Economic Meltdown

  • March 4 Day of Action Ripples Through California and Beyond
    Paul Abowd
    Mar 5 2010 - 12:04pm

    Walkouts, student strikes, and marches shook every level of California’s embattled public education system on March 4. College students and campus workers joined forces with K-12 teachers and students for the day of action.

  • California Activists Set for Day of Action to Defend Public Education
    Marcel Paret
    Mar 3 2010 - 11:00am

    Sights are set on a March 4 Strike and Day of Action to resist business as usual: layoffs, fee hikes, and program cuts in a call for expanded federal education funding, open admissions, and democratic schools.

  • Budget Woes Prompt Privatization Fights in Public Transit
    Evan Rohar
    Mar 1 2010 - 4:00pm

    As budget-butchering legislators and executives slash away at public services and public workers, they’re reaching for a familiar tactic: privatization. Bus drivers at UC Berkeley have led the push back, scoring a victory against outsourcing in late February.

  • A Pattern of Retreat: The Decline of Pattern Bargaining
    Kim Moody
    Feb 16 2010 - 10:02am
    The age-old goal of unions has been to “take wages out of competition.” But after a 30-year employer onslaught, national pattern bargaining has been largely devastated or has become a top-down conduit for concessions.
  • After Bankruptcy and Concessions at Telecom Firm, Communications Workers Push to Prevent a Repeat
    by Mischa Gaus
    Feb 3 2010 - 4:52pm

    What happens when a guppy swallows a whale? In telecom, it’s meant service problems, then bankruptcy—which spells concessions for workers.

  • Hospitals Ravaged by Recession Pile More Work on Staff
    Mischa Gaus
    Feb 3 2010 - 11:38am

    Hospital work is thought to be recession-proof. No matter what the economy, people get sick and need care. The work is there, but at a cost: hospital workers and researchers say some hospitals are churning through a round of reorganization, strapping on more work, skimping on training, and trying to stuff contract concessions through.

  • The View from Ontario, 137 Days into a Mine Strike
    Yannick Rivard
    Nov 26 2009 - 12:14pm

    Emotions are running high as the strike at Vale Inco’s mines closes in on the six-month mark. Strikers are fighting the profitable company's attempt to use the economic crisis to shift power.

  • Classical Musicians Get Their Penguin Suits Dirty
    Barbara Zmich
    Nov 9 2009 - 1:16am

    The on-stage evening dress worn by musicians in unionized symphonies may be more frayed than it looks from far away. Musicians are banding together in a recession that's putting orchestras and union contracts under fire.

  • Harvard Workers Fight Layoffs
    Joshua Koritz
    Nov 1 2009 - 1:05am
    ** Print only

    In spite of a massive endowment—still valued at $26 billion despite the stock-market slide—Harvard has laid off between 200 and 500 clerical, technical, and janitorial workers, many of them union members. The school is hinting at another round of layoffs this winter.

  • University Labor Education Programs Under Fire in Economic Crisis
    Bob Bussel and Paul Abowd
    Oct 24 2009 - 1:11am
    ** Print only

    The corporate attack on workers is reaching into the academy, too, where labor studies programs are facing cutbacks or wholesale cancellation. They’re being targeted by anti-labor ideologues and by budget-cutting administrators, but they’re not giving up easily.