Work Stoppage

After several quick headlines, we start this week with the first ever successful union election of a major men's basketball team in the NCAA at Dartmouth. Then we've got a major UAW update covering the last two weeks including major developments at Mercedes in Alabama, Toyota in Missouri, and more. We also discuss the continued existence of sweatshops right here in the US, as tobacco processing workers in NYC face horrific conditions. Unions in Minneapolis came together around years of organizing for a week of action that could show a vision of rooting the resurgent labor movement deeply in our communities. QA testers at Activision formed the largest union in video games in the US this week, and animators at Nickelodeon finalized a record new contract. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

Episode 6 - Women Build the CIO If you're not a patron you can get the full episode by visiting patreon.com/workstoppage and support us with $5 a month. For the first few decades of the 20th century, the AFL consistently failed to live up to its promises to fight for equal pay for equal work. But in the 1930s, an alternate labor federation, the Congress of Industrial Organizations, broke away and launched the most historic nationwide labor upsurge in US history, and a key part of their success was the organization of women. The UAW and the UE, two of our favorite unions, led the fight for women's equality in the workplace, striking for equal pay and winning it in contracts across the country. In the 1940s, World War 2 also made enormous changes for women workers, opening up countless fields that had previously been barred from them by chauvinism. While some unions were slow to accept the massive changes in the workforce during the war, this period marked the first time major unions consistently began to fight and win demands for equality on a national scale. Pushed by prominent Communist organizers, the CIO finally devoted resources to organizing women and closing the wage gap, and the gains for the labor movement as a whole were enormous. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

It's March! We begin by discussing yet another horrifying story of abuse of child labor, but also a story of how one UFCW local in Minnesota is fighting against the conditions creating it.  In a huge milestone, Starbucks has agreed to a framework to move negotiations forward towards a national contract. Fast food companies are using AI, and of course it's to make their employees lives even worse. In a rare case, a boss is being held liable for killing a worker in New York. Finally, Teamsters at Anheuser-Busch reached an agreement at the last minute before a strike. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

Episode 5 - Communist Women In the Great Depression If you're not a patron you can get the full episode by visiting patreon.com/workstoppage and support us with $5 a month. The Great Depression was one of the greatest crises in capitalism's history, throwing millions out of work and pushing them to the brink of starvation. Women workers bore the brunt of this, being the first to be fired in nearly every workplace. But women workers fought back, organizing massive strikes, marches, and demonstrations against both their atrocious working conditions and the inadequate relief from the government. A new organization emerged in this period to take up the lead in the struggle for social equality: the Communist Party.  Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

A lawsuit filed in Colorado this week to block the Kroger-Albertson's merger reveals anti-union collusion. Starbucks Workers United filed for union elections at 21 stores in one day. The UAW continued making major moves, doubling their organizing budget and launching an international support effort with Mexican autoworkers. IBEW faced mold so toxic whole building a new Ford battery plant they were hospitalized. One of the biggest new union wins we've seen in a long time came at Cal State this week, with 20,000 student assistants voting to join the SEIU. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

If you're not a patron you can get the full episode by visiting patreon.com/workstoppage and support us with $5 a month. We talk about a lot of labor history on our show, and one of the organizations we've come back to again and again is the Industrial Workers of the World. We've talked about the epic struggles in the early 20th century, but where is the IWW today, a century after its peak? We're joined by IWW Organizer and Trainer Maria Cunningham for a discussion of the modern IWW. We talk recent history, some prominent campaigns the IWW has led over the last few decades, and how the organization works in the 21st century. To check out the IWW, go to iww.org or redcard.iww.org Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

After a quick discussion of Amazon joining the corporate lawsuit aimed at destroying the NLRB, we turn to the continuing efforts by workers around the world to fight to end the genocide in Palestine. Next we discuss the latest round of protests by thousands of farmers in India fighting for their livelihoods. Farm owners in this country in NY have sued to stop a law granting labor rights to farm workers. 100,000 flight attendants picketed airports around the country to demand a fair contract. Teamsters in Texas shut down Molson Coors for the western half of the US after the company offered raises of just $1 an hour after record profits. Workers at "Employee Owned" WinCo Foods in Utah organized with the Teamsters this past week to make that label a reality, not just a slogan. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

Episode 4 - Revolutionaries Press The Issue If you're not a patron you can get the full episode by visiting patreon.com/workstoppage and support us with $5 a month. On the eve of WW1, a radical new force shook the US labor movement with its vision of all the workers under one big union, running society instead of the exploiters. The IWW also had a much more advanced vision of women's equality than prior national labor associations. Women workers in the IWW made major gains and reached heights heretofore unheard of in a nationwide labor federation. But World War 1 would shake up both the industrial workforce, with millions of women changing jobs, but also the political scenery, with the first Red Scare cracking down on any organization deemed radical, even for just promoting women's equality. Through this period, women workers entered occupations and organizations previously barred from them, but as we've seen on prior episodes, they would at times face opposition from the very people who stood the most to gain from their solidarity. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

We start this week's episode with a quick rundown of new anti union repression at Starbucks and Amazon. This week workers calling for a ceasefire have reached the top of the US labor movement, with the AFL-CIO itself finally getting on board. The UAW continues its massive and ambitious nationwide union drive, hitting a critical milestone at VW in Chattanooga of a majority of workers signed up. Legal assaults on the labor rights of public workers in Florida are having major effects, with dozens of unions decertified in just the first few weeks of the year. Teachers in Chicago struck two charters schools this week fighting against mismanagement and refusal to provide special education resources. Finally, we got closer this week to seeing the first unionized team in the NCAA. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

Episode 3 - Garment Worker Rebellion If you're not a patron you can get the full episode by visiting patreon.com/workstoppage and support us with $5 a month. On the third episode of our series, we zoom in to a few years at the beginning of the 20th century. From 1909-1913, tens of thousands of women workers in the garment industry in the industrial cities of the northern US organized and went on strike in record numbers. The conditions these workers labored in were truly shocking, and quite literally deadly. These were life and death struggles in an industry where factory owners locked the doors to keep women from leaving and charged them for the use of a stool. The titanic struggles waged by these women workers would grow women's participation in the labor movement to record highs, even without the help of the top leaders of the AFL. Join the discord: discord.gg/tDvmNzX  Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee