end talks between the railroads and four rail unions that rejected their deals Biden helped broker before the original strike deadline in September. Eight other unions have approved their five-year deals with the railroads and are in the process of getting back pay for their workers for the 24% raises that are retroactive to 2020.

    If Congress does what Biden suggests and imposes terms similar to what was agreed on in September, that will end the union’s push to add paid sick time. The four unions that have rejected their deals have been pressing for the railroads to add that benefit to help address workers’ quality of life concerns, but the railroads had refused to consider that.

    Biden said that as a “a proud pro-labor president” he was reluctant to override the views of people who voted against the agreement. “But in this case — where the economic impact of a shutdown would hurt millions of other working people and families — I believe Congress must use its powers to adopt this deal.”

    Biden’s remarks and Pelosi’s statement came after a coalition of more than 400 business groups sent a letter to congressional leaders Monday urging them to step into the stalled talks because of fears about the devastating potential impact of a strike that could force many businesses to shut down if they can’t get the rail deliveries they need. Commuter railroads and Amtrak would also be affected in a strike because many of them use tracks owned by the freight railroads.

    The business groups led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers and National Retail Federation said even a short-term strike would have a tremendous impact and the economic pain would start to be felt even before the Dec. 9 strike deadline. They said the railroads would stop hauling hazardous chemicals, fertilizers and perishable goods up to a week beforehand to keep those products from being stranded somewhere along the tracks.

    “A potential rail strike only adds to the headwinds facing the U.S. economy,” the businesses wrote. “A rail stoppage would immediately lead to supply shortages and higher prices. The cessation of Amtrak and commuter rail services would disrupt up to 7 million travelers a day. Many businesses would see their sales disrupted right in the middle of the critical holiday shopping season.”

    A similar group of businesses sent another letter to Biden last month urging him to play a more active role in resolving the contract dispute.

    On Monday, the Association of American Railroads trade group praised Biden’s action.

    “No one benefits from a rail work stoppage — not our customers, not rail employees and not the American economy,” said AAR President and CEO Ian Jefferies. “Now is the appropriate time for Congress to pass legislation to implement the agreements already ratified by eight of the twelve unions.”

    Business groups that have been pushing for Congress to settle this contract dispute praised Biden’s move.

    “The Biden administration’s endorsement of congressional intervention affirms what America’s food, beverage, household and personal care manufacturers have been saying: Freight rail operations cannot shut down and imperil the availability and affordability of consumers’ everyday essentials,” said Tom Madrecki, vice president of supply chain for the Consumer Brands Association. “The consequences to consumers if a strike were to occur are too serious, especially amid continued supply chain challenges and disruptions.”

    Clark Ballew, a spokesman for the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division, which represents track maintenance workers, said before Biden’s announcement that the union was “headed to D.C. this week to meet with lawmakers on the Hill from both parties. We have instructed our members to contact their federal lawmakers in the House and Senate for several weeks now.”

    The U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Neil Bradley said Biden was correct in advocating for the deal already reached. “Congress must do what it has done 18 times before: intervene against a national rail strike,” Bradley said in a statement, and he called Congress enforcing the deal agreed to by railroads and union leaders the “only path to avoid crippling strike.”

    The railroads, which include Union Pacific, BNSF, Norfolk Southern, CSX and Kansas City Southern, wanted any deal to closely follow the recommendations a special board of arbitrators that Biden appointed made this summer that called for the 24% raises and $5,000 in bonuses but didn’t resolve workers’ concerns about demanding schedules that make it hard to take a day off and other working conditions. That’s what Biden is calling on Congress to impose.

    ———

    Associated Press writer Colleen Long in Washington contributed to this report.

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  • More than 150 agents back striking HarperCollins workers

    More than 150 agents back striking HarperCollins workers

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    NEW YORK — More than 150 literary agents, whose clients include Danielle Jackson, V.E. Schwab and L.A. Chandlar, have signed an open letter to HarperCollins vowing to “omit” the publisher from upcoming book submissions until it reaches an agreement with striking employees.

    Around 250 entry- and mid-level staff members, from publicists to editorial assistants, have been on strike since Nov. 10, with the two sides differing over wages, workforce diversity and other issues that have become increasingly prominent across the industry. No new talks are scheduled.

    “While many consider publishing to be a labor of love, we agents know how quickly that labor can lead to burnout, tension, missed opportunities for advancement, and mistakes,” the letter reads in part.

    “This generation of rising publishing professionals must contend with student loan debt, the rising cost of living, and the barriers inherent in working long hours without adequate compensation. These employees, many of whom bring with them the diverse viewpoints our industry lacks, have been essential to the production of the books we are so proud of.”

    Agents endorsing the letter come from Janklow & Nesbit Associates, Aevitas Creative Management, Root Literary and other firms. The letter was organized by Chelsea Hensley of the KT Literary Agency, who noted that the effort comes during a traditionally slow time of year for deal making.

    “I wanted them (HarperCollins) to know that even if they don’t think they’re seeing the effects of the strike now, they’ll definitely be seeing it come January, which is when agents will have the most new projects to share,” Hensley told The Associated Press.

    HarperCollins is the only major New York publisher with a union; striking employees are members of Local 2110 of the United Auto Workers. A spokesperson for the publisher did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

    “HarperCollins has agreed to a number of proposals that the United Auto Workers Union is seeking to include in a new contract,” according to a statement released Monday by the publisher. We are disappointed an agreement has not been reached and will continue to negotiate in good faith.”

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  • Railway workers in Austria to strike Monday in pay standoff

    Railway workers in Austria to strike Monday in pay standoff

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    BERLIN — Railway workers in Austria are set to hold a one-day strike on Monday after a failed round of talks in pay negotiations.

    The Austria Press Agency reported Sunday that both sides said the fifth round of talks on pay for some 50,000 employees of about 65 railway operators, including the main national operator OeBB, had failed.

    That means that there will be no regional, long-distance or night trains on Monday, and that only buses and other public transport run by municipal authorities will run.

    Labor union vida has called for an extra 400 euros ($416) per month for railway employees, which it says is equivalent to an average 12% increase.

    Employers have said that would amount to a 13.3% raise and is too much. OeBB said employers were offering an 8.44% increase and strongly criticized the strike.

    Like many other countries, Austria has seen inflation surge this year following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The country’s annual inflation rate hit 11% in October.

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  • UK lecturers, teachers join postal workers in strikes

    UK lecturers, teachers join postal workers in strikes

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    LONDON — Thousands of postal workers, university lecturers and schoolteachers in the U.K. were going on strike on Thursday to demand better pay and working conditions amid the country’s cost-of-living crisis.

    Picket lines will be set up outside postal offices, universities and schools in one of the biggest co-ordinated walkouts this year.

    Britons have faced travel misery and overflowing garbage bins in recent months as unions representing multiple industries launched successive strikes. Lawyers, nurses, posties and many others have walked out of their jobs to seek pay rises that match soaring inflation. Domestic energy bills and food costs have skyrocketed this year, driving inflation to a 41-year high of 11.1% in October.

    In Scotland, most schools will close Thursday as teachers there take the first large-scale strike action in decades.

    In universities, some 70,000 academic staff will strike on Thursday and again on Nov. 30 in the biggest action of its kind in higher education. The action will affect an estimated 2.5 million students.

    Meanwhile, workers at the Royal Mail will walk out on Thursday and again on Black Friday and Christmas Eve.

    The latest walkouts come after the Rail, Maritime and Transport union announced Tuesday that more than 40,000 rail workers will stage fresh strikes in December and January, disrupting travel for scores of people during the busy festive season. The union said members will walk out for four days from Dec. 13 and in the first week of January.

    Pubs, bars and other hospitality businesses have expressed dismay at the latest train strike announcement.

    “Continued rail strikes have had a huge impact on our hospitality sector; preventing staff from making it into work and disrupting consumers’ plans, meaning a huge drop in sales for venues across the sector,” said Kate Nicholls, chief executive for the UKHospitality trade body.

    “Further strikes during the busiest time of the year for hospitality will be devastating, just as everyone was anticipating an uninterrupted Christmas period for the first time in three years,” she added.

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  • Foxconn apologizes for pay dispute at China factory

    Foxconn apologizes for pay dispute at China factory

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    BEIJING — The company that assembles Apple Inc.’s iPhones apologized Thursday for what it said was a technical error that led to protests by employees over payment of wages offered to attract them to a factory that is under anti-virus restrictions.

    Protests erupted Tuesday in the central city of Zhengzhou after employees complained Foxconn Technology Group required they do extra work to receive the higher pay promised by recruiters. Foxconn is trying to rebuild its workforce after thousands of employees walked out last month over complaints about unsafe conditions.

    Videos on social media showed police in white protective suits kicking and clubbing protesting workers.

    Foxconn, the biggest contract assembler of smartphones and other electronics for Apple and other global brands, blamed the dispute on a “technical error” in the process of adding new employees. It promised they would receive the wages they were promised.

    “We apologize for an input error in the computer system and guarantee that the actual pay is the same as agreed and the official recruitment posters,” said a company statement. It promised to “try its best to actively solve the concerns and reasonable demands of employees.”

    The dispute comes as the ruling Communist Party tries to contain a surge in coronavirus cases without shutting down factories, as it did in 2020 at the start of the pandemic. Its tactics include “closed-loop management,” or having employees live at their workplaces without outside contact.

    Authorities promised last month to reduce economic disruptions by cutting quarantine times and making other changes to China’s “zero-COVID” strategy, which aims to isolate every case. Despite that, the infection surge has prompted authorities to suspend access to neighborhoods and factories and to close office buildings, shops and restaurants in parts of many cities.

    On Thursday, people in eight districts of Zhengzhou with a total of 6.6 million residents were told to stay home for five days. Daily mass testing was ordered in what the city government called a “war of annihilation” against the virus.

    Apple earlier warned iPhone 14 deliveries would be delayed after employees walked out of the Zhengzhou factory and access to the industrial zone around the facility was suspended following outbreaks.

    To attract new workers, Foxconn offered 25,000 yuan ($3,500) for two months of work, according to employees, or almost 50% more than news reports say its highest wages usually are.

    Employees complained that after they arrived, they were told they had to work an additional two months at lower pay to received the higher wage, according to an employee, Li Sanshan.

    Foxconn offered up to 10,000 yuan ($1,400) to new hires who choose to leave, the finance news outlet Cailianshe reported, citing unidentified recruiting agents.

    Foxconn’s statement Thursday said employees who leave will receive unspecified “care subsidies” but gave no details. It promised “comprehensive support” for those who stay.

    The protests in Zhengzhou come amid public frustration over restrictions that have confined millions of people to their homes. Videos on social media show residents in some areas tearing down barricades set up to enforce neighborhood closures.

    Foxconn, headquartered in New Taipei City, Taiwan, earlier denied what it said were comments online that employees with the virus lived in factory dormitories.

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  • Workers protest, beaten at virus-hit Chinese iPhone factory

    Workers protest, beaten at virus-hit Chinese iPhone factory

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    BEIJING — Employees at the world’s biggest Apple iPhone factory were beaten and detained in protests over contract disputes amid anti-virus controls, according to witnesses and videos on social media Wednesday, as tensions mount over Beijing’s severe coronavirus strategy.

    Videos that said they were filmed at the factory in the central city of Zhengzhou showed thousands of people in masks facing rows of police in white protective suits with plastic riot shields. Police kicked and hit a protester with clubs after he grabbed a metal pole that had been used to strike him.

    Frustration with restrictions in areas throughout China that have closed shops and offices and confined millions of people to their homes for weeks at a time with little warning have boiled over into protests in some areas. Videos on social media show residents in some areas tearing down barricades set up to enforce neighborhood closures.

    Last month, thousands of employees walked out of the iPhone factory operated by Taiwan’s Foxconn Technology Group over complaints about unsafe working conditions following virus cases in the facility.

    A protest erupted Tuesday over complaints Foxconn changed conditions for new workers who were attracted by offers of higher pay, according to Li Sanshan, an employee.

    Li said he quit a catering job in response to advertising that promised 25,000 yuan ($3,500) for two months of work. Li, 28, said workers were angry after being told they had to work two additional months at lower pay to receive the 25,000 yuan.

    “Foxconn released very tempting recruiting offers, and workers from all parts of the country came, only to find they were being made fools of,” Li said.

    The ruling Communist Party promised this month to try to reduce disruption by shortening required quarantines and making other changes. But the party says it will stick to its “zero-COVID” strategy that aims to isolate every case at a time when other governments are relaxing travel and other restrictions and trying to live with the virus.

    Protests have flared as the number and severity of outbreaks has risen across China, including in Beijing. This week, authorities reported the country’s first COVID-19 deaths in six months.

    More than 253,000 cases have been found in the past three weeks and the daily average is increasing, the government reported Tuesday. Local leaders have responded by closing neighborhoods and imposing other restrictions that residents complain go beyond what the national government allows.

    On Wednesday, the government reported 28,883 cases found over the past 24 hours, including 26,242 with no symptoms. Henan province, where Zhengzhou is the capital, reported 851 in total.

    The government will enforce its anti-COVID policy while “resolutely overcoming the mindset of paralysis and laxity,” said a spokesman for the National Health Commission, Mi Feng.

    The capital, Beijing, has closed shops, restaurants, office buildings and some apartment compounds.

    Shanghai and the southern city of Nanchang banned people from outside the city from visiting public venues for five days after arrival.

    Foxconn said earlier the Zhengzhou factory uses “closed-loop management,” which means employees live at their workplace with no outside contact.

    The protest lasted through Wednesday morning as thousands of workers gathered outside dormitories and confronted factory security workers, according to Li.

    Other videos showed protesters spraying fire extinguishers toward police.

    A man who identified himself as the Communist Party secretary in charge of community services was shown in a video posted on the Sina Weibo social media platform urging protesters to withdraw. He assured them their demands would be met.

    Apple Inc. has warned deliveries of its new iPhone 14 model would be delayed due to anti-disease controls on the factory. The city government suspended access to an industrial zone that surrounds the factory, which Foxconn has said employs 200,000 people.

    Foxconn, headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan, didn’t respond to requests for information about the situation.

    New reports earlier said the ruling party ordered “grassroots cadres” to fill in for Foxconn employees in Zhengzhou who left. The company didn’t respond to requests for confirmation and details about that arrangement.

    ———

    Zen Soo reported from Hong Kong. AP news assistant Caroline Chen contributed.

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  • Consumers could pay price if railroads, unions can’t agree

    Consumers could pay price if railroads, unions can’t agree

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    OMAHA, Neb. — Consumers could see higher gas prices and shortages of some of their favorite groceries during the winter holiday season if railroads and all of their unions can’t agree on new contracts by an early-December deadline that had already been pushed back.

    The likelihood of a strike that would paralyze the nation’s rail traffic grew on Monday when the largest of the 12 rail unions, which represents mostly conductors, rejected management’s latest offering that included 24% raises and $5,000 in bonuses. With four of the 12 unions that represent half of the 115,000 rail workers holding out for a better deal, it might fall to Congress to impose one to protect the U.S. economy.

    The Retail Industry Leaders Association said a rail strike “would cause enormous disruption” although retail stores are well stocked for the crucial holiday shopping season. It’s not clear what a strike would mean for packages because FedEx and UPS, which both rely on rail to some degree, haven’t commented in detail.

    “Fortunately, this year’s holiday gifts have already landed on store shelves. But an interruption to rail transportation does pose a significant challenge to getting items like perishable food products and e-commerce shipments delivered on time, and it will undoubtedly add to the inflationary pressures already hitting the U.S. economy,” said Jess Dankert with the group that represents more than 200 major retailers.

    Even getting close to the deadline could cause problems because railroads will freeze shipments of dangerous chemicals and perishable goods ahead of time. And commuters could be stranded if there is a strike because so many passenger railroads operate on tracks owned by the freight railroads.

    Just about every industry could be affected because so many businesses need railroads to deliver their raw materials and completed products, and there aren’t enough trucks to pick up the slack.

    Tom Madrecki with the Consumer Brands Association said a rail strike “would effectively bring hundreds of America’s largest food, beverage, household and personal care manufacturing operations to a halt in a matter of days as inputs and ingredients run out. On-shelf availability and accessibility will quickly drop, compounded by almost inevitable panic buying.”

    There’s no immediate threat of a strike even though four unions have rejected deals the Biden administration helped broker before the original strike deadline in September. Those unions agreed to try to hash out a contract before a new Dec. 5 strike deadline. But those talks have deadlocked because the railroads refuse to add paid sick time to what they’ve already offered.

    Railroad engineers voted Monday to join seven smaller unions in approving the deal, but conductors’ union rejected its contract, joining three unions that previously voted no.

    It appears increasingly likely that Congress will have to settle the dispute. Lawmakers have the power to impose contract terms, and hundreds of business groups have urged Congress and President Joe Biden to be ready to intervene.

    White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre reiterated to reporters on Monday that Biden believes “a shutdown is unacceptable” but that “the best option is still for the parties to resolve this themselves.”

    Workers frustrated with the demanding schedules and deep job cuts in the industry pushed to reject these contracts because they wouldn’t do enough to resolve their quality-of-life concerns. The deals for the engineers and conductors did include a promise to improve the scheduling of regular days off and negotiate the details of those schedules further at each railroad. Those two unions also received three unpaid days off a year to tend to medical needs as long they were scheduled at least 30 days in advance and the railroads said they wouldn’t penalize workers who were hospitalized.

    The railroads also lost out on their bid to cut crew sizes to one person as part of the negotiations. But the conductors in the Transportation Division of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers union still narrowly rejected the deal. A small division of the SMART-TD union did approve it.

    “The ball is now in the railroads’ court. Let’s see what they do. They can settle this at the bargaining table,” SMART-TD President Jeremy Ferguson said. “But, the railroad executives who constantly complain about government interference and regularly bad-mouth regulators and Congress now want Congress to do the bargaining for them.”

    Dennis Pierce, the president of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen union, said the deal engineers ratified should help improve working conditions somewhat, but that the railroads must address workers’ frustrations, especially after they cut nearly one-third of their jobs over the past six years as they overhauled their operations.

    “When you’ve got to offer $20,000 to get somebody to go to work for the railroad in Lincoln, Nebraska, you’ve got a problem. People used to stand in line there,” Pierce said. “The reason for that is the word is out that if you go to work here, you’re not going to ever see your family.”

    The railroads maintain that the deals with the unions should closely follow the recommendations made this summer by a special panel of arbitrators Biden appointed. That’s part of the reason why they don’t want to offer paid sick time. Plus, the railroads say the unions have agreed over the years to forgo paid sick time in favor of higher pay and strong short-term disability benefits.

    The unions say it is long overdue for the railroads to offer paid sick time and that the pandemic highlighted the need for it.

    The group that negotiates on behalf of the railroads that include Union Pacific, Norfolk Southern, BNSF, Kansas City Southern and CSX said Monday that the unions that rejected their deals shouldn’t expect to receive more than the Presidential Emergency Board of arbitrators recommended.

    It’s unclear what Congress might do given the deep political divisions in Washington D.C. and a single lawmaker could hold up a resolution. But the head of the Association of American Railroads trade group, Ian Jefferies, said “if the remaining unions do not accept an agreement, Congress should be prepared to act and avoid a disastrous $2 billion a day hit to our economy.”

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  • Judge orders Amazon to stop retaliations against organizers

    Judge orders Amazon to stop retaliations against organizers

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    NEW YORK — A federal judge has ordered Amazon to stop retaliating against employees engaged in workplace activism, issuing a mixed ruling that also hands a loss to the federal labor agency that sued the company earlier this year.

    The ruling came in a court case brought by the National Labor Relations Board, which sued Amazon in March seeking the reinstatement of a fired employee who was involved in organizing a company warehouse on Staten Island, New York.

    In its lawsuit, the agency argued Amazon’s termination of the former employee, Gerald Bryson, was unlawful and would have a chilling effect on organizing. It said that not reinstating Bryson to his role would make workers think the agency would not be able to protect their labor rights under federal law.

    On Friday, U.S. District Judge Diane Gujarati ruled there was “reasonable cause” to believe the e-commerce giant committed an unfair labor practice by firing Bryson. She issued a cease-and-desist order directing the Seattle-based company to not retaliate against employees involved in workplace activism.

    But Gujarati denied the agency’s request to reinstate Bryson. She determined that the NLRB did not present evidence that Bryson’s termination is having considerable effect on organizing efforts by employees or the Amazon Labor Union, the nascent group in connection to Bryson that ultimately pulled off the first-ever labor win at an Amazon warehouse in the U.S. in March.

    In her ruling, Gujarati also noted Bryson was fired before the union was formed, which makes it different from other cases where a slowdown of organizing support was shown after the firing of a union activist.

    Bryson was fired in April 2020, weeks after participating in a protest over working conditions during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. While off the job during a second protest, he got into a dispute with another employee. Amazon did its own investigation into the dispute and cited a violation of the company’s vulgar-language policy for terminating Bryson. The company denies the firing was connected to organizing activities.

    Shortly after Bryson was fired, he filed a complaint with the NLRB. An administrative law judge concluded earlier this year the company pursued a “skewed investigation” into the dispute designed to blame Bryson. Amazon has said it would appeal that ruling in the NLRB’s own administrative process. Friday’s court ruling came from a separate federal case filed by the agency, which doesn’t have enforcement powers.

    On Friday, Gujarati ordered Amazon to post English and Spanish copies of the court order at the Staten Island facility that voted to unionize. She also ordered the company distribute electronic copies to employees and hold a mandatory meeting where the order can be read aloud.

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  • Ohio’s Intel project triggers housing fears in tight market

    Ohio’s Intel project triggers housing fears in tight market

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    COLUMBUS, Ohio — Intel’s announcement earlier this year of a $20 billion manufacturing operation bringing thousands of jobs to rural Ohio was greeted as an economic boon.

    But behind that enthusiasm lurked a pressing question.

    “Where are we putting everybody?” asked Melissa Humbert-Washington, vice president of programs and services at Homes for Families, which helps low-wage workers find housing in a region already suffering a major shortage.

    Intel says its initial two computer chip factories will employ 3,000 people when the operation is up and running in 2025. The project is also expected to employ 7,000 construction workers. And none of that includes the hundreds of additional jobs as Intel suppliers move in, along with the expected boom in the service sector.

    Such housing challenges are playing out across the country as companies increasingly come under fire for failing to consider the shelter needs of their new employees or the impact big developments will have on already tight housing markets.

    Experts agree that years of underbuilding dating to the Great Recession of 2008 has caused widespread housing shortages. Nationally, the country is short about 1 million homes, according to Rob Dietz, senior economist at the National Association of Home Builders. The National Apartment Association estimates a rental shortage of about 600,000 units.

    “We have underbuilt housing by millions of homes over the past 15 years,” said Dennis Shea, executive director of the J. Ronald Terwilliger Center for Housing Policy. “So when a big company comes into a community that is supply constrained, the demand that they’re going to inject … is going to affect home prices and rental prices because there’s more demand than supply.”

    For a big company’s impact on housing, look no farther than Intel’s own operations in Chandler, Arizona, which grew from a small agricultural city of about 30,000 in 1980 when the company built its first factory to a high-tech metropolis of 220,000 today. That was accompanied by tremendous housing growth, and today Chandler is running out of developable land, with nearly 95% of the area built out with residential, office, industrial and retail projects, according to the Greater Phoenix Economic Council.

    Housing is also more expensive in Chandler, with a median home sale price of $525,000 compared to $455,000 in greater Phoenix, and median rents of $2,027 compared to $1,950 in Phoenix.

    The challenge for areas like rural Ohio is that they don’t have local employees to build or staff a large project, said Mark Stapp, director of the Center for Real Estate Theory and Practice at Arizona State University. There’s neither the housing nor the infrastructure to accommodate the thousands of new arrivals, increasing housing prices and possibly forcing existing residents out.

    “It’s economic development. It’s going to employ people. But you are probably going to have to bring a lot of people into the area,” he said. And “those jobs require housing.”

    “If you don’t recognize that and don’t properly plan infrastructure, land use policies and manage that growth, it can be a big problem. The great opportunity turns into a big problem.”

    In central Ohio, the Intel site is rising on hundreds of acres of rural land once occupied by farm fields and modest homes where large business parks have also sprung up near major thoroughfares. The region has averaged about 8,200 building permits per year for both single-family and multi-unit buildings, even as job and population growth estimates predating the Intel project called for more than twice that, according to the Building Industry Association of Central Ohio.

    “We’re not building enough of anything,” said the group’s executive director Jon Melchi. Central Ohio, with about 2.4 million residents today, will grow to at least 3 million by 2050, the group said.

    The central Ohio shortage includes the “missing middle” of workforce housing, or homes up to $250,000, said Tre’ Giller, CEO and president of Metro Development, one of Ohio’s largest apartment developers. A recent Zillow search showed only about 570 listings for homes $250,000 or less in the area.

    The housing pressure is especially intense for low-wage workers. Central Ohio already has about 71,000 households considered “severely rent burdened” — families spending more than half their income on housing, said the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing in Ohio. The region has only 34 affordable units available for every 100 low-rent households, it said.

    The problem is even more severe in Licking County, home to the future Intel plants, where more than one in five renters are considered severely rent burdened.

    Affordable housing is crucial for the low-wage workers who keep the economy running, from pre-school teachers to medical assistants, said COHIO executive director Amy Riegel. But housing also has to be viewed on a spectrum: Without enough higher-end properties to purchase, buyers will snap up rentals, which then shuts out workers of limited means.

    “Housing is definitely an ecosystem,” Riegel said. “If you add housing at one end, and don’t take care of the other end, it has an impact and a ripple effect through the whole system.”

    On the Nov. 8 ballot, Columbus voters approved a $200 million bond issue aimed at increasing the city’s affordable housing stock for homeowners earning less than $50,000 annually. “We simply do not have enough places for people to live,” Mayor Andrew Ginther said in announcing the issue in July.

    Janna Sharrett is grateful for her apartment in an affordable housing complex in suburban Columbus as the region braces for Intel’s arrival and its real estate impact. The 60-year-old customer service rep works from home and earns just $14.94 an hour. Her rent on the one-bedroom apartment she shares with her dog, Bella, and cat, Daisy, is $695.

    The $6.5 million, 28-unit building where Sharrett lives was developed by Homeport, a Columbus-based nonprofit that works to expand affordable housing. Sharrett moved in two years ago seeking relief from a $1,000 rent payment, and today isn’t sure what she’d do without it.

    She worries about the needs of people like herself as the region grows through projects such as Intel.

    “Rent is outrageous. Prices of homes are outrageous. And my income is not outrageous,” Sharrett said.

    Across the country, a growing number of companies are responding to housing concerns by rolling out ambitious plans for thousands of units of new housing — though efforts fall far short of actual needs.

    In 2021, Amazon launched its $2 billion Housing Equity Fund to create over 8,000 affordable homes across three regions where it operates: the Puget Sound in Washington state; Arlington, Virginia, and Nashville, Tennessee.

    In 2019, Apple said it would commit $2.5 billion toward easing California’s housing crisis, one of a number of initiatives by high tech companies. This month Walt Disney World picked a developer to construct affordable housing on 80 acres of its land in Orange County, Florida.

    Intel, too, looks forward to partnering with Ohio community leaders to prepare for the increased housing demand over the next few years, said Intel spokesperson Linda Qian, without providing details.

    Experts say it’s in Intel’s best interest to contribute toward alleviating the region’s housing shortage. Employers in greater Columbus already blame high worker turnover and reduced productivity on long commute times, according to a report by the Affordable Housing Alliance of Central Ohio.

    “Without the housing product it can easily stifle the workforce needs of Intel and others,” said Jamie Green, a Columbus-based planning consultant.

    As the Intel project unfolds, it highlights the challenges ahead, said Leah Evans, president and CEO of Homeport, which developed Sharrett’s affordable apartment complex.

    “This just brought to light that for every one job you create, you’ve got a commute and you’ve got a housing unit” need, Evans said. “You have to be thinking about all those things.”

    ———

    Michael Casey in Boston contributed to this report.

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