Portside

State banks and power stations shut and public transport halted in some states as public sector workers take industrial action.

This paper finds that Black union workers of today are very different from Black union workers of the past. In particular, Black union workers today are more likely to be female, older, have more years of formal education, be immigrants, and work in the public sector. Black union workers also enjoy higher wages, and better access to health insurance and retirement benefits than their non-union peers.

PROMESA has already brought changes to Puerto Rico, including slashing the minimum wage to just US$4.25 for people under 25 amid high levels of poverty and unemployment. Funding for pensions, education, and healthcare is also facing cuts, while basic services are at risk of privatization.

“We really got together for the fun of it, singing in Pete’s basement on Macdougal Street,” Mr. Hellerman told The New York Times in 1980. “We sang for unions, at picket lines and at hootenannies, but we had no anticipation of getting jobs. Even Pete, the most accomplished of us, could not get jobs on his own, so we couldn’t expect anyone to pay for four of us.”

President Recip Tayyip Erdoğan has effectively used Turkey’s failed coup to isolate his internal opposition and consolidate his personal power. In the wake of the coup, the Kurds have suffered setbacks in Turkey and throughout the region. But there is also evidence of some shifts in regional alliances that may impact the deadly civil wars in Syria and Yemen, if the outside powers fueling the two conflicts can agree on negotiated solutions to these unwinnable wars.

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