The Teamsters get ready to become a ‘sanctuary union’; a Florida bill would protect immigrant workers injured on the job; low-wage workers return to the streets to fight for $15; and the death of a social worker highlights the risks of occupational violence.
It’s unusual for a notice of proposed rulemaking to not include any quantitative analysis. Did the Trump administration not want to acknowledge that their proposal could lead to workers losing billions of dollars in tips each year?
NPR’s Howard Berkes reports today on more than 400 new cases of severe black lung disease in U.S. coal miners. CDC says it understates the problem–the cases are only from one region of coal country.
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.
Yolanda Baron Carmona, 52, and Maria Rodriguez, 46, are celebrating a victory for themselves and all of California’s hotel housekeepers. Soon the state will require lodging establishments to identify and address hazards that put housekeepers at risk of back injuries and other musculoskeletal disorders.
USDA has proposed a scheme to allow pork producers to run their slaughtering lines as fast as they want in exchange for conducting their own inspections. Worker safety and consumer protection will suffer.
President Trump’s despicable comments about immigrants got me thinking about the challenge of conducting research with farmworkers about working conditions. Many are unauthorized or have guestworker visas and likely reluctant to participate.
Two new papers describe the relationship between heat strain, dehydration, and acute kidney injury among U.S. farmworkers. The research describes a current health hazard that will only get worse with heat waves and the changing climate.
A report released this week by the National Academies calls on federal and state agencies to establish and strengthen the systems for assembling data on work-related injuries, illnesses, and exposure to hazards. The last report of this type was published more than 30 years ago by the National Research Council.
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.