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Tidbits – Sept. 5 – Reader Comments: 2024 Elections – Public Schools, Action on Corporate Power, High Prices, Inflation; Israel-Gaza: A Way out of This Mess – Please Take It; Learning About Unions, Public Employees Pay Gap; Remembering Paul Mishler;

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Reader Comments: 2024 Elections - Public Schools, Action on Corporate Power, High Prices, Inflation; Israel-Gaza: There Is a Way Out of This Mess - Please Take It; Labor Day, Learning About Unions, Public Employees Pay Gap; Remembering Paul Mishler;

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Extreme Chutzpah! Authoritarians Launch Existential Attack on Fla. Unions

Steve Wishnia Work-Bites
Public employees would have to sign a form, in 14-point type, larger than the rest of the text, stating, "Florida is a right-to-work state,” “union membership and payment of union dues and assessments are voluntary,” no employee may be discriminated against “for refusing to join or financially support a labor union.”

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Right to Work has Failed to Live up to Conservative Hype

Rick Haglund Michigan Advance
The annual decline in the number of union members actually slowed after the a right-to-work law in Michigan took effect in 2013. And membership grew to 604,000 in 2020 from 589,000 in 2019. 

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Commemoration of the 2011 Wisconsin Uprising

Frank Emspak Portside
Wisconsin working people are at a cross roads. If we are to regain workplace rights we will have to show the employer how valuable we are. In the absence of that, even with effective political mobilization, the balance of forces will not change.

Greensboro City Workers Form a Union

Eric Fink Yes! Weekly
Moderators note: In North Carolina it is illegal for a public employee union to bargain or negotiate a contract with the workers employer.

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Victory for Unions as Supreme Court, Scalia Gone, Ties 4-4

Adam Liptak The New York Times
A U.S. Supreme Court ruling allowing workers to refuse to pay the fees would have been the culmination of a decades-long campaign by a group of prominent conservative foundations aimed at weakening unions that represent teachers and other public employees. Tuesday’s deadlock denied them that victory, but it set no precedent and left the door open for further challenges once the Supreme Court is back at full strength.

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Untold Story: How Scalia's Death Blew Up an Anti-union Group's Grand Legal Strategy

Michael Hiltzik Los Angeles Times
The implications of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's death for the anti-union case known as Friedrichs are a bit uncertain. Some experts say the appellate ruling in favor of the union would be effectively affirmed by an evenly divided court. Others believe the court will ask for re-argument of the same case next term, presumably after it gets back up to full nine-member strength by the appointment and confirmation of successor to Scalia.
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