Subscribe to the Belabored RSS feed here. Support the podcast on Patreon. Subscribe and rate on iTunes, Stitcher, and Spotify. Tweet at @DissentMag with #Belabored to share your thoughts, or join the conversation on Facebook. Check out the full archive here. Belabored is produced by Casey Stone.

Migration is almost always connected to work, and is usually the product of some combination of aspiration and desperation, ambition and escape. Saket Soni’s new book, The Great Escape, recounts the journey of a group of Indian migrant workers who came to the Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, on the promise of jobs that would help rebuild the region. Instead, they were roped into a convoluted transnational labor trafficking enterprise.

Written as a nonfiction thriller/memoir from the point of view of Soni, who organized the workers to hold their captors accountable, The Great Escape tells the story of how they collaborated with local activists to free themselves from bondage and advocate for their rights. But the narrative of escape intersects with the workers’ stories at multiple angles: not only did they have to escape physical captivity, they were also on a much longer quest to escape poverty and social pressures in their homeland; the hierarchies of race, citizenship and culture that ensnared them in the United States; the talons of immigration enforcement; and their own self doubt. Soni now heads Resilience Force, which aims to change the way the country responds to disasters by supporting the workers who help communities cope with the rebuilding, healthcare, and social needs that emerge after disaster.

In other news, we look at Dollar General workers organizing in Louisiana, with NOLA Dollar General worker David Williams; an Amazon workers’ opera in St. Louis; the impact of the debt ceiling deal on older people and student debtors; and hardships facing aging workers.

Thank you for listening to our 267th episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected].

This season of Belabored is supported in part by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.

News

Gabrielle Fonrouge, Activist firms call on Dollar General, Dollar Tree to improve worker safety, wages, CNBC

Michael Corkery, Dollar General Is Deemed a ‘Severe Violator’ by the Labor Dept., New York Times

Sarah Fenske, New ‘Workers Opera’ Is About How Much Working for Amazon Sucks, Riverfront Times

Alex Fees, St. Peters warehouse worker takes safety message to Amazon shareholders, KSDK 5 On Your Side

Matt Bruenig, The Debt Ceiling Deal Is an “F You” to Poor People, Jacobin

Kamaron McNair, ‘This bill does end the payment pause’: What the debt ceiling deal means for student loan borrowers, CNBC

Monique Morrissey, Many older workers have difficult jobs that put them at risk: Working longer is not a viable solution to the retirement crisis, Economic Policy Institute

Conversation

Saket Soni, The Great Escape: A True Story of Forced Labor and Immigrant Dreams in America, Algonquin Books

Farah Stockman, When $20,000 Gets You Exploited in America, New York Times

Sarah and Michelle: Belabored Podcast #50: The Future of Work, with Saket Soni, Dissent 

Resilience Force 

The post Belabored: How Workers Escape, with Saket Soni appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

Subscribe to the Belabored RSS feed here. Support the podcast on Patreon. Subscribe and rate on iTunes, Stitcher, and Spotify. Tweet at @DissentMag with #Belabored to share your thoughts, or join the conversation on Facebook. Check out the full archive here. Belabored is produced by Casey Stone.

The miners’ strike in the early 1980s was a turning point for British labor. The defeat of the powerful National Union of Mineworkers at the hands of Margaret Thatcher signaled open season on organized workers, and it was accomplished in part through the use of new and brutal police tactics. These days, the strike is back across Britain, with workers fighting for and in many cases winning inflation-busting wage hikes and improved conditions, driving out bad bosses, and demanding recognition for all that “essential” work during the pandemic. Today’s Conservative government is attempting to take a page from Thatcher’s book to crush the unions any way they can, including with new legislation designed to drastically curtail the right to strike.

This week, we take a step back and consider the strike wave in the context of that history, with longtime organizer Joe Rollin with Unite the Union, and journalist, author, and filmmaker Morag Livingstone, co-author of Charged: How the Police try to Suppress Protest.

We also hear about some new rights for workers thanks to the Minnesota state legislature, what the Rutgers unions won, the latest on the struggles of Starbucks workers with Evan Sunshine of Starbucks Workers United, and warehouse workers’ fight for safe conditions.

Thank you for listening to our 266th episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected].

This season of Belabored is supported in part by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.

News

Matt Dougherty, Cornell Students Organize to Kick Starbucks off Campus, Ithaca.com

Irene Tung, Fighting for Safe Work: Injury Data Show Urgent Need for Intervention in NY State’s Warehouses, National Employment Law Project

P. Kenneth Burns, ‘We have to continue to teach this university a lesson’: 3 Rutgers faculty unions vote to ratify contract, but say ‘unfinished business’ remains, WHYY

Mary Ann Koruth, Here are the raises, new benefits included in Rutgers union contracts approved today, Northjersey.com

Abdirahman Muse, Emma Greenman, and Erin Murphy, Minnesota Enacts Landmark Protections for Amazon Warehouse Workers, The Nation

Max Nesterak, Minnesota lawmakers approve 9 major worker-friendly changes, Minnesota Reformer

Matt Butler, Starbucks closing last two Ithaca locations, union fight brewing, The Ithaca Voice

Conversation

Unite the Union

Charged: How the Police try to Suppress Protest

Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign

Protect the Right to Strike

The post Belabored: Reviving the Strike in Britain, with Morag Livingstone and Joe Rollin appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

Subscribe to the Belabored RSS feed here. Support the podcast on Patreon. Subscribe and rate on iTunes, Stitcher, and Spotify. Tweet at @DissentMag with #Belabored to share your thoughts, or join the conversation on Facebook. Check out the full archive here. Belabored is produced by Casey Stone.

Almost exactly thirty-one years ago, Los Angeles was burning as several days of civil unrest erupted in the wake of the acquittal of the police officers who had brutally beaten Rodney King. It was not just an impulsive uprising fueled by rage at police brutality but a reflection of many years, if not decades, of a simmering urban crisis in which social disinvestment, deindustrialization, and deep segregation turned the city into an economically and racially polarized landscape, with the police serving as chief enforcers of a brutal social hierarchy. In this episode, we talk about working-class Los Angeles before and after the civil unrest of 1992—and how the city’s labor movement reflects and grapples with the scars of historical injustice.

The late Mike Davis examined the racial, cultural, and political divisions of Los Angeles in his seminal work on the city, City of Quartz. We revisit that text and the events of 1992 with Tobias Higbie, associate director of UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, and Kent Wong, director of the UCLA Labor Center, to discuss how the city’s structural inequities continue to shape its labor struggles in sectors from the classrooms to the docks. 

In other news, we look at the Hollywood writers’ strike, teachers’ strikes across England with Vik Chechi-Ribeiro of NEU Manchester, African tech workers organizing, and South Asian Americans mobilizing against caste discrimination with Karthikeyan Shanmugam of the Ambedkar King Study Circle.

Thank you for listening to our 265th episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected].

This season of Belabored is supported in part by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.

News

John Koblin, Brooks Barnes, and Nicole Sperling, Hollywood, Both Frantic and Calm, Braces for Writers’ Strike, New York Times

Daniel Arkin, Hollywood writers go on strike after contract negotiations fail, NBC 

Sakshi Venkatraman, California is one step closer to banning caste-based discrimination, NBC 

Richard Adams, Schools across England close as teachers vow to continue strikes, Guardian 

Vik Chechi-Ribeiro, The NEU strike – Winning a rank-and-file led union, Notes From Below 

Billy Perrigo, 150 African Workers for ChatGPT, TikTok and Facebook Vote to Unionize at Landmark Nairobi Meeting, Time  

OpenAI Used Kenyan Workers on Less Than $2 Per Hour, Time

Conversation

Kent Wong, Director, UCLA Labor Center

Tobias Higbie, Associate Director, UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment

Mike Davis, Realities of the Rebellion, Against the Current 

Cindi Katz, Neil Smith, and Mike Davis, L. A. Intifada: Interview with Mike Davis, Social Text

Ruth Milkman, Immigrant Organizing and the New Labor Movement in Los Angeles, Critical Sociology

Corina Knoll, Adeel Hassan, and Shawn Hubler, Los Angeles Schools and 30,000 Workers Reach Tentative Deal After Strike, New York Times 

Sarah and Michelle, Belabored: L.A. Teachers Shut It Down, with Alex Caputo-Pearl, Dissent

Sarah Jaffe, What Rydell High School Can Teach Us about the LA Teachers Strike, Nation

Michelle Chen, Warehouse Workers of Los Angeles, Unite!, Nation

City on the Edge, HERE Local 11

The post Belabored: Los Angeles, 1992, Revisited with Tobias Higbie and Kent Wong appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

Subscribe to the Belabored RSS feed here. Support the podcast on Patreon. Subscribe and rate on iTunes, Stitcher, and Spotify. Tweet at @DissentMag with #Belabored to share your thoughts, or join the conversation on Facebook. Check out the full archive here. Belabored is produced by Casey Stone.

The wave of unionization continues apace across the United States and elsewhere in the world, but there’s often much less attention paid to the part of the process that comes after the winning of a union election: the bargaining of a contract. It can seem like the hard part is over when the votes are counted, but our guest this week reminds us that the hard part is just beginning. If that sounds daunting, well, Jane McAlevey is here to share her knowledge of how to make that hard part, if not easier, at least to help you succeed. McAlevey is a longtime organizer and organizing theorist,  the founder of the massively popular online trainings, Organizing for Power, supported by the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, and the author and co-author of several books and many reports and articles on the art of worker organizing. Her newest book, with Abby Lawlor, is titled Rules to Win By: Power and Participation in Union Negotiations, and she joins us to talk about using big, open, democratic bargaining tactics to win major gains at the table and in the contract. 

We also check in with Donna Murch of Rutgers AAUP-AFT on the multi-union, 9,000-worker strike at Rutgers University in New Jersey, and hear from Katie Wells on a new report on the conditions of Doordash drivers. And we hear about the firing of a union leader (and former Belabored guest) at Planned Parenthood North Central States, and the junior doctors and nurses’ strikes fighting to save the British National Health Service.

Thank you for listening to our 264th episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected].

This season of Belabored is supported in part by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.

News

Daniel Han, ‘Pissed off’: Rutgers unions mull resuming strike amid mounting frustration over finalizing contract, Politico

Noah Lanard, Why Rutgers Faculty Are Striking for the First Time in 257 Years, Mother Jones

Sarah, “Injury to All” at Rutgers University, Dissent

Katie Wells and Isabella Stratta, The Instant Delivery Workplace in D.C., Beeck Center

Michelle, Transcript: Courier Class War, with Antonio Solis, Dissent

Anne Rumberger, Abortion Rights Are Workers’ Rights, Jacobin  

Sarah and Michelle, Belabored: Game Workers Unite and Win, with Emma Kinema, Dissent

Sarah and Michelle, Belabored: Reproductive Justice Is Labor Justice, Dissent

Dan Zahedi, Junior Doctors Will Fight as Long as It Takes, Tribune

George Walker, Nurses Tell of Disappointment With Latest NHS Pay Offer, Novara

Aubrey Allegretti, Denis Campbell, Kiran Stacey, and Jamie Grierson, Nurses will strike again in England after voting to reject government pay deal, Guardian

Conversation

Jane McAlevey

Organizing for Power

Jane McAlevey, Getting to Contract: Negotiating and Winning Against the Odds, The Nation

Sarah, After a Union Election Victory Comes the Hard Part, The Progressive

The post Belabored: How to Bargain for Power, with Jane McAlevey appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

Subscribe to the Belabored RSS feed here. Support the podcast on Patreon. Subscribe and rate on iTunes, Stitcher, and Spotify. Tweet at @DissentMag with #Belabored to share your thoughts, or join the conversation on Facebook. Check out the full archive here. Belabored is produced by Casey Stone.

When you hear the words “child labor,” your mind may go to the turn-of-the-century photographs taken by Jacob Riis and Lewis Hine of the grim lives of tiny laborers toiling in mines and urban sweatshops. Or you may think about the children in Africa or South Asia who dig for precious metals or harvest crops on plantations; their exploitation is the target of many international human-rights campaigns and condemnations from various Global North governments. But recent news reports have revealed that child labor is alive and well in the United States in 2023. Fueled in large part by the influx of migrants from Central America, many “unaccompanied minors,” or children living with relatives, have to work to support families back home. Meanwhile, some politicians are actively working to undermine existing child labor restrictions—as weak as they already are—under the pretext that giving businesses the flexibility to employ child workers for longer hours and with less oversight is actually beneficial for society. 

Jack Hodgson, a visiting professor in history at the University of Roehampton, joins the podcast to discuss child labor throughout U.S. history and in the context of labor and civil rights struggles that continue to this day.

In other news, we look at Brandon Johnson’s victory in the Chicago mayoral race and the legacy of the Chicago Teachers Union; a new union drive by New York University contract faculty with Hannah Gurman; the school service workers’ strike in Los Angeles; and why France is on fire over pension policies. 

Thank you for listening to our 263rd episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected].

Belabored’s tenth season is supported in part by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.

News

Micah Uetricht, The Movement That Made Brandon Johnson Mayor of Chicago, The Nation

Kari Lydersen, Brandon Johnson Won the Race for Chicago’s Mayor By Loving and Fighting for the City, In These Times

Sara Wexler, Full-Time Contingent Faculty at New York University Are Trying to Unionize, Jacobin

Angelique Chrisafis, Hundreds of thousands of people take to French streets amid fears of violence, Guardian

Ellen Francis and Claire Parker, Why French workers are fighting to retire at 62, Washington Post 

Jon Peltz, In Los Angeles, 60,000 Education Workers Just Went on Strike and Won Big, Jacobin  

Megan Giovannetti and Jasmin Joseph, “If They Strike, We Won’t Cross the Picket Line”: LA Teachers And Service Workers Unite, In These Times

Conversation

Jack Hodgson, Child labor remains a problem in the United States, Washington Post

Hannah Dreier, Alone and Exploited, Migrant Children Work Brutal Jobs Across the U.S., New York Times

The post Belabored: Child Labor, Child Strikes, with Jack Hodgson appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

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As we wind 2022 and our COVID-19 series to a close, our struggles around pandemic work are anything but over. We’re seeing upticks in unionization, strikes, and other forms of workplace resistance. We’re also seeing workers quitting so-called “essential” jobs at record rates, leaving their former coworkers in the unenviable position of picking up the slack while also battling to improve their conditions—and those of the people they care for. Teachers and nurses have been at the heart of all these struggles, on top of pre-pandemic labor shortages and constant admonitions to “do more with less,” so to wrap up our year and our in-depth COVID-19 reporting, we invited two rank-and-file leaders from those fields to join us for a live episode, recorded December 15 via Zoom.

Elizabeth Lalasz is a registered nurse, union steward, and professional practice committee member with National Nurses United. She has worked three times on COVID-19 units over the course of the pandemic. Jia Lee has been a special education teacher for over twenty years in the New York City Department of Education and has served as a union chapter leader since 2005. She is a steering member of the Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE), a caucus within the United Federation of Teachers, and a steering member of Black Lives Matter at Schools, NYC.

Thank you for listening to our 262nd episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected]

Conversation

Elizabeth Lalasz

Jia Lee

Sarah Jaffe and Michelle Chen, Belabored: Is it Safe to Go Back to School? Dissent

Sarah Jaffe, What If Nurses Ran the Healthcare System? Dissent

Sarah Jaffe, How the New York City School System Failed the Test of Covid-19, The Nation

Michelle Chen, For Some Workers, Schools Never Closed, The Nation

Sarah Jaffe, The Great Ungrieving, The New York Review of Books

Michelle Chen, Educators March to Get NYPD out of NYC Schools, Dissent

Sarah Jaffe, Schools Reopen — and Teachers Fight for Their Lives, Their Students, and the Future of Public Education, Rethinking Schools

Michelle Chen, Teachers’ Aides Adjust to the COVID Classroom, Dissent

Sarah Jaffe, How the Attack on Teachers Threatens the Future of Public Schools, Rethinking Schools

Michelle Chen, Deregulated Under Trump, Nursing Homes Are Becoming COVID Morgues, Truthout

Sarah Jaffe, First, Nurses Saved Our Lives—Now They’re Saving Our Health Care, The Nation

Michelle Chen, The Bereavement of Elder Care, Dissent

Sarah Jaffe and C.M. Lewis, Nurses Are Striking Across the Country Over Patient Safety, The Nation

Thanks to the Ford Foundation of Social Justice for sponsoring this series.

The post Belabored: Essential Workers in Crisis, with Elizabeth Lalasz and Jia Lee appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

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You may not see many signs in everyday life that the pandemic is still ongoing these days; mask mandates have been removed, social gatherings have resumed, and employers are pushing workers to return to in-person work. But for several million people across the United States, the pandemic is still assaulting their bodies and minds—with chronic pain, respiratory problems, cognitive issues, fatigue, and other hard-to-treat symptoms. For more than two years, people living with “long COVID,” or “longhaulers,” have largely had to struggle on their own to access medical treatment, disability benefits, and workplace accommodations, and have often faced discrimination and disbelief when trying to advocate for their rights as patients and workers.

While there is still much scientists do not understand about the illness, long COVID is profoundly changing the way people work, often intersecting with other forms of discrimination, income inequality, and systemic barriers to healthcare and leave time. We spoke with Rebecca L. Jacobs, Director of Community Support for the COVID-19 Longhauler Advocacy Project, and Kimberly Knackstedt, Co-Director of the Disability Economic Justice Collaborative at The Century Foundation, about long COVID as an issue of labor rights and disability justice, and how our systems of worker protection and disability support need to change.

In other news, we look at a win for British Telecom workers, Congress blocking railroad workers from striking and denying them sick days, and New School and University of California academic workers and Twitter janitors on strike.

To wrap up our in-depth series on the ongoing pandemic’s effect on workers, we’re going to be doing a special end-of-year live show on December 15, 7 p.m. (EST). We’ll be joined by two rank-and-file leaders in nursing and public school teaching: Elizabeth Lalasz and Jia Lee. Register here.

Thank you for listening to our 261st episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected]

News

Katy Stech Ferek and Esther Fung, Senate Votes 80-15 to Pass Bill Blocking Nationwide Railroad Strike, Wall Street Journal

Ross Grooters and Jonah Furman, Railroad Engineer on the Imposed Contract: “It Really Fell Short of Railroad Workers’ Needs,” Jacobin

Dani Anguiano, Closed labs, cancelled classes: inside the largest strike to hit US higher education, The Guardian

Claudia Irizarry Aponte, The New School and Part-Time Faculty Go Into Mediation as Strike Enters Third Week, The City

Miles Hamberg, The New School Staff Are Still Striking for a Fair Deal, The Progressive

Ryan Mancini, Twitter lays off janitors on strike weeks before Christmas holiday, MassLive

Sergio Quintana, Janitors Locked Out of Twitter Headquarters Without Warning, Join Picket Line, NBC Bay Area

‘Bank the money and our collective strength,’ BT Group members urged, as ballot begins on company’s ‘final’ pay offer, Communication Workers Union

Mark Sweney, BT awards tens of thousands of staff £1,500 as strikes end, The Guardian

Conversation

Rebecca L. Jacobs, Director of Community Support for the COVID-19 Longhauler Advocacy Project

Kimberly Knackstedt, Co-Director of the Disability Economic Justice Collaborative at the Century Foundation

Kimberly Knackstedt, Why the COVID-19 Pandemic Isn’t Over, The Century Foundation

Patient-Led Research Collaborative

Ryan Prior, Rebecca Vallas, and Kimberly Knackstedt, The Long Haul: Q&A About Long COVID and the Future of Disability Policy, The Century Foundation

Natalie Shure, We Might Have Long Covid All Wrong, The New Republic

Thanks to the Ford Foundation of Social Justice for sponsoring this series.

The post Belabored: When COVID Never Ends appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

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This podcast is coming to you the week of Thanksgiving in the United States, and while many of you might be listening after a relaxing meal and day off work, for retail and grocery store workers, the holiday just means extra stress, crowded stores, long lines, and Black Friday sales. Continuing our series on the workers who have borne the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic, we talk to a couple of the people who make holidays go smoothly: Cynthia Murray, a longtime Walmart worker and founder of United 4 Respect, and Lisa Harris, longtime Kroger worker and member of UFCW Local 400. They talk to us about the lack of respect given to so-called “essential” workers, the added stress of the holidays, and why workers need a seat at the table in determining sick policies.

We also learn about a new union for service workers in the South and the latest on the possibility of a rail strike in the United States, the conditions of the workers who built the World Cup, and a big win for some of our recent guests, the Liverpool dockworkers.

Thank you for listening to our 260th episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected]

News

Lena Geller, Service Workers in NC, Other Southern States Launch a Union, INDY Week

Union of Southern Service Workers

Hundreds of dock workers in Liverpool return to work after dispute ends following pay offer, ITV News

Liverpool dockers celebrate major victory after Unite secures pay deal worth between 14.3% and 18.5%, Unite the Union 

Astha Rajvanshi, Why U.K. Nurses Voted to Strike for the First Time Ever—and What That Means for Hospitals, TIME

Holly Turner, I’ve been an NHS nurse for 15 years. Here’s why I’m going on strike, openDemocracy

“If we complain, we are fired”: Discrimination and Exploitation of Migrant Construction Workers on FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 Stadium Sites, Equidem

Chris Isidore and Vanessa Yurkevich, America faces a possible rail strike in two weeks after largest union rejects labor deal, CNN

Conversation

Walmart 2021 Pandemic Workforce Advisory Council Proposal, United 4 Respect

Siddharth Cavale and Richa Naidu, Walmart halves paid leave for COVID-positive workers, Reuters

Albert Samaha, They Fed America During Lockdown. Nearly Two Years Later, Many Grocery Workers Can’t Make Ends Meet, BuzzFeed News 

Sarah Jaffe, What Happened to Kroger’s “Hero Pay”? Dissent 

Thanks to the Ford Foundation of Social Justice for sponsoring this series.

The post Belabored: Pandemic Black Fridays are Twice as Tiring, with Cynthia Murray and Lisa Harris appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

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While the pandemic brought turmoil and massive job losses to many sectors of the economy, some industries flourished during the many months of lockdowns, quarantines, and remote work and schooling. We came to rely on Zoom and Amazon as basic means of communication and consumption, and when it came to staying fed, many of us turned to food platforms like Grubhub, DoorDash, or Uber Eats. Food couriers became part of the essential workforce of the pandemic, toiling for long hours on the streets and often putting their own health at risk to serve the public.

With many people seeking work after restaurants and other businesses shuttered, the ranks of delivery workers expanded massively, as did the health and safety risks endemic to their trade. Many began organizing to improve their pay and seek more protections at work. The transnational struggles of couriers sparked innovative ways of networking and mobilizing, as workers discovered they could use their phones not just to pick up gigs but also to connect with fellow couriers. To learn more about organizing food delivery labor during the pandemic, we spoke with Antonio Solis, a member of Los Deliveristas Unidos—an organization of app-based delivery workers in New York City—and with Ahmed Hafezi and John Kirk, Deliveroo couriers and organizers with the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain.

Read a transcript of Michelle’s interview with Antonio Solis here.

In other news, we look at allegations of worker abuse in the House of Bezos, the Gannett newsroom strikes, Chinese iPhone workers struggling under a COVID-19 lockdown, and labor ballot measures. 

Thank you for listening to our 259th episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected]

News

David K. Li and Diana Dasrath, Housekeeper’s claims that Jeff Bezos made staff go ‘without rest or meal breaks’ are without merit, his lawyer says, NBC News

Josh Eidelson, Lawyer Suing Twitter Over Layoffs Says Musk Trying to Comply, Bloomberg News

Sam Hancock, Apple: Chinese workers flee Covid lockdown at iPhone factory, BBC News

New York rally in solidarity with Foxconn workers; Apple’s new statement hides the truth, change.org 

Aaron Morrison, Slavery, involuntary servitude rejected by 4 states’ voters, AP News

Daniel Wiessner, Voters in Illinois, Tennessee approve dueling measures on union membership, Reuters

Pittsburgh Union Progress

Gannett Union Press

Conversation

Los Deliveristas Unidos

Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain

Michelle Chen, Los Deliveristas Unidos Demand Justice, Dissent

Michelle Chen, Your Rent or Your Life, The Nation

Sarah Jaffe and Michelle Chen, Belabored: Riding for Deliveroo, with Callum Cant, Dissent

Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura, Food Delivery Apps Are Booming. Their Workers Are Often Struggling, New York Times

The Transnational Courier Federation, Notes From Below

Thanks to the Ford Foundation of Social Justice for sponsoring this series.

The post Belabored: Courier Class War appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

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This week begins our new series on workers and the pandemic. While politicians and many people would like to pretend that COVID-19 is over, for so many workers the damage done by the virus and the inadequate response continues to compound. For the rest of the year, we’ll be talking in depth with people who work in industries that have borne the brunt of the risk, the pain, and the grief of the pandemic in America. And we’ll be wrapping the series up with a virtual live event!   This week, we spoke with Kellie Benson, senior mental health coordinator at Allina Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis and a member of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa. Healthcare workers are, of course, the first people we think of when we think of the impact of COVID-19, but the mental health pandemic that has come alongside the virus is less often discussed, and for mental healthcare workers, the two issues are deeply intertwined. Benson tells us about how her work has changed, and the ongoing struggle of mental health workers for fair pay, safe staffing, and support on the job.   In the news, we look at a general strike in Palestine and the victory of Oklahoma City Apple Store workers, a nationwide strike vote for British university workers and a union drive at Netflix.  

Thank you for listening to our 258th episode! If you like the show, you can support us on Patreon with a monthly contribution, at the level that best suits you.

If you’re interested in advertising on the show, please email [email protected]. And as always, if you have any questions, comments, or tips, email us at [email protected]

News

Netflix Music Supervisors File for Unionization Election at Labor Board, International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees

Jazz Tangcay, Netflix Music Supervisors Seek Unionization Vote, Variety

Noam Scheiber, Apple Store in Oklahoma City Becomes Second to Unionize, New York Times

University staff vote for UK-wide strike action in historic ballot, University and College Union

Sally Weale, UK university staff vote for strike action over pay, conditions and pensions, The Guardian

Mariam Barghouti and Yumna Patel, What is happening in the West Bank right now: a full breakdown, Mondoweiss

Palestinians strike in West Bank, Jerusalem over Israel killings, Al Jazeera

Sarah and Michelle: Belabored: General Strike in Palestine, Dissent

Conversation

SEIU Healthcare Minnesota & Iowa

Kiya Edwards, Mental health workers announce one-day walkout strike, KARE 11

Max Nesterak, Mental health workers launch 3-day strike at Allina hospitals in Twin Cities, Minnesota Reformer

Thanks to the Ford Foundation of Social Justice for sponsoring this series.

The post Belabored: Mental Health Workers’ Double Pandemic, with Kellie Benson appeared first on Dissent Magazine.

Labor journalists discuss media coverage of the recent strike wave in Britain.

The post Belabored: The Death and Life of Labor Journalism appeared first on Dissent Magazine.