September 04, 2004

As President Bush addressed the Republican National Convention on Thursday, September 2, 10,000 union members -- like Oregon Canvass Director Michael Occonnor of SEIU Local 2028 -- went door-to-door to talk with a million union households about the jobs crisis, the need for affordable health care and a secure retirement - - and where the candidates stand on these issues. It was the largest single-day election mobilization in the union movement’s history.

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September 01, 2004

Two months ago, SEIU launched PurpleOcean.org, an online community of people who want to fight for better jobs and health care and fight against corporate power.  Now, I'd like to invite you to participate in a conference call this Labor Day where we'll lay out our plans for making PurpleOcean.org a force for economic change.

As I said back in May, if we are going to challenge the Wal-Mart economy, business-as-usual unions won't cut it anymore:

SEIU is taking bigger and bigger steps, and greater and greater risks, not only in obtaining justice for more SEIU members but reshaping the rules of the world's economy and global corporations for all working people.

But -- surprise, surprise -- the global economy, and those corporate giants that salute no flag but their own company logo are far too big for any single organization to battle alone. To take the fight for our families' economic future to the next level, and, more importantly, to have a real chance to win, SEIU must open its doors, change its rules, and find ways to formally and officially link up with millions of you who are not yet SEIU members.

That's why SEIU created PurpleOcean.org, giving you the chance to become a member of the world's first virtual union.

In the past two months I've asked you to join Purple Ocean, but I haven't asked you to do much more.  Now I need your help.  On Labor Day, I'm going to hold a short conference call, and I'd like you to be a part of it.  I will say a few words about where PurpleOcean.org is headed this Fall, and then you will have a chance to ask questions, help us refine our plans, and get ready to start spreading the word. 

The conference call, which is free, is at 6 p.m. East Coast time and will last about a half hour. To RSVP online, visit http://www.purpleocean.org/laborday.

For most of us, Labor Day is about spending time with our family and friends at picnics and barbecues.  This Labor Day, let's also make it about spending time with our new friends across the country, coming together to build a movement to take back our world.

As we watch the RNC convention this week, we’ll hear praise heaped on George Bush for a lot of things. A variety of speakers will ascend the podium and laud him for leading the country in tough times.

It’s important to review where we’ve been, but the big question for me this election is: Where are we going?

The bottom line is that things are getting worse in this country – and much, much worse for those most in need. For the third straight year, the number of Americans living in poverty and the number without health insurance increased. Nearly 45 million lack health insurance, up from 43.5 million the previous year. Just to provide perspective, I read somewhere that 45 million people equals the population of California, Oregon, and Washington – combined.  Put another way, there are nearly 150 uninsured Americans for every physician in this country.

And how has the president “led” us through this crisis? By remaining silent? C’mon! We need a serious national plan to solve the health care crisis, not words wrapped in red, white, and blue. We can do better.

If you tune in to watch the convention, be sure to ask yourself, “What has this ‘leadership’ done for me lately?”

August 27, 2004

"The national debate over soaring health care costs hit Seattle yesterday" is how the leading newspaper in Seattle began its coverage of a five-day strike by SEIU health care workers. 

The story captured how SEIU’s nurses and other hospital and clinic employees are fighting for the principle that everyone in America needs affordable health care.

More than 1,700 SEIU 1199NW members are on strike at Group Health Cooperative to stop health benefit cuts. Incredible when health care providers want to raise costs for their own workers so that would make family health coverage unaffordable for many workers.

Group Health, is a member-owned non-profit that was founded to provide affordable health care for Washington residents. It operates one hospital and more than twenty clinics ,and its current  behavior is  a symbol of everything that needs to be fixed in our broken health care system.

When an employer whose purpose is to provide affordable health care decides it won’t provide affordable family care to its own caregivers, you know you’ve got a crisis on your hands.

Fortunately, SEIU members in Washington state -- like SEIU members across the country -- have been getting ready to deal with this crisis for years.

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August 26, 2004

The new Bush rules are now implemented. They have put in jeopardy overtime pay for 6 million workers. It is no surprise that this Administration favors wealth and not work. Corporate special interests and their allies in the White House and Congress have been putting in some serious overtime -- to bloat their profits at the expense of our hard work. The new Golden Rule: they that have the gold make the rules.

The passing of Bush's overtime rules sounds more alarms for American workers. It is incredible to think that when good jobs are going overseas and new jobs are paying $9,000 less that the ones they replace that George Bush would approve new regulations that call for the largest pay cut for workers in US history. The new rules also give our tax dollars to employers to figure out how to implement the rules -- to their liking, of course.
 
The question is now quite clear: Are all of us willing to work overtime in conversations at worksites, overtime in the streets, in the neighborhoods, on the phones, so that these people in the White House will run out of time on Nov. 2?  I'll be working overtime on this election in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia in the next few weeks.  How about you?

August 24, 2004

Last week, Costco joined the ranks of Morgan Stanley, Boeing and Wal-Mart when its female workers filed a class-action lawsuit claiming they were denied pay and promotion based on their gender.

In another case filed yesterday in San Francisco, a Costco assistant warehouse manager alleged that the retailer did not announce openings for higher paying managerial jobs, relying instead on a "tap on the shoulder" by top level male executives to pick other men for higher level positions. Although Costco's U.S. workforce of 78,000 is nearly 50 percent female, fewer than 1 in 6 senior managers are women, according to the lawsuit, which seeks to represent about 650 women. (Washington Post, August 18, 2004)

As a woman who started out as a rank-and-file worker in Pennsylvania, I found myself thinking: what women need are fewer lawyers and more unions.

Not that I have anything against lawyers, but trying to solve workplace problems through lawsuits alone is like waiting to treat medical problems until they show up in the ER.

Without a union, it’s hard to stand up by yourself against an aggressive employer. You don’t have any real power unless you have deep pockets and can afford to wait years before the problem is solved.

And even if you win, you may not help others facing the same or similar problems. If you had a union, you could have assistance in solving the problem right away. And you wouldn’t be standing alone – you’d have the backing of your union brothers and sisters.

Most of the huge, rapidly growing service companies have a business strategy of paying women (and men) less than a living wage, without real health coverage or pensions. That's a problem for working families, for our communities, and for America. And it's not going to be solved just by lawsuits but by making these companies let their workers form unions without employer interference and intimidation.

Even at Costco, which has a better reputation as an employer than competitors like Wal Mart, only a small number of workers – less than 20% -- are unionized. Suits like the one they are facing clearly demonstrate a need for workers to have a voice on the job and a way to protect their rights.

Corporations and their political allies like to complain that there are too many lawyers and lawsuits in this country, but at the same time they do everything they know how to fight workers who want unions. What they are really saying is that they're against any weapon that working families use to stand up for ourselves.

So my question is, how can the workers of Costco and Wal-Mart and other service companies get real justice?

August 20, 2004

Affordable drugs for Americans, or even more profits for drug companies -- which do you think is more important?  You picked affordable drugs?  Well, so did Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich.

This week, Illinois became the first state to help its residents gain access to cheaper drugs by providing meds from Canada, the United Kingdom, and Ireland, where American drug companies charge less for exactly the same drugs  because those countries have elected leaders who stand up for working people.

Illinois has had to create its own solution to help its citizens get the drugs and the care that they need because of a failure on the part of the Bush Administration to address the health care crisis in this country.

Americans pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. Why? Because without a national strategy to keep costs down, the so called "free" market is controlled by profit hungry pharmaceuticals, not by consumers.

You'd think that the leader of our country would notice such a huge problem, but President Bush has done nothing to help the situation. Worse, he's passed legislation that helps rich American drug companies, not working and retired Americans.

President Bush's new law undermines Medicare and does not rein in the prices charged by drug companies -- leaving American seniors paying 1/3 more than seniors in other countries. It even forbids Medicare officials from negotiating lower drug prices for seniors. With the new law, most Medicare recipients will pay more out of pocket expenses for prescription drugs in 2007 than they do today.

We need a national plan to solve the health care crisis in America.  John Kerry's got a plan to help lower costs and deliver coverage to more Americans. The Kerry/Edwards ticket is proposing allowing the re-importation of safe prescription drugs from Canada, overhauling the Medicare drug plan, ensuring low-cost drugs, and ending artificial barriers to generic drug competition  -- and Kerry’s committed to fighting for this plan in the first 100 days of his administration.

I just don't get how you can turn a blind eye to the situation while millions of Americans -- especially our seniors and our working families -- struggle to afford coverage, pay for drugs, and keep their families healthy.