tagged w/ Labor Department
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Republicans have their futures invested, not only in offshore and unnumbered Swiss bank accounts, but on the failure of President Obama to turn the economy around. When, in heavens’ name, will this torrent of bad tidings cease?
Five straight months, now! For the fifth month in a row, the unemployment rate has dropped! How, in God’s name, is Mitt Romney supposed to keep saying, with a straight face that President Obama’s policies are making things worse?
The Republicans need Obama to fail and fail real hard! They need to show themselves as American’s only salvation, riding to the rescue on a big white (yes, white) horse to save America from the communist, socialist, marxist, fascist, villainous, reckless, Kenyan Indonesian economic policies of this man whose first words to his Communist mother were allgedly “death to America.”
That’s the only reason Obama is improving the economy. To fool you into thinking he cares about you. It’s the same reason former National Rifle Association President Wayne LaPierre gave last September for Obama not pushing gun control. It’s all a massive conspiracyso he can come get your guns in the second term!
http://deepbrainmedia.com/2012/02/04/will-this-torrent-of-bad-news-for-republicans-never-cease/Republicans have their futures invested, not only in offshore and unnumbered Swiss... more
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There's a holiday coming up. It's...it's...30% Off at Penny's Day? Um, how about Toyota Salebration Marathon Day? No, that's not right. Small Business Entrepreneur Day? Damn! That's what happens in July. It's that holiday about working folk. CEO Bonus Week? Unemployment Office Stand-in-Line Day? Nah, ooo, ooo, it's right on the tip of my tongue...Labor Day!There's a holiday coming up. It's...it's...30% Off at Penny's Day?... more
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The Labor Department took an unprecedented step against a Kentucky coal mine Wednesday, asking that a federal judge shut it down immediately to protect the lives of those who work there.
In filing for a preliminary injunction in U.S. District Court, the government cites persistently dangerous conditions in Massey Energy's Freedom Mine No. 1 in Pike County. The action — the toughest enforcement action available to federal regulators — would shut down the mine until safety hazards are addressed and Massey Energy demonstrates it can operate the mine safely.
The Freedom Mine employs about 130 miners and was cited for safety violations more than 700 times this year alone.
The move is viewed by mine safety experts as one response to the deadly explosion in April at Massey's Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia. Twenty-nine mine workers died in that tragedy, which has triggered civil and criminal investigations.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130596700The Labor Department took an unprecedented step against a Kentucky coal mine... more
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(AP) The Labor Department intends to issue regulations this week ordering businesses to give gay employees equal treatment under a law permitting workers unpaid time off to care for newborns or loved ones.
Labor Secretary Hilda Solis planned to announce Wednesday that the government would require employers to extend the option that has been available to heterosexual workers for almost two decades, two officials briefed on the plan said Monday. Neither was authorized to speak publicly ahead of the announcement.
The move, coming less than five months before November's congressional elections, seemed likely to incite conservatives and Republicans who stood in lockstep against the Obama administration's earlier efforts to repeal a ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military. It also appeared likely to be popular with loyal Democrats and organized labor.
The Family and Medical Leave Act allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave each year to take care of loved ones or themselves. The 1993 law, which also allows employees to take time off for adoptions, has previously only been applied to heterosexual couples.
The Labor Department planned to extend those rights based on a new interpretation of the law, the officials said. There was no plan to ask Congress to change the law, which means future presidents could reverse the decision.
President Barack Obama and his administration have slowly rolled out policies to help gays and lesbians, who supported his candidacy but have soured on what they consider his slow pace in making incremental instead of wholesale changes. He planned to meet with gay activists Tuesday at the White House, the second time such a reception has been held at the executive mansion.
Gay activists have been frustrated with Obama's approach to gay policies. The White House reluctantly backed a compromise on the military's "don't ask don't tell" policy on gays in the military that would move ahead on repeal but still allow the Pentagon time to implement new policies.
Earlier this month, Obama issued orders for government agencies to extend child care services and expanded family leave to their workers. Obama's order for federal employees, though, covers only benefits that can be extended under existing law, without congressional action. Legislative action would be required for a full range of health care and other benefits.
Last year, Obama gave federal workers' same-sex partners a first round of benefits including visitation and dependent-care rights. He also authorized child-care services and subsidies; more flexibility to use family leave to attend to the needs of domestic partners and their children; relocation benefits; giving domestic partners the same status as family members when federal appointments are made; and access to credit union and other memberships when those are provided to federal workers.(AP) The Labor Department intends to issue regulations this week ordering businesses... more
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By Zach Carter, Media Consortium blogger
While the poor judgment of top-level officials at Treasury and the Office of Management and Budget frequently makes the news, there is another, unrecognized economic crew doing terrific work: Officials at the Department of Labor are restoring workers’ rights after nearly a decade of neglect.
To top it all off, President Barack Obama appears ready to make another set of strong, though less high-profile, economic appointments that will help rein in Wall Street excess.
DoL All-Stars
As Esther Kaplan documents in a masterful piece for The Nation, the Department of Labor (DoL) has been transformed from an agency that enabled corporate excess to one that holds companies accountable. In less than a year, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis and her team of deputies significantly leveled the playing field between ordinary workers and high-flying executives.
For decades, when conservatives have attempted to confront social problems, they’ve relied on the mantra of enforcement. If we had more cops, we’d fix everything. But as Kaplan documents, under President George W. Bush and his Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, the DoL simply stopped enforcing worker protection laws. From wage theft to mine safety, the Department essentially allowed corrupt employers to do anything they wanted.
That neglect has already ended. Armed with a budget of just $1.5 billion—that’s roughly 0.2% of the Troubled Asset Relief Program—Solis and company have cultivated a list of economic accomplishments that seemed impossible when they took office. As Kaplan details:
“Facing badly depleted enforcement ranks, Solis hired 710 additional enforcement staff, including 130 at OSHA and 250 for the crucial wage-and-hour division, upping inspectors by more than a third. Another hundred will come on next year to staff a crackdown on the misclassification of millions of employees as “independent contractors”–a dodge to avoid paying taxes and benefits–a move that has set off enormous buzz on business blogs. Her team took a plunger to the stagnant regulatory pipeline, moving forward new rules on coal mine dust, silica, and cranes and derricks. She restored prevailing wages for agricultural guest workers and is poised to restore reporting rules on ergonomic injuries.”
Fixing the Fed
Obama also appears ready to make another slate of strong economic appointments at the Federal Reserve, an agency stuffed with free-marketers who helped engineer both an economic catastrophe and resulting bailouts. Obama’s rumored picks—economists Janet Yellen and Peter Diamond and bank regulator Sarah Bloom Raskin—are aggressive about making the economy work for everyday citizens, as I emphasize for AlterNet.
If Congress passes financial reforms similar to what Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) has proposed, the Fed’s regulatory responsibilities will actually expand, despite its failures over the past decade. The Fed has never effectively regulated anything and it’s not very concerned with unemployment as an economic problem.
That makes Obama’s pending slate of officials who prioritize bank regulation and broader employment very important. Raskin, in particular, stands out with her strong record as a state banking regulator. If Obama ultimately nominates her, she’ll be the first pure regulator ever appointed to the Fed. The potential picks don’t make up for Obama’s reappointment of bailouteer Ben Bernanke as Federal Reserve Chairman, but they do show that the President is capable of sound judgment.
Strengthening the Dodd bill
But the strength of Obama’s potential Fed nominees doesn’t justify the weakness of Dodd’s financial regulation bill. As Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez of Democracy Now! reveal in interviews with economist Robert Johnson and ColorLines Editorial Director Kai Wright , the bill leaves plenty to be desired. Dodd is currently making the rounds and declaring that his bill will end the abuses giant banks deployed against the broader economy, but the truth is, the bill has largely been gutted by bank lobbyists. Here’s Johnson:
“We’re engaged in a Kabuki theater right now, hoping the material is too complex for the American people to understand, declaring victory, and yet basically encoding into law current practices of the banks. Every one of your listeners should ask the question, given this legislation, if the President, House and Senate pass it, will we be in a place where AIG couldn’t have happened, Lehman Brothers couldn’t have happened, Bear Stearns couldn’t have happened, and, more importantly, nine, ten percent unemployment caused by the banking crisis couldn’t have happened? I argue this bill does very little.”
The importance of trust-busting
So Dodd’s bill needs to be substantially strengthened as it moves through the Senate. But there’s plenty of other economic work to be done outside of Wall Street. As Barry C. Lynn and Phillip Longman explain for The Washington Monthly, the steady expansion of corporate monopolies has resulted in a fundamentally unstable economy.
The U.S. simply does not create jobs at the rate it once did, and companies aren’t held accountable to market forces like competition. Many of our monopolies are hidden, as Lynn and Longman note. Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s seem like competitors, but they’re owned by the same holding company. The same dynamic holds true in auto manufacturing, banking, pet food, health care and IT. Consumers think they’re choosing between competing goods and services, when in fact they’re shopping in different divisions of the same corporate Goliath.
All hope is not lost. As Laura Flanders emphasizes for GRITtv, the passage of health care reform proves that the Obama administration and Congress can make substantive progressive changes when they put their minds to it. The question is whether Obama is willing to limit his economic accomplishments to lower-level issues, or go big and take on the deep-pocketed corporate campaign contributors.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the economy by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Audit for a complete list of articles on economic issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, health care and immigration issues, check out The Mulch, The Pulse and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Zach Carter, Media Consortium blogger
While the poor judgment of top-level... more
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YPNation contributor Alex Hertel-Fernandez has a follow-up to his post on providing more federal protection to college students when it comes to loans. This time he takes a look at protection under the law from discrimination and harassment.
Here's an excerpt of what he had to say: "Students who can’t afford an unpaid internship don’t get the valuable leg-up they need in searching for employment after graduation.
But there is another, more serious problem with our system of internships. Unpaid interns (and many paid interns as well) are not protected by the civil rights laws that prevent against workplace discrimination and harassment. The primary test the legal system uses for determining whether or not a worker is protected under anti-discrimination laws is if the worker is compensated by his or her employer. No pay, no protection."
http://www.ypnation.net/no-so-equal-protection-unpaid-and-unprotected-internsYPNation contributor Alex Hertel-Fernandez has a follow-up to his post on providing... more
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During inspections throughout the state, investigators found workers living in unlicensed migrant labor camps with sewage from a faulty septic system seeping up near living units. They also discovered untreated waste water spilling out of broken pipes, no hot water for hand washing and infestations of bugs and rodents.
(AP, 2009, October 30, par.11)
The U.S. Department of Labor announced this week that a check of 35 randomly selected farms in Michigan led to eight of them being fined about $36,000 in all for violating federal migrant-housing and child-labor laws.
(AP, 2009, October 30, par.4)
Ten other farms were cited for violations but not fined. Adkin was the lone farm fined for both migrant-housing and child-labor law violations and paid more than $5,500 in penalties, said Scott Allen, a Labor Department spokesman based in Chicago.
(AP, 2009, October 30, par.5)
[more details at the link...]
[image: canr.msu.edu]
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33554339/ns/business-us_business/During inspections throughout the state, investigators found workers living in... more
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