t cannot be overstated how crucial Veterans Affairs (VA) has been and continues to be to effectively caring for the people who serve the United States of America, and they have been through hell and highwater in the last couple years as everything from greedy politicians to privatization to downsizing and more has threatened the…
Author: Joe Harrison
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The Importance of Michigan’s Repeal of “Right to Work”
everal key victories for the labor movement have occurred in the State of Michigan, including the reinstitution of prevailing wage laws and the repealing of the state’s “Right To Work” system (which Alabama currently also employs). It is well known by workers in the labor movement that “Right To Work” is fundamentally anti-worker, and effectively…
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Explained: Michigan Reinstitutes Prevailing Wage
ast month, we highlighted a conversation we had with Dr. Larissa Petrucci about a study she conducted with the Illinois Economic Policy Institute on the topic of “prevailing wage”; the research focused on the negative effects experienced by states who had dismantled their prevailing wage laws. Michigan was numbered among the states who had removed…
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Florida Politicians’ War on Public Sector Unions
lorida Governor Ron DeSantis has been engaging in a concerted effort to strangle the liberties of the labor movement in the Sunshine State, and those efforts only seem to be growing bigger and bolder with time, as the Right-Wing governor is taking aim at Public Sector unions in the state. “A big enemy of DeSantis…
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LEAD Academy: A Case Study in School Privatization
he Valley Labor Report has been keeping an eye on so-called “School Choice” efforts and motions by lawmakers to privatize schools, and we have not kept silent on our strong opposition to these efforts, as we believe that school privatization is a deeply flawed education system built on greed, segregation, control, and more. One thing…
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Birmingham Writers Walk Out After Three Years of Bad Faith Negotiations
en workers at Hearst Magazine in Birmingham, Alabama, staged a walkout recently in protest of bad faith negotiations. These workers successfully voted to unionize in 2020, joining up with the Writer’s Guild of America East, but claim that, since then, they have been stuck in “negotiation hell” with their employer, who has consistently and intentionally…
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What 42,000 Disney Workers Won in their Tentative Agreement
hortly after rallying together to reject their employer’s so-called “best offer” (estimates are that the offer was rejected by 96%) Disney workers have won big in a new tentative agreement, marking a victory for the labor movement in an anti-union state (Florida). McKenna Schueler, Florida-based freelance journalist and reporter for Orlando Weekly joined Jacob on…
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7 Years Later, Hyundai Supplier is Penalized for a Workers Death
midst allegations of child labor, mismanagement, and racism, Hyundai’s supply chain in Alabama just can’t seem to “catch a break” as they are now facing penalization for the death of a worker on the shop floor. But to demonstrate just how much employers can get away with, this citation comes 7 years after the death…
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Alabama Politicians Want to MICROCHIP Parolees
his strange move to consider microchipping parolees was kicked off by representative Prince Chestnut, a democrat, proposing a bill with some urgency before the legislative session began, during a house judiciary committee meeting on March 22. The bill was to ban microchipping of employees by employers within the state. At face value, this doesn’t seem like…
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“66 People Have Died in Alabama Prisons Since We Last Spoke” – Alabama Reporter on the State’s Prisons
t is fairly common knowledge by this point that Alabama’s prison system is among the worst in the country, not only in terms of mass incarceration and stringent parole rates, but also the horrific and even lethal conditions of the prison facilities themselves. Journalist John H. Glenn joined The Valley Labor Report last week to…
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23,000 New Jobs: The Economic Impact of Medicaid Expansion
ften left out of discussions about Medicaid Expansion in Alabama are the positive effects that expanding the healthcare service would have not just on individuals but on the economy as a whole. Alabama would likely see a major boom in the job market as new opportunities open up for employment. Debbie Smith is the campaign…
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Why did Huntsville school bus drivers unionize?
e broke the news a couple weeks ago that Huntsville City School bus drivers are unionizing with the Teamsters; their organizing comes after a vote among the drivers that led to a blowout of 131 yes to 6 no. While the fact that they are unionizing is important in itself, it’s just as important to…