Portside

Roughly 20 to 25 percent of all union contracts have recently contained some kind of two-tier payment. Such arrangements, often made in response to threats of plant closures or job losses, can turn into strategies for long-term suppression of wages. They can also generate conflict and resentment among workers making vastly different amount of money and undermine solidarity.

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Historic election brings outside interference in the vote of Chattanooga Volkswagen workers

If workers vote to join a union at Volkswagen's Tennessee plant this week, they'll be changing America's labor relations for the better - Harold Meyerson. (Voting started yesterday, Feb. 12, and continues through tomorrow, Feb. 15) Lane Windham looks at past labor and UAW organizing efforts in the south.

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Huge victory for organizing workers. A Majority of workers at the Volkswagen assembly plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee have signed cards with the United Auto Workers (UAW) declaring that they want a union. Union representation at Volkswagen would signal a sea change in labor relations among foreign automakers who have resisted unions at their plants in the South.

Discussions between the United Auto Workers union and a Tennessee Volkswagen plant have raised fears among Southern politicians that union representation would deter businesses - and badly needed jobs - from coming to their respective states.