Striking Amazon for the Holidays
Amazon workers at seven warehouses walked off the job starting yesterday, in a major escalation of the Teamsters’ efforts to organize the company. In New York, the strikers faced repression from the police.
276 Article(s) by: Alex N. Press
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Alex N. Press is a staff writer at Jacobin who covers labor organizing.
US Unions Take on Artificial Intelligence
The labor movement has a special responsibility to confront artificial intelligence’s imposition on workers: without unions, bosses have carte blanche to use AI to undercut workers at every level.
Timothy Pearson Is the Kind of Guy Eric Adams Loves
Former NYPD sergeant Timothy Pearson allegedly spent his time in the Eric Adams administration threatening and sexually harassing people and bragging about kickbacks. The mayor still let him oversee the safety of one of the city’s most vulnerable populations.
Uber and Lyft Found a Loophole to Pay NYC Drivers Less
Uber and Lyft have found a new way to evade a New York City law guaranteeing rideshare drivers a minimum wage. Since June, drivers say they’ve been arbitrarily locked out of apps when they want to work — setting the companies up to save hundreds of millions.
Getting Renters Organized
In Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis, two cofounders of the LA Tenants Union offer an account of housing, tenancy, the connections between labor and renters’ organizing, and what the authors call the “centuries-long war on tenants.”
Climate Change–Induced Disasters Are Killing Workers
Eleven of Impact Plastics’ workers were at the company’s Tennessee factory when Hurricane Helene hit. Two are confirmed dead, and four are still missing. Workers say the company did not let them leave until it was too late.
The First East Coast Longshore Strike in Half a Century Is On
After a monthslong impasse between the longshore workers’ union and its employers, 47,000 ILA workers from docks along the East and Gulf coasts have struck. Billions of dollars’ worth of goods won’t move until they return to work.
Eric Adams Said Crime Is Out of Control. He Would Know.
Eric Adams is now the first sitting New York mayor to face criminal charges. Yet his worst actions — cutting budgets for schools, libraries, childcare, and anything else he could in his single-minded quest for more austerity — have been perfectly legal.
A Towering Screenwriter Brought Low by McCarthyism
A new biography rescues Mary C. McCall Jr, the Screen Writers Guild’s first female president, from an unjust obscurity. McCall’s writing talents were immense. But in an era of witch hunts, her status as a labor leader made her a target.
What’s Good for Boeing Workers Is Good for the Public
On the West Coast, 33,000 Boeing workers are in the midst of the US’s largest strike. It’s not just wages and benefits at stake — it’s the question of whether we will continue to have skilled, secure workers making goods as delicate and complex as airplanes.
Autoworkers Have Made Both Candidates Pay Attention
Anyone wanting substantive discussion of jobs in last night’s debate was disappointed. But because of the UAW’s organizing and strikes over the past year, both Trump and Harris felt compelled to insist they were the best candidate for autoworkers.
A Thousand Tennessee Autoworkers Just Joined the UAW
Workers at Ultium’s Spring Hill electric vehicle plant, a joint venture between General Motors and LG Energy Solution of Korea, have unionized. It’s the latest case of the UAW’s Big Three strike bearing fruit.
Who Are New York City’s Worst Bosses?
The New York City comptroller’s office has launched a useful new tool for the public: a database detailing the city’s worst bosses and their various labor abuses, along with an accompanying “Employer Wall of Shame.”
Universities Are Cracking Down on Free Speech Over Gaza
The school year is kicking off, and American universities are starting the semester with scaling back students’ First Amendment rights, with the goal of stopping criticisms of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.
Shawn Fain’s DNC Speech Put Stellantis on Notice
Shawn Fain used his speech at the DNC to escalate pressure on Stellantis, which the UAW says is reneging on wins secured after last year’s auto strike. The union is preparing to strike the company once again if it doesn’t reverse course.
The UAW Is Now a Chief Antagonist of Donald Trump
An all-out war has now developed between the Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump, and one of the country’s most visible and increasingly militant unions, the UAW.
Israeli Prisons Are a Giant Torture Machine
A new Israeli human rights group report shows that Palestinians held in Israeli prisons and detention centers during the war on Gaza are subjected to torture, sexual abuse, violence, humiliation, starvation, sleep deprivation, and denial of medical care.
Walz’s Pick as VP Is an Opportunity for Unions
Democrats have a history of making and abandoning big promises for labor. But Kamala Harris’s pick of Tim Walz as vice presidential candidate at least suggests the possibility of substantial pro-union legislating.
The US Is Backing Israel’s Systematic Killing of Journalists
The United States government regularly decries authoritarian press crackdowns around the world. Yet that same government gives billions to Israel as it makes no attempt to hide its policy of killing journalists.
Sing Sing Is a Humanizing Portrait of the Dehumanized
Prisons serve as giant holding pens for people our society has come to see as subhuman. Sing Sing resists such dehumanization through a tender portrait of the creative capabilities and emotional lives of prison actors.