August, 25 2020, 12:00am EDT
Union Workers Are Paid 11.2% More and Have Greater Access To Health Insurance and Paid Sick Days Than Their Nonunion Counterparts
Policymakers must strengthen workers’ ability to form unions, particularly during the coronavirus crisis.
WASHINGTON
A new report by the Economic Policy Institute discusses the importance of unions and workers' collective action in establishing an equitable economy, particularly during the coronavirus pandemic.
The authors find that unionized workers earn on average 11.2% more in wages than nonunionized peers (workers in the same industry and occupation with similar education and experience). Unionized Black workers are paid 13.7% more than their nonunionized peers, while unionized Hispanic workers are paid 20.1% more than their nonunionized peers. White workers represented by union are paid 8.7% more than their nonunionized peers. Additionally, 94% of workers covered by a union contract have access to employer-sponsored health benefits, compared with just 68% of nonunion workers and 91% of workers covered by a union contract have access to paid sick days, compared with 73% of nonunion workers.
However, in 2019, only 1 in 9 U.S. workers were covered by a union contract, while 48% of all nonunion workers who say they would vote for a union if given the opportunity
"The right to a union is a racial justice issue, as well as an economic justice issue," said Celine McNicholas, EPI's Director of Government Affairs and one of the report's authors. "Unions help shrink the Black-white wage gap, due to the dual facts that Black workers are more likely than white workers to be represented by a union, and Black workers who are in unions get a larger boost to wages from being in a union than white workers do. Unions also provide a crucial voice to workers in which they can address issues of discrimination and inequities at their workplace."
The report's authors explain that a badly broken system governing collective bargaining has eroded unions and worker power more broadly, contributing to both the suffering during the pandemic and the extreme economic inequality exacerbated by the pandemic. Despite efforts to push policy reforms, the U.S. entered the COVID-19 pandemic with a weak system of labor protections. As a result, working people, particularly low-wage workers--who are disproportionately women and workers of color--have largely borne the costs of the pandemic. While providing the "essential" services our economy relies on, many of these workers have been forced to work without protective gear, have no access to paid sick leave, and when workers have spoken up about health and safety concerns they have been fired.
"Now, more than ever, we need strong labor laws to protect working people from the health and economic impacts of the coronavirus pandemic," said Lynn Rhinehart, EPI Senior Fellow and one of the report's authors. "We need policymakers to use their power to halt and reverse the four-decades-old trend of rising inequality, while also creating meaningful reforms that help workers organize unions."
The authors--who also include EPI's Director of Policy Heidi Shierholz, Policy Associate Margaret Poydock, and Research Assistant Daniel Perez--recommend a slate of federal and state policy reforms to promote workers' collective power and grow union density. The Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act is a comprehensive set of reforms that would close loopholes in our labor law and strengthen workers' rights to organize. Additionally, their recommendations include passing the Public Sector Freedom to Negotiate Act and the Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act, which would give all public sector workers the right to collectively bargain and amending the National Labor Relations Act to give workers more power at every stage of the organizing process.
EPI is an independent, nonprofit think tank that researches the impact of economic trends and policies on working people in the United States. EPI's research helps policymakers, opinion leaders, advocates, journalists, and the public understand the bread-and-butter issues affecting ordinary Americans.
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'Important Step,' But Biden Bus and Truck Pollution Policy 'Falls Short'
"This rule could have provided relief to communities across the country by driving a more ambitious transition to zero-emissions technology, which is also what the climate crisis demands."
Mar 29, 2024
After being accused last week of caving to Big Auto and Big Oil on passenger car and light-duty truck pollution standards, the administration came under fire again on Friday for inadequate new rules on buses and freight trucks.
While the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency circulated some praise for the administration's announcement from some green groups and congressional Democrats, Earthjustice president Abigail Dillen said in a statement that "the EPA did not go far enough to protect communities from dangerous health impacts linked to heavy-duty truck pollution."
The rules will increasingly restrict the amount of pollution allowed for over 100 types of vehicles—from school, shuttle, and transit buses to delivery, public utility, and tractor-trailer trucks—for model years 2027 through 2032. The Washington Postnoted that unlike the proposal released last year, "the final rule will not require truck manufacturers to dramatically ramp up the production of cleaner vehicles until after 2030."
The EPA estimates the standards will prevent 1 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions in a country where transportation is the top source of planet-heating pollution and "provide $13 billion in annualized net benefits" for truck owners and operators, the changing climate, and the 72 million Americans—disproportionately those with low incomes and people of color—whose health is at risk because they live near freight routes.
"We have the technology to be more ambitious and missed the opportunity to do more to clean up the freight sector."
"Diesel trucks not only spew tons of carbon dioxide into the air, they also choke communities all along our freight corridors with deadly air pollution, including nitrogen oxides and soot emissions," said Dillen. "This rule could have provided relief to communities across the country by driving a more ambitious transition to zero-emissions technology, which is also what the climate crisis demands. Instead, truck manufacturers have pushed EPA to slow-walk this change."
Steven Higashide, director of the Clean Transportation Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, pointed out that "heavy- and medium-duty trucks make up only 10% of the vehicles on the road but contribute 28% of transportation-related global warming pollution, along with 45% of nitrogen oxides and 57% of fine particulate matter from on-road vehicles."
"Over 1,000 scientists called for the strongest possible rule and this rule falls short," he said. "We have the technology to be more ambitious and missed the opportunity to do more to clean up the freight sector, especially the heaviest and most polluting vehicles."
Not only does the United States have the technology, but "thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, we have the resources to modernize our freight system," noted Dillen, referring to a pair of landmark laws signed by President Joe Biden in 2022 and 2021.
"We will continue to push federal agencies to adopt standards and policies that will drive us towards zero-emissions trucks," she pledged. "In the absence of that federal leadership, EPA must quickly authorize strong state standards that will lead the way on cleaning up freight pollution, and work with the other federal agencies to deploy investments in freight-impacted communities to support state and local efforts to achieve broad freight electrification."
Guillermo Ortiz, clean vehicles advocate at the Natural Resources Defense Council, celebrated the public health and climate benefits of the EPA standards while similarly stressing that "this rule could have done more."
"Our nation needs a vision to eliminate pollution from the freight transportation system," Ortiz argued. "Every wheeze, every gasp for breath in communities impacted by the movement of freight serves as a reminder of the urgency to act. The federal government needs to fully address this scourge on our families."
"Every wheeze, every gasp for breath in communities impacted by the movement of freight serves as a reminder of the urgency to act."
Sierra Club president Ben Jealous—who previewed the EPA announcement in a Common Dreams opinion piece earlier this week—also welcomed the administration's attempt to "move the needle on electrifying our biggest, dirtiest vehicles" in a statement Friday.
"Despite the truck and oil industries' relentless lobbying to weaken and delay these lifesaving standards, the Biden administration's new emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks and buses are an important step to address this harmful pollution," Jealous said. However, like Dillen and Ortiz, he emphasized that "even more is needed to address heavy-duty vehicle pollution" and specifically expressed support for the federal government allowing states like California to impose stricter standards.
Evergreen Action vice president Craig Segall agreed that "EPA should now move forward to approve enforcement of the even more rigorous programs developed by the California Air Resources Board and adopted by states across the country to further drive reductions—and create opportunities for even more ambition in future federal standards."
"Federally, we especially need to see full support for electrification for all parts of the freight system, from warehouses to ports, from planes to ships—and will be looking for further work on trucking to complete the work that this rule begins," he continued.
Segall added that "the path is open for these historic actions because President Biden has taken a strategic all-of-government approach, pairing today's announcement with the new national zero-emission freight corridor strategy announced earlier this month."
While the Democratic president has endured criticism for various climate-related decisions during his first term—including refusing to declare a climate emergency, backing the Willow project and Mountain Valley Pipeline, continuing fossil fuel lease sales, and skipping last year's United Nations summit—he has also made high-profile efforts to tackle the global crisis such as signing landmark laws and pausing approvals for liquefied natural gas exports.
Meanwhile, former President Donald Trump, the presumptive GOP nominee for the November election, has pledged to "drill, baby, drill," and a study released earlier this month shows that compared with Biden's plans, the Republican getting a second term would lead to 4 billion more tons of carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere by 2030—the combined annual emissions of the European Union and Japan.
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In 'Major Victory for Voting Rights,' Texas Court Overturns Crystal Mason's Conviction
"I was thrown into this fight for voting rights and will keep swinging to ensure no one else has to face what I've endured for over six years," Mason said following her acquittal.
Mar 29, 2024
Crystal Mason, the Texas woman sentenced in 2018 to five years in prison for casting an illegal ballot in the 2016 election, was cleared Thursday by a state appeals court, which found no evidence that she knew she was ineligible to vote.
The 2nd Court of Appeals in Fort Worth formally acquitted Mason, a grandmother and mother of three who was on supervised release for felony tax fraud when she filled out a provisional ballot that was never counted in the 2016 presidential election. Her prosecution was based on an affidavit she signed before voting that required her to swear that she had "completed all my punishment including any term of incarceration, parole, supervision, period of probation, or I have been pardoned."
Mason's parole supervisor testified at her trial that no one from the office informed her that she was ineligible to vote.
"Crystal Mason was unfairly targeted because of bad faith actors in this state who are determined to use every tool at their disposal to attempt to intimidate voters, especially Black and Brown voters."
The court's ruling states that prosecutors' primary evidence "was that Mason read the words on the affidavit, but even if she had read them, they are not sufficient—even in the context of the rest of the evidence in this case—to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she actually knew that being on supervised release after having served her entire federal sentence of incarceration made her ineligible to vote by casting a provisional ballot when she did so."
Mason contended that she did not carefully read the affidavit and that she would never have risked her freedom by knowingly casting an illegal ballot.
"I am overjoyed to see my faith rewarded today," Mason said Thursday in a statement published by the ACLU. "I was thrown into this fight for voting rights and will keep swinging to ensure no one else has to face what I've endured for over six years, a political ploy where minority voting rights are under attack."
"I've cried and prayed every night for over six years straight that I would remain a free Black woman," Mason added. "I thank everyone whose dedication and support carried me through this time and look forward to celebrating this moment with my family and friends."
Christina Beeler, voting rights attorney at the Texas Civil Rights Project, said that "this ruling gives us hope not just for Ms. Mason, but for the broader fight for voting rights in Texas."
"Crystal Mason was unfairly targeted because of bad faith actors in this state who are determined to use every tool at their disposal to attempt to intimidate voters, especially Black and Brown voters, but that approach will not work here in Texas," she continued.
"We are proud to have assisted in securing Ms. Mason's freedom, and we are proud of Ms. Mason—instead of intimidating Ms. Mason through her unlawful prosecution, the state has empowered Ms. Mason to continue fighting for voting rights alongside other advocates," Beeler added.
Sophia Lin Lakin, director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project, said: "Crystal Mason has bravely fought this grave injustice for years now. No one should be forced to endure what she has, and Crystal's victory today is an inspiration and cause for celebration."
Mason's case attracted international attention and widespread condemnation, with voting rights defenders comparing her conviction and sentencing to white offenders who received more lenient punishments.
For example, Russ Casey, a justice of the peace in the same county where Mason was convicted, admitted to submitting fake signatures on documents required to secure a spot on a primary ballot. Initially sentenced to two years behind bars, Casey had his punishment reduced to five years' probation. He also resigned from his job.
On Wednesday, a Georgia judge ruled that Brian Pritchard—a vice-chair of the state Republican Party, right-wing talk show host, and prominent 2020 election denier—voted illegally nine times from 2008-10 while he was on probation for felony check forging. Pritchard will not serve any prison time; instead he was fined $5,000 and will receive a public reprimand from the State Election Board.
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Low-Paid Immigrant Farmworkers Most at Risk From Toxic Weedkiller US Refuses to Ban
Farmworkers "should not be subjected to additional health risks due to the negligent actions of pesticide manufacturers, farm owners, and state regulatory agencies," said one analyst.
Mar 29, 2024
Concerns about the safety of paraquat, a highly toxic herbicide, pushed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2021 to ban its use on golf courses—but the weedkiller is still permitted for agricultural use, and a new first-of-its-kind analysis shows how the EPA's continued approval of the substance has put low-income Latino communities at disproportionate risk for health impacts.
The Environmental Working Group (EWG) found in a study released Wednesday that 5.3 million pounds of paraquat were sprayed over a five-year period in California, the only state with readily available figures on the herbicide.
Most of the weedkiller's use was concentrated in central counties where farms produce almonds, walnuts, alfalfa, and other crops—and where Latino people make up about 75% of the population and nearly the entire farm labor force.
Ninety-six percent of farmworkers in the state are Latino, and 90% of people in the agricultural workforce were born outside of the U.S., making immigrants who often work for low wages among the people who are most affected by continued use of paraquat on farms.
The ingestion of a single teaspoon of paraquat is considered deadly, which has led 60 countries to ban the chemical while the EPA released an analysis in January concluding that its health risks were outweighed by the economic benefits of using paraquat.
The weedkiller has been linked to non-Hodgkin lymphoma, respiratory damage, kidney disease, and childhood leukemia. Al Rabine, an analyst for EWG who authored the report, said the EPA has also ignored a "mountain of evidence" that paraquat causes Parkinson's disease.
An epidemiological study of central California found that people living within a third of a mile of where paraquat is sprayed are twice as likely to develop Parkinson's.
"Paraquat is not only a threat to our environment but also a direct danger to the health and well-being of these communities, particularly Latino populations, who make up the majority of the population," said Rabine. "The findings of our analysis underscore the urgent need for action by the state to protect these communities from the harmful effects of exposure to this toxic weedkiller."
Between 2017-21, EWG found, about 80% of the paraquat used on California crops was sprayed within Latino-majority census tracts. The group identified Kern County and the towns of Shafter and Wasco as "hot spots" for paraquat use.
"These three communities combined have over 80% Latino residents who witnessed almost 180,000 pounds of paraquat spraying during that time period," the group said.
In Kern County, which has a poverty rate of nearly 30%, EWG found that 1.2 million pounds of the herbicide were sprayed over roughly 1,200 square miles of farmland—threatening not only laborers who completed the work but also farmworkers who live in the surrounding communities, as paraquat can remain in soil and travel through the air—as well as coming home with workers on their clothing and potentially exposing their families.
EWG identified five "fatal flaws" in the analysis the EPA has used to defend its continued approval of paraquat for farming, including:
- Ignoring new evidence about the potential health impacts of paraquat that has come out of legal action against its manufacturer, the Switzerland-based and Chinese-owned Syngenta;
- Ignoring the fact that paraquat use is largely concentrated in specific communities inhabited largely by low-income Latino farmworkers;
- Excluding from its safety analysis paraquat applications that can drift through the aid, especially on windy days;
- Failing to consider the health and environmental costs to farm owners, workers, and people who live near farmland; and
- Dismissing a growing body of research linking paraquat to Parkinson's, including 90 articles of evidence and "cutting edge studies" submitted by the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research.
EWG called on the EPA to follow the lead of dozens of countries that have banned paraquat—but warned that states must not wait for the federal government to take action.
"Federal pesticide law sets a floor, not a ceiling—states can choose to restrict a chemical, even without an EPA ban," wrote EWG government affairs manager Geoff Horsfield and toxicologist Alexis Temkin. "To protect their residents and public health, state and local governments should exercise their power to ban paraquat."
Immigrant communities across central California, Horsfield said, "should not be subjected to additional health risks due to the negligent actions of pesticide manufacturers, farm owners, and state regulatory agencies."
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