Portside

Strikes have become rare; open-ended strikes at industrial plants even more so. 2,000 workers have been on strike in northern Wisconsin for several weeks. The odds are against them, and they need support. What is the future of the labor movement if unions lost the ability to launch and win strikes?

The United Auto Workers union won its first organizing vote at a foreign-owned auto assembly plant in the U.S. South on Friday, in a groundbreaking victory after decades of failed attempts.

Once a year, Portside Labor asks all of our readers for support. Every year our readers come thru. We run these appeals for just two weeks. If you have already contributed, many thanks! If you haven't... what could be a better time than over the weekend. If you have thought of going to our donate page, but haven't...please do. Here's why we are asking for your support.

Oaxacans in 2006 tied the repression of education workers to broader frustrations with official impunity and deep-seated social and economic inequality. Those frustrations continue to animate everyday life. In confronting today's new challenges, Oaxacans are doing more than simply “saying no.” They’re drawing from an array of experiences – including that of the Oaxaca Commune in 2006 – to imagine collective alternatives, and make them real.

Huffington Post editorial and HuffPost Live staff have signed cards to unionize and join the Writers Guild of America East. They have asked the Huffington Post for recognition.

The court is considering whether to overrule its 1977 decision allowing states to require public employees to join a union or pay a fee to cover collective bargaining costs. A win for the plaintiffs—a group of California teachers who say they oppose union efforts to increase pay and protect job security—could cripple public sector unions in about two dozen states that have “agency fee” laws.

The service Portside provides is in greater demand than ever. Thousands are discovering that there is a Left in the US, and our daily posts help give a sense of its real scope, however diverse and organizationally diffuse. We turn for you to help because as we grow, so do our financial needs. We will continue, but to measure up to a re- charged and re-vitalized movement, your contributions will make all the difference.

How to Promote a Just Transition and Break Out of the Jobs vs. Environment Trap

The victory of the therapists, counselors, and social workers at Kaiser Permanente in California is a landmark, in healthcare and above all in mental healthcare. The bottom line: these workers have won patient care ratios, they’ve won the right to advocate for patients, and they won these in a context of a nationwide drive to cut costs and press productivity in an industry awash in cash.

There might not be too many young workers represented by unions yet, but that doesn't mean they don't want to be.