Category: labor unions

Hill Democrats Push to Allow Congressional Staff to Unionize

House Democrats, led by Rep. Andy Levin of Michigan, are pushing a proposal to enable congressional aides to form collective bargaining unions, like those that represent nearly half of the federal government’s 2.1 million career civil servants. “In a matter of days, 130 of my colleagues have joined me to say we could not serve…


Ineligible Unions Collected Nearly $37 Million in Federal COVID-19 Relief: Report

Labor unions and related organizations took in $36.7 million in federal taxpayer funds through the Paycheck Protection Program for which they were legally ineligible, according to a new report from the Freedom Foundation. Legislation creating the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) was signed by President Donald Trump on March 27, 2020, as part of the Coronavirus…


Starbucks Employees Vote to Form Union, the First in Company History

Starbucks workers in three locations in Buffalo, New York, have voted on Dec. 9 to unionize, the first U.S. stores to be represented by a union in the company’s 50-year history. This comes after the majority of ballots counted by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) from among the 100 Starbucks workers eligible to vote were…


4 NYC Labor Unions Agree to Drop Lawsuit on City’s Vaccine Mandate

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the city government reached an agreement with four labor unions over its COVID-19 vaccine mandate for city employees. The unions as part of the deal agreed to withdraw a lawsuit they filed last month challenging the city’s right to implement the vaccine mandate. The agreement includes handling of…


Government of the Unions, by the Unions, for the Unions

Commentary President Joe Biden keeps boasting that all the new jobs his programs will supposedly create will be “good-paying union jobs.” But, Joe, what about the 93 percent of private sector workers who are not members of unions? Does he care about them? The Labor Department reports that in America today, 6.3 percent of all…


Biden Offers Remarks on Labor Unions

President Joe Biden gave remarks Wednesday in the East Room of the White House to honor labor unions, two days after spending his first Labor Day as president. In his speech, Biden recounted past labor movement victories like the eight-hour workday and weekends. “Unions built the middle class,” he told the room of mostly labor…


The Economics and Politics of the Pro-Union Protecting the Right to Organize Act

Commentary For many decades now, the percentage of private-sector American workers who belong to a labor union has been declining. According to a Hoover Institution study by Richard A. Epstein, the percentage of unionized workers in the private sector has fallen from nearly 20 percent in 1983 to 6.2 percent in 2019. Attempts by union…


How Biden’s Favored Unions Could Get Jammed in His Infrastructure Traffic

President Biden repeatedly insists that his infrastructure plan will create millions of jobs and labor unions will be the big winners. But interviews with economists, union leaders, government officials and trade groups as well as basic math suggest otherwise. The once-dominant trade and construction unions no longer have enough members outside of their strongholds on…


Labor Unions Would Rake in $9 Billion More From Dues If PRO Act Is Passed: Report

Total labor union dues collection would increase by $9 billion if a pro-union bill in Congress was signed into law, according to an industry report. The Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act would substantially increase union membership and therefore cause higher dues collection, according to the Institute for the American Worker (IAW) report released…


Qantas Workers’ High Court Sick Leave Bid

Qantas workers who have been stood down during the COVID-19 pandemic are taking their fight for sick leave to the nation’s highest court. A Federal Court appeals bench rejected their claim in November, saying that because the employees were not working there was nothing to take leave from. Qantas won an earlier Federal Court case…