AFL-CIO Blog

  • Service + Solidarity Spotlight: During COVID-19 Pandemic, Oregon Workers Are Helping Workers
    Service + Solidarity Spotlight: During COVID-19 Pandemic, Oregon Workers Are Helping Workers Oregon AFL-CIO During the COVID-19 pandemic and widespread protests in response to the killing of George Floyd, working people across the United States have stepped up to help out our friends, neighbors and communities. In our new Service + Solidarity Spotlight series, we'll showcase one of those stories every day. Here's today's story. Working people in Portland, Oregon, have stepped up to fill community needs by hosting the Workers Helping Workers food drive and distribution program. The program is led by President Jeff Anderson (UFCW) of the Northwest Oregon Labor Council, Oregon AFL-CIO President Graham Trainor (IBEW) and Labor’s Community Service Agency. In response to layoffs, furloughs and record unemployment, the unions came together to distribute 1,000 food boxes in the first of at least three planned distributions. Kenneth Quinnell Tue, 06/23/2020 - 14:20 Tags: COVID-19, Community Service — Jun 23
  • Respect at Work Has to Become the New Normal: ILO Convention 190 and Rebuilding for a Fairer Economy
    Respect at Work Has to Become the New Normal: ILO Convention 190 and Rebuilding for a Fairer Economy The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown into stark relief the direct correlation between the exploitative labor model that fuels our global economy and the systemic racism and discrimination that leads to attacks on Black people’s bodies and lives. It is a system rooted in discrimination and oppression, one that strategically devalues and dehumanizes Black and Brown workers, particularly women. Returning to “normal” is not an option or even desirable—we must instead rebuild an economy designed to meet human needs and protect fundamental rights, including safety and respect on the job. After years of campaigning by the global labor movement, workers, governments and employers came together June 21, 2019, at the International Labor Organization to negotiate a global standard to end violence and harassment in the world of work. The ILO Convention that resulted from those discussions, C190, was the first international treaty to recognize the right of every worker to be free from violence and harassment, including gender-based violence and harassment, and the responsibility of governments and employers to ensure safe, respectful workplaces. Uruguay recently became the first country to ratify the convention, and others are soon to follow its lead. One year later, as we confront racial, economic and health crises, the convention takes on an even greater role in addressing the many forms of work-related violence and harassment workers are reporting related to the pandemic.  With increased incidence of domestic violence and health and safety violations during the current crisis, unions are using the C190 framework to negotiate with employers and governments for policies that address the forms of violence they confront. Female workers throughout the global economy often are the first to lose their jobs as the economy contracts or are forced to work in low-paid positions with few health and safety protections. C190 requires that employers recognize gender-based violence and harassment in their safety and health protections. It is clear the convention provides an important framework for addressing the systemic discrimination and exploitation workers face around the world. Rebuilding our economy will require that we proactively design and implement systems that empower and protect workers and address systemic power imbalances. As countries shape policies for reopening and rebuilding economies, the C190 framework provides guidance on how to ensure workplaces are safe and address the continuum of violence workers often experience. C190 calls on all governments to address the root causes of violence and harassment at work, including discrimination, and develop strategies to address the underlying factors that support these systems. Women, particularly women of color, have been on the front lines of the pandemic, many working for very low wages. Overall, front-line workers are 64% women and disproportionately people of color. According to the National Domestic Workers Alliance, 73% of Black immigrant domestic workers report not being provided with any form of personal protective equipment (PPE) by their employers. Women particularly are overrepresented in care work, making up more than 85% of child care workers and 75% of health care workers. Caring for others sustains our communities and allows our economy to function, but it has long been dismissed as women’s work and systematically devalued, informalized and underpaid. Not coincidentally, these professions also face high rates of violence and harassment on the job.  In addition, women, along with marginalized groups such as migrant workers, Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC), LGBTQ and gender-nonconforming individuals, are disproportionately pushed into the precarious workforce. And while precarious work arrangements—aka corporations using subcontractors, franchises and gig models to avoid a formal employment relationship and escape liability for some or all labor rights—predate COVID-19, the pandemic has spotlighted how these jobs operate with little to no regard for worker safety.  C190 explicitly requires governments to address precarious work arrangements and ensure that everyone in the working world has legal protections from violence and harassment. It also contains protections for others in the workplace who are often left unprotected by labor laws and social protection systems, including people looking for work, unpaid interns and apprentices. As unemployment rises and state reopenings foreclose many from qualifying for emergency assistance, people will become increasingly desperate for income and can be forced into more dangerous and exploitative situations. Critically, C190 also recognizes the importance of addressing underlying power relationships at work. Ending violence and harassment requires shifting more agency and control into the hands of workers themselves. This pandemic has made clear that far too often, workers are not viewed as human beings deserving of dignity and safety, but as expendable cogs in a machine. Violence and harassment exist in this system not as a glitch, but as a feature—tools of control used to reinforce hierarchy both in the workplace and in society. To get all of this done, we need to build alliances across our movements. Feminist, worker, climate, racial justice, migrant and human rights organizations must build joint analysis and campaigns that work toward ratification and implementation of C190. All workers must have the ability to organize collectively to proactively shape their own working conditions. A union is how change is made, and one of the few inspiring outcomes of the pandemic has been the rise of new waves of worker and community organizing. Going forward, we must create an enabling environment for organizing to demand respect on the job by protecting everyone’s fundamental right to come together and act in concert to demand better.  One of the most heartbreaking elements of the COVID-19 crisis is that so much of the suffering is the result of political choices, made to prioritize the stock market and uninterrupted markets, rather than human life. C190 provides us a framework for a worker-centered response and recovery that builds systems for all workers and addresses the power imbalances created by systemic discrimination. We can and must make different, better choices—choices to recognize the inherent dignity and value of all workers, to require respectful, safe working conditions, and to allow people more agency in shaping their working lives.   Kenneth Quinnell Tue, 06/23/2020 - 12:37 Tags: COVID-19 — Jun 23
  • Service + Solidarity Spotlight: Working People Across the Nation Join Workers First Caravan for Racial + Economic Justice
    Service + Solidarity Spotlight: Working People Across the Nation Join Workers First Caravan for Racial + Economic Justice During the COVID-19 pandemic and widespread protests in response to the killing of George Floyd, working people across the United States have stepped up to help out our friends, neighbors and communities. In our new Service + Solidarity Spotlight series, we'll showcase one of those stories every day. Here's today's story. Thousands of workers across the country joined together on June 17 in a national day of action. We called for the Senate to pass the HEROES Act and for Congress to take actions to address structural racism. The HEROES Act is grounded in America’s Five Economic Essentials that are desperately needed to keep working people safe and financially secure. This day of action was just the beginning. Today and every day that follows, working people will mobilize like never before to make the HEROES Act the law of the land and rid our institutions of systemic racism. Check out this video recapping the various actions around the country. Kenneth Quinnell Mon, 06/22/2020 - 12:50 — Jun 22
  • Has the Supreme Court Shielded Us from Trump Administration Health Care Rules?
    Has the Supreme Court Shielded Us from Trump Administration Health Care Rules? The Supreme Court last week handed down a landmark decision barring employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity⁠—a significant step forward in the full inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals in the workplace and in broader society. While this case is an important advance in civil rights, it may also undermine the Trump administration’s new health regulations designed to eliminate existing civil rights protections. The AFL-CIO applauds the Supreme Court for its decision in Bostock v. Clay County. Our affiliates represent people in a broad array of work settings and organizational cultures. We believe a person should be judged by their actual performance on the job, not stereotypes of a particular occupation or a particular gender. Union members are protected from invidious discrimination by their employers because of union contracts that protect them from being fired or discriminated against without just cause. But the court’s ruling provides essential workplace protections for millions of workers in the 27 states without LGBTQ anti-discrimination laws.  The case also may have implications for work-based health coverage and other benefits. For example, employers may need to adjust group health plan coverage of gender dysphoria and related services, adjust benefits for same-sex and opposite-sex spouses, and review the need for gender assignment as an identifier in benefit plan administration.  The court’s ruling also undercuts the legality of harsh new regulations from the Trump administration issued three days before the court’s decision that would allow doctors, hospitals and other providers to withhold medical care from transgender people.   The court’s decision in Bostock rests on an interpretation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act—so it doesn’t address the health care regulations directly. But those regulations rely on an interpretation of sex discrimination in Title IX of the Education Amendments Act and other laws that are quite similar to Title VII. Courts often look to interpretations of Title VII when they decide the meaning of the anti-discrimination provisions in Title IX. With the Supreme Court rejecting the administration’s narrow understanding of Title VII when it comes to hiring and firing, most experts believe the courts will look skeptically at new health regulations that seek to reduce protections against discrimination in the same way.    The AFL-CIO, along with hundreds of other organizations, submitted comments to the administration last year urging them not to go forward with these new regulations, which are part of a broader Republican effort to undermine the Affordable Care Act (ACA). As an organization that recognizes the importance of work-based health insurance, we believe it is critical that payers and health care providers provide the full range of medically necessary health care services, regardless of whether or not a worker conforms to the stereotype⁠—whether it is a stereotype for that particular occupation or a stereotype for a particular gender. By preventing insurers from denying coverage based on gender identity, the ACA protections have saved lives. One study found that the suicide rate among transgender and gender-nonconforming people dropped by as much as 50% in states that barred such discrimination.  Of course, the timing of these new rules couldn’t be worse⁠—limiting access to health care during a pandemic. Turning away patients based on their sexual orientation or gender identity not only may have life-threatening implications for those individuals but the well-being of the broader community. The next big test will be later this month when the administration must decide whether or not to publish the regulations in the Federal Register. The Supreme Court has given the administration valuable guidance on the scope of federal nondiscrimination laws. One can only hope that the administration is listening because going forward with these regulations would do nothing to help the Department of Health and Human Services fulfill its mission to promote the health and well-being of people across the nation. Kenneth Quinnell Mon, 06/22/2020 - 09:07 Tags: LGBTQ Rights — Jun 22
  • Service + Solidarity Spotlight: Union Member Uses Seat on City Council to Lead Fight to Ban Tear Gas
    Service + Solidarity Spotlight: Union Member Uses Seat on City Council to Lead Fight to Ban Tear Gas Braxton Winston During the COVID-19 pandemic and widespread protests in response to the killing of George Floyd, working people across the United States have stepped up to help out our friends, neighbors and communities. In our new Service + Solidarity Spotlight series, we'll showcase one of those stories every day. Here's today's story. Braxton Winston knows what it’s like to be tear-gassed by the police while exercising his First Amendment rights to nonviolently protest police brutality. A member of the Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) and a City Council member in Charlotte, North Carolina, since 2017, he has led the fight to ban the use of tear gas in his city. Last week, the Charlotte City Council voted to stop funding chemical agents for the police department. Winston wrote an editorial column for The Washington Post, in which he described his experience and what led him to fight for this change: “No chemical agents should be used on a human being anywhere in this world. And that certainly includes American streets as citizens exercise their First Amendment rights. Being exposed to tear gas and pepper ball rounds is a miserable experience that I will never forget…. “Our police chief has argued that without chemical agents, police will be forced to use batons to break skin and bones. But that is not an acceptable answer to the people of Charlotte. What’s more, comments like that hurtfully evoke Bull Connor’s German shepherds and fire hoses. If the current police chief, or the new chief set to take over in September, cannot figure out how to deal with human beings without the tactics of violence and fear, the people that make up this city will be here, step by step, to show him how to deal with us as the sentient beings we are.” Kenneth Quinnell Fri, 06/19/2020 - 10:41 Tags: COVID-19, Community Service — Jun 19