Union Perspectives

The last bastion of organize labor is now on the west and east coasts, like New York City, Seattle, and Los Angeles. Labor has mostly given up on the south and the middle of the U.S., is that because unions aren’t up to the fight? We have lost Detroit, Michigan and Wisconsin, which was the start of public unions. These GOP government control states, like govenors Synder and Pence have kicked our union butts. In California, labor has lost all of the rural counties, Orange and San Diego counties; and now San Francisco, Sacramento and Los Angeles counties are our last strong holds. It would not take a lot to lose California. California has elected GOP governors before and with our new federal government now in place and with the Koch brothers, et al, and their money it could be done again. We, union workers, could lose it all. They have started on teachers’ union and they are still trying to break the postal workers union by forcing the pension funds to be funded 75 years ahead of pay...

The world financial wealth is $95.5 trillion. This is the cash that keeps the capitalist system running now, what happens when there is 8 percent or $7.6 trillion missing? This is money, which is not circulating in the system, such as wages paid or being spent on durable goods that would need to replaced eventually, stoves, or washers and dryers. It is just a loss to all except the hoarders of the $7.6 trillion. To make matters worse, there is also $190 billion lost in taxes worldwide, $35 billion just in the U.S. and this is money that has to be made whole by the 47 percent. Once again, cash taken out of the capitalist system in ways like pay for our federal, state, county and city government workers, law enforcement, firefighters, infrastructure, schools, colleges, and renewable energy exploration. All would make for good jobs we need, but with no cash no jobs can be created. Our taxes are making up for what these thieves are hiding in other countries. Their excuse is that it’s not i...

In a small town in San Francisco’s East Bay, the 22,000 workers, 2,227 of who are minimum wage workers, received a bump in pay. Emeryville, CA, is home to the highest minimum wage in the county at $15 an hour. Emeryville’s wage hike went to $14.44 overnight where Los Angeles’ $15 will make an appearance in 2020. Seattle’s wage hike to $15 is also being slow walked to 2017, but the genie is out of the bottle and the workers have gotten a taste of what a living wage can afford them and others see their gains and now know it can be done—done without having their wages slow walked. Now eight cities in San Francisco's South Bay are contemplating raising its minimum wage. What some of the wage slaves, who make more than $15 an hour, don’t understand is when the people earning $9 an hour wage that goes to $15 it will push all other wages up, and they probably will not even after ask for as raise. Case in point, dishwashers now make $15 an hour and then the cook, who has always made $15 t...

Why do wins and gains for the wage slaves turn into losses? To understand this one only has to look back to the old International Workers of the World (IWW) and the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) and countries like Ukraine and the Arab Spring. The old IWW used the soapbox approach on street corners to arouse exploited workers to a spectacular and sudden fight for free speech, higher wages. And for ten years they had wins, but then failed to hold their membership. Just like the IWW, OWS also had wins in getting the 99 percent fired up over wages, Wall Street greed and they had cell phones all over the U.S. to motivate people, but again OWS failed to hold the people together. Even countries like Ukraine who fought a hell of a fight and changed its government, and now it is in trouble as it careens toward a civil war. The Arab Spring, which again changed its government, but now are in trouble. Why is it these groups didn’t plan or ever think about what they will do when or if they win, like put...

The fight for $15 to $18 and the inequality has caught the corporations by surprised. The corporate heads had control of their people for so long with low wages and their in-house anti-union propaganda that the corporations underestimated the wage slaves’ resolve to climb out of poverty and demand their civil rights for a good livable wage, healthcare and a pension. With public opinion supporting the workers and public opinion against fast food and box stores corporations, the corporate heads are starting to throw crumbs to the workers trying to lead the workers into complacency, but it is not working as workers are seeing through these sad tactics. Understand that the only reason for the crumbs is the bad press the corporations are getting and that is having a direct impact on their profits. This is another example of the power of networking on social media. There is no reason for wage slaves to slow down their protests or their fight. When the enemy is in retreat and the workers are ...

The slow walking of the $15 to $18 an hour minimum wage and the free state college up to the bachelor’s level (as what Starbucks wants its new hires to have), but at least corporations in the U.S. is walking very slowly, which just goes to show that it is possible to win higher wages and free higher education. But we need to accelerate the pace before the money people turn public opinion against the movement by giving inch by inch until they see that the momentum is turning toward them. So when we get a little relief in wages the wage slaves should not think of it as a win, but look at it as a stalling tactic to slow down the fight for $15 to $18. Remember anything less than $15 is a loser for most low wage stand along workers for $8 through $12, probably will reduce or disqualify you from any kind of government assistance, such as food stamps or healthcare. The minimum to help in the inequality has to be at least $15 to $18. Now, for college tuition, look at where the ever increasin...

On April 15, there will be the largest protest for the Fight for $15. The protest by fast food and retail workers will stage what organizers say will be the largest low-wage worker protest in modern history. The planned rallies, to be held nationwide (and should be worldwide) will be part of the ongoing movement of wage slaves demanding $15 a hour living wage, which should be $18 to $24 had it kept up with inflation, and the right to form a union. At a time when corporate profits are higher than ever before and productivity is at an all-time high, wage slaves are asking why their wages are stagnate, especially in the fast food and retail industries. One reason is that they have no union, and second they have not asked or forced the corporations to pay more and the corporations never will raise wages or provide benefits unless forced to do so. The April 15 tax-day strike, the Fightfor$15, will be backed by the Service Employees International Union. The movement has already won victories...

Organizers of unions must look at new ways to organize new members for nothing stays the same and trying to do and use the same methods that no longer work is the definition of insanity. Organizers have depended on the National Labor Relation Board (NLRB) laws to give workers the right to unionize and protect then, but using the NLRB as a fortress to protest will not work today. In any fortress there will sooner or later be destroyed either by being overrun or by just poking holes into it and making it no longer defensible without upgrades, like new, stronger laws. The NLRB is dying so organizers must change their tactics. The SEIU, between 1995 and 1999, unionized 74,000 home healthcare workers in Los Angeles. The labor movement will be in low wage employees working toward $15 to $18 an hour minimum wage plus benefits. The once powerful trade and industrial labor unions, which built the middle class, are no longer able to protect the interests of the American workers and this also is...

The stock market is close to a never before high of 17,000. Wall Street still will not support Main Street’s minimum wage increase, which should be even higher than the $15 to $18 than advocated and now some say should be more like $22 an hour if the minimum had kept up with inflation. Never the less, it is now been shown the need by workers and businesses that there has to be cash in the pockets of the spenders to save the capitalist consumer society. The Stock holders of large corporations should be the ones pushing their CEOs (chief executive officers) to raise the workers’ wages, especially when their wages are so high that they border on obscene. What is it with these CEO thinking they deserve such high compensation while others, the ones who do the work, are being paid chump change? Are these CEOs so greedy and heartless that they turn a blind’s eye to the suffering of others? Do they really think they are the only ones entitled to the good life? They don’t feel the pain the re...

In all wars the battles decide who wins so you must win the most battles and the most important ones and the battle to unite the working class against the divide and rule strategies of the capitalist class upon which their domination rest. It is a battle the wage slaves must win. If you don’t fight, you don’t win—period. If someone you know doesn’t understand why the minimum wage needs to raise, wait until the end of the month and then ask again. The cost of everything is going up; some of the costs are understandable, but some are not and corporations are using any excuse to raise prices, but not workers’ wages. How the hell are we supposed to survive> The employers try to turn workers who are black, female, gay, Mexican, or immigrant into scapegoats as distraction for the lack of good jobs creation along with the strategies the oligarchies blame Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act and the minimum wage, but the minimum wage raises are coming and the spending power of the toilers w...

The best chance for wage slaves to prevail in their fight for higher wages can be found in the tireless work of two women: Kshama Sawant in Seattle, WA, and Marilule Wili in Switzerland. Sawant is a Seattle city council member and Wili is a waitress and musician and a member of the organization, Generation Basic Income, an activist group trying to persuade voters to amend Switzerland’s Constitution to guarantee every citizen a yearly income of $33,000 a year whether they work or not. They have gotten the necessary 100,000 signatures to place the initiative on the ballot to put it before the country’s voters. The vote will be in two or three years. Philosophically, the idea of equality has a long history drawing support from the likes of the English/American revolutionary Thomas Paine and economist Milton Friedman. The best minimum wages are in Denmark, which gives its poorest citizens $1,800 a month; enough to keep their citizens out of poverty. This all can be financially feasible by...

Janet Yellen is the new Federal Reserve chair; the first woman to hold this position of the world’s largest economy. She has three major goals as head of the Fed that will help the working wage slaves, but with her 36 years of experience and knowledge of the monetary system she can pull it off. One is to get unemployment down from 7 percent to 5-4 percent, which is in contrast to her predecessor Allen Greenspan, who wanted to keep unemployment at 6 percent, which always favored the money over the workers. Yellen’s number two goal is to get the flat wages up to a living wage with some disposal cash. Her third goal is to get the housing market growing again, which will be a huge boost in jobs, building, and also in needed goods for housing construction, like lumber and appliances. For the workers to have a person in the top position of finance who understands the need of the workers has never happened before. With the push by fast food for $15 an hour, some states, federal government a...

California minimum wage is going to $10-$12 is just enough to move workers off of government assistance, such as food stamps, but still does not give the workers disposal income, which will boost the economy with more jobs and more taxes for local and state coffers. It would be a step in the right direction to stop the taxpayers subsidizing corporations that pay low wages to their workers. Millionaire Representative Ron Unz, of Silicon Valley California, wants to raise the California minimum wage to $12 an hour. Governor Brown wants to raise the state’s minimum wage to $10 an hour; Seattle, WA., mayor wants the minimum wage to be $15 and this is where it should be, $15 to $16 at this time. The increase is being slow walked, but it is going to happen. Whichever state does it first will be the winner. Their jobs and their economy will be a huge success for the state, and if California voters would do the $15 an hour minimum and the legalization of marijuana, California workers and the g...