The Black Lung Disability Trust Fund faces the risk of insolvency; Trump signs executive order making it easier to fire civil servants; farmworker advocates call on Wendy’s to join the Fair Food Program; and thousands of activists call on Amazon to eliminate forced arbitration for contractors.
Nashville’s housing boom brings new high in construction worker deaths; EPA drops chemical safety rules proposed after the West, Texas, fertilizer explosion; new research identifies nearly 5,000 cases of severe black lung disease; and Tesla reports missing worker injuries after journalists expose unsafe working conditions at its California plant.
Don Blankenship’s Senate run is a heartbreaking ordeal for families of the Upper Big Branch mining disaster; California Supreme Court ruling will make it much harder to misclassify workers as independent contractors; farmworker families struggle with respiratory health problems; and workers around the world take to the streets for May Day.
Investigation finds serious worker safety problems and under-reporting of injuries at Tesla; advocates fight for stronger laws to protect waste collection workers; farm workers take to the streets to protest Trump’s immigration policies; and JetBlue flight attendants vote to unionize.
Striking West Virginia educators are inspiring teachers across the country; U.S. appeals court rules that bias laws also prohibit workplace discrimination against transgender people; Austin extends its new paid sick leave rule to city temp workers; and congressional Democrats introduce legislation to protect workers’ tips.
It’s time for federal lawmakers to catch up with the quickly changing relationship between employers and workers; an upcoming Supreme Court case could upend public-sector unions; New York farmworker loses court case to gain organizing rights, but vows to appeal; and the country’s biggest janitorial company faces new allegations of sexual abuse in the workplace.
Sanitation workers in the meatpacking industry face life-threatening dangers on the job; number of OSHA inspectors down under Trump; truckers feel the pressure to work while sleep-deprived; and despite increased demand for sexual harassment training, there’s little evidence it actually works.
An Oklahoma rehab center funnels forced free labor into private industry; the National Labor Relations Board reconsiders Obama-era union election rules; farmworkers at risk from California’s wildfire smoke; and domestic workers organize for greater labor rights in Seattle.
Local efforts help California nail salons create healthier working conditions; California court ruling a win for farm workers and labor unions; Milwaukee institutes new safety measures after a city employee is shot and killed; and flight attendants chronicle sexual harassment in the skies.
Environmental Health
Protecting the workers rebuilding Houston: ‘We must see them as full human beings who deserve fairness’
Even before the rains of Hurricane Harvey let up, Marianela Acuña Arreaza was mobilizing to protect the workers who would dig out and rebuild the city of Houston after catastrophe.