Former organizer, current Associate Professor of Sociology at McGill University. Author, Labor and the Class Idea in the US and Canada (
@CambridgeUP
, 2018)
Out now from
@CambridgeUP
: my book, Labor and the Class Idea in the United States and Canada. If you've been wondering what's behind union decline (and how to fix it), then check it out
#labor
#1u
#classidea
:
On Wednesday, the
@UAW
announced a campaign to organize all 13 non-union automakers in the US, over 150,000 workers. It’s one of the most exciting organizing drives we’ve seen in the US in decades. Here’s why 🧵 1/
Your periodic reminder that a
@Teamsters
UPS strike this year would be the 5th largest strike in US history, and the largest strike *ever* against a single US employer.
Again, collective bargaining isn’t about the law; it’s about power. We’ll have to see a lot more of this “thinking outside the law” for labor to be able to rebuild.
on GM agreeing to put its EV plants under the UAW master agreement: legally, the union was constrained against folding that issue into this strike, but the truth is, you actually can achieve something like that if you are strong enough
In case it wasn’t clear the first time, let me say:
1. Michigan repealing RTW is a huge victory, a big deal
2. We should celebrate and replicate this victory
But why should we be celebrating? 1/ 🧵
BREAKING: Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer just signed a repeal of the state’s “Right to Work” bill in to law.
This is the first repeal of the anti-union and anti-worker legislation anywhere in the U.S. in 60 years. It’s a huge victory for working people.
“The UAW wasn’t founded by asking for permission. The founders of this union didn’t wait for the law. They didn’t worry about the law. They wanted their dignity and they wanted their fair share, and they did what the hell they had to do to get it."
— UAW President Shawn Fain
This is a promising development. Instead of fighting turf battles, existing unions and independents can help and learn from each other. It's the only way labor has a future.
The amazing thing with the
@UAW
#StandUpStrike
is that they’re whipsawing in reverse. Instead of the companies pitting locals against each other for concessions, the UAW is pitting the Big 3 against each other to see who can stay off the Friday strike list ✊🪧
UAW President Shawn Fain, in Lansing, tells
@LindsayVanHulle
he got an email from Stellantis "roughly 3 minutes before we were going live" at 10 a.m. with an updated offer, which kept them off today's strike list.
"When we make progress, we honor our word."
📸 by Jack Hallauer
Unreal that a Democratic governor with national ambitions would behave in this way in 2023, in the midst of some of the most important worker mobilizations we’ve seen in years. But I guess old habits die hard, so here we are…
Spineless
#SaturdayNightVeto
of
#SB799
.
On the heels of a summer of strikes, where workers are being pushed out by employers who find it OK to STARVE THEM OUT, this is ANOTHER disgrace by
@GavinNewsom
. Striking workers deserve UI benefits bc THEY earned it. In short…👇
At the
#HuntsPointStrike
, we met Marcos, a striking worker, who's just started reading Farrell Dobbs’ Teamster Rebellion. We asked him why. His response? “It teaches you about how the union started. I wanna learn more. I wanna have more power. I want more people to have a union.”
This is a key shift in public perceptions that has to happen for unions and workers to win: instead of people asking "why do those union workers have so much?" they start asking "why don't I have that too?"
When
@ShawnFainUAW
and the
@UAW
propose a 40% wage hike over 4 years, this is the context in which that demand needs to be considered. It’s just digging out of the hole dug over the past decade.
As a labor scholar, the announcement that a former SEIU local president-turned-corporate-shill for Airbnb and Uber will be California’s next US Senator makes me think it’s time to revive the terms “Labor Fakir” and “Bunko-Steerer”
It’s hard to think of a *single* organizing win that would be more symbolically and substantively consequential than organizing the Tesla Fremont plant. Yes, other entire companies are more important, but is there another single shop?
New: Employees at Tesla’s Fremont California car factory have formed an organizing committee with the UAW. After the UAW’s big wins at the Big Three, will this time be different? w/
@danahull
.
@UAW
President
@ShawnFainUAW
delivering the keynote at this year’s
@TeamsterRnF
Convention, as TDU co-founder Ken Paff applauds. This would have been unthinkable a year ago.
It’s a new day for the US labor movement. ✊⚙️
French unions called for a general strike today.
And the people responded. Over 200 demos were held in the country, with upwards of 3.5 million on strike across the country.
In Paris alone unions estimate that 800,000 people turned out. 🧵
Read Gabriel Winant on how the response to the student encampments for Gaza reveals the problem of the undemocratic university:
Why Students Must Shout to Be Heard
🚨 LABOUR ALERT 🚨
As
@agsem_aeedem
TAs continue day 3 of their strike, professors in the
@mcgillu
Faculty of Arts
@McGillARTS
have announced that over 60% of us have joined together to form the Association of McGill Professors in the Faculty of Arts ✊
Big news in Quebec today: the CSN has organized a first Amazon warehouse in Laval. Quebec has card check recognition, so there’s no election involved. It would be a first in Canada
This piece is right (citing
@NelsonLichtens1
) that
@ShawnFainUAW
is channeling the best of Walter Reuther in articulating a broader vision for
@UAW
. But it’s more Reuther 1945 than Reuther 1950—a critical distinction. Here’s why 🧵 1/ Follow
@newrepublic
It’s refreshing how the new
@UAW
leadership has thrown the old rhetoric of labour-management “partnership” in the trash along with insulting company contract proposals. Instead, they’re saying that they’re ready to fight not just for autoworkers, but the entire working class 🗑️✊
NEW: Here's what the Big Three and the corporate media's NOT telling you about car prices, autoworker wages, and our fight for justice at the Big Three. Get the facts.
#UAW
I wrote a piece about the role of academic workers in the current referendum that could bring direct leadership elections to the UAW, & the history of academic/autoworker relations more broadly
I’m leaving my daughter in LA soon to return to Montreal for the start of the school year. Since I won’t be around, I thought it would be important to impart some Canadian culture so she can get in touch with her roots.
#ImCrushingYourHead
@KITHOnline
The courage and determination that
@RepRashida
has shown in the face of all the vicious attacks against her in recent weeks, resolutely standing for the basic humanity of Palestinian people, has been one of the few bright spots in a dark time. 🇵🇸
I am the only Palestinian American serving in Congress, and my perspective is needed here now more than ever. I will not be silenced and I will not let anyone distort my words.
I’m from Detroit, where I learned to speak truth to power, even if my voice shakes.
Student in office hours: "I think I want to write my paper about something regarding the 1997 UPS strike. Do you have suggestions where I can learn more about it?"
Why yes, indeed, I do.
#TheKidsAreAlright
Impressive developments in India. Notably, the strikers’ demands are explicitly political, taking a stand against privatization, and pushing to extend social security benefits to cover informal workers, who compose a significant part of the labour force.
At the
#HuntsPointStrike
, we met Marcos, a striking worker, who's just started reading Farrell Dobbs’ Teamster Rebellion. We asked him why. His response? “It teaches you about how the union started. I wanna learn more. I wanna have more power. I want more people to have a union.”
A sobering finding I discovered while working on the
@jacobin
@labornotes
piece on the UAW election: real hourly earnings in the auto industry declined by over 20% from 1990 to 2018, while private sector overall increased by over 17% (source:
@BLS_gov
) 1/
For the
@mcgillu
administration to send out an email calling for "respect for others" at the same time that it is warning professors that we can either disrespect our students and ourselves by scabbing on our TAs, or be placed on 100% unpaid administrative leave, is a bit much 1/
This take from Matt Yglesias seems to be getting some traction on the Left in the wake of the
@uawmembers
victory in the recent UAW leadership elections. It’s wrong, and here’s why 🧵 1/
I can only imagine how Jane must be feeling these days, having spent much (most?) of her adult life working to reform the UAW. She is the genuine article ✊
I wanted to share this pic of Labor Notes co-founder Jane Slaughter at UAW rally today. Jane is a former auto worker who fought for many of the changes we are seeing in the UAW. The pic encapsulates what I think of ppl doing movement work—we need marathon walkers, not sprinters.
In my latest piece for
@washingtonpost
, I detail the profoundly undemocratic nature of union representation elections, and why employers have no business interfering in them. 1/
The hubris it takes to report multi-billion-dollar earnings to shareholders one moment and then immediately turn around to cry poverty when it comes to compensating workers is simply staggering
#StandUpUAW
✊🪧
This morning, our national negotiators called on UAW members at GM's biggest plant to walk off and join our Stand Up Strike.
Hear their story.
#StandUpUAW
Solidarity with
@PSAC_AFPC
✊ This is one of the largest strikes in Canadian history. For comparison, the number of workers on strike today is comparable to the *total* number of US workers who went on strike in 2022.
Just because a union is independent doesn't mean that it is free from the pressures towards bureaucratization that affect more established unions. And as with more established unions, building a democratic culture is key to long-term strength and viability for independent unions
Breaking: A reform caucus in the ALU at the Amazon facility JFK8 on Staten Island files a lawsuit in federal District Court in Brooklyn to demand a free and democratic election--and vowing to bring the fight to Amazon.
This highlights a critical feature of the Sanders campaign: his use of his campaign infrastructure to support & stoke other movements independent of his campaign. This is far more important than any particular set of policy proposals. via
@politico
The idea that workers might want a degree of control over their lives at work is so foreign to employers that they can only understand it as a pathology or character defect.
If anyone else hacked into your bank account and withdrew a week’s worth of your wages, they would be charged with theft, wire fraud, etc. But if it’s your employer, then it’s just an “administrative matter they’re trying to resolve.” Wage theft is theft.
In my latest for
@jacobin
I assess the Teamsters’ tentative agreement at UPS. Member organizing won important gains, but also ratcheted up expectations, leaving some feeling that they could have won more. That’s a good problem to have.
“After carefully considering how to make this look like we’re doing the right thing, we have decided to pit the struggles of marginalized scholars and marginalized hotel workers against each other, undermining both in the process.”
Got it.
It wouldn’t be a
@TeamsterRnF
Convention without the requisite
@UnionDrip
. On the left,
@elliotrlewis
models the stone-cold classic black satin Teamster jacket. On the right, Peter Landon models a vintage 1970s TDU puffer vest, which is overdue for a reissue ✊🐴
Alabama’s new Commerce Secretary, Ellen McNair, says “the days of Alabama being a premier destination for industry investment may be coming to an end” if the United Auto Workers are able to successfully organize in the state’s auto plants.
Today
@mcgillu
officially awarded me the Changemaker Prize for my “highly understandable and nuanced commentary…on the causes and effects of the unprecedented strike action over the past year in various sectors… 1/
Why is
@ASAnews
sending out surveys to its membership trying to see how willing members would be to attend meetings at non-union hotels? This is shameful and appalling, especially given that our meeting theme this year is "Power, Inequality, and Resistance at Work."
It's up to Teamster members to decide how to vote on this agreement, but the most important thing to remember is that the only reason UPS gave up as much as it did was due to Teamster members mobilizing and creating a viable strike threat.
“By daring to take on corporate giants and make his case to the American public, Fain and the UAW are cutting through the culture-war noise to the core issues of inequality in our society.”
Great piece from
@paul_prescod
@jacobin
Stunning new findings on cumulative union advantage from
@TVanheuvelen
&
@ZParolin
:
"[U]nionization throughout one’s career is associated with a $1.3 million mean increase in lifetime earnings, larger than the average gains from completing college."
McGill
@agsem_aeedem
TAs strike on Monday. The administration is ordering professors to scab on our students. In this letter to colleagues, I lay out why this would be to the detriment of our students, our university, and our profession.
After working on this for over a year with a great team, I’m excited to see the
@DSA_Labor
pamphlet on the rank and file strategy in print.
I’m also looking forward to helping a new generation of organizers put the pamphlet’s ideas to work! 1/
Contrary to common narratives about deindustrialization and the decline of US manufacturing, the sector remains a vitally important part of the U.S. economy. 3/
“Business unionism” can be a murky concept, but there are clear-cut cases. Take this one from former SEIU president Andy Stern, quoted in a 2007 WSJ piece headlined “Labor Leaders, Buyout Kings Speak Same Language”
Glad that Stern’s vision is in the rear-view mirror these days.
In my latest for
@jacobin
, I use the recent repeal of Right to Work in Michigan to think through how and why RTW repeal matters: not by getting unions an influx of agency fee payers, but by sending a message that it’s no longer open season on unions.
Good news: injunction that not only would have dismantled the
@mcgillu
encampment, but prevented protest within 100m of any building gets rejected:
Campement à McGill : la Cour supérieure rejette l’injonction via
@RadioCanadaInfo
?
For any social scientists out there teaching in the fall, feel free to use this one-page guide I give to all my students on how to read social science. I got it from Dylan Riley, who got it from Maurice Zeitlin. It really helps students figure out what to focus on.
MILITANT MINDS
The new leadership of the
@UAW
, including President Shawn Fain, came to
#Teamsters
headquarters today to meet with General President Sean M. O’Brien, General Secretary-Treasurer Fred Zuckerman, and Teamsters Carhaul Division Director Avral Thompson.
#1u
My latest piece for
@jacobinmag
asks why the simple act of workers deciding to form an organization together at Amazon is enough to garner international media attention:
“Red sky in morning, bosses’ warning”
That’s how the saying goes right?
Anyway, our
@mcgillu
Arts faculty union (AMPFA) filed for certification with the Quebec Labour Tribunal today (we have card check in Quebec, so no need for an election)
A new day is dawning at McGill 🌄✊
This is a great quote, but the political sociologist in me can't help but think "Yes, but that's just a one-dimensional view of power. We need a 3-dimensional view that takes into account agenda-setting and the hegemonic shaping of interests." A nerdy thread 🧵 1/
“Power is the ability of a labor union like UAW to make the most powerful corporation in the world—General Motors—say 'yes' when it wants to say 'no.'”
— Walter Reuther , 4th President of the
#UAW
#StandUpUAW
Labor law reform won’t save us, etc., BUT this does shift the organizing terrain in a more positive direction. A refreshing change from the past 50 years.
Today, the Board issued a decision in Cemex Construction Materials Pacific, LLC announcing a new framework for determining when employers are required to bargain with unions without a representation election.
"One of my coworkers reached out to me and she said, "Hey, I know you're a member of DSA and I know you love Bernie—what can you tell me about organizing?'"
–
@tallnutwalnut
on how his Starbucks store got started organizing for their union
.
@JimboStanford
is talking here about Canada in the time of coronavirus, but the point he’s making is more general: quite often, what gets described as a “labor shortage” is actually an unwillingness of employers to pay more.
via
@torontostar
Second, given the location of many of the auto plants being organized, this is also the most serious effort to organize the U.S. South since the CIO’s Operation Dixie in the late 1940s. 7/
“Here’s what you can expect from us. No more bargaining in total secrecy behind closed doors. The company knows what’s happening in bargaining. Hell, they’re in the room,” Fain said.
Let's be clear: to the extent that university campuses today are unsafe, the fault lies squarely with pro-Israel counter-protesters, the cops, and the university administrators who enable them.
Amazing turnout for the joint
@utlanow
and
@seiulocal99
rally at City Hall today to demand better for all education workers. The kids enjoyed themselves, while keeping me mildly terrified as I tried not to lose them in the crowd.
#ReadyToStrike
#StrikeToWin
#UTLAStrong
The
@UAW
kicks off its celebration of Black History Month by announcing its organizing campaign at the Hyundai plant in Montgomery, Alabama
#OrganizeTheSouth
#StandUpUAW
Welcome to Montgomery, Alabama.
The city where Rosa Parks sat down.
And where thousands of Hyundai workers are ready to Stand Up.
#StandUpUAW
#StandUpHyundai