Consider two different ways a union can take action to solve problems. A top-down approach may solve the immediate workplace problem, but it may not change the balance of power. Engaging as many members as possible in a bottom-up approach may accomplish both goals. For example, consider the case at right where a boss unilaterally announces an unpopular new schedule, and how things might play out depending which approach you take, top-down vs. bottom-up ..read more

United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain recently called A Troublemaker’s Handbook his “other bible.” Author Dan La Botz recalls how this classic Labor Notes book came to be. It was published in 1991 and is now out of print, but available for free download as a PDF ..read more

For three and a half decades, lean management drove the production and movement of goods. But now logistics and manufacturing employers are shifting to a new model. To maximize our leverage, workers should understand it. Lean production, introduced in the 1980s from Japanese automakers, caught on in many U.S. industries. It was a whole bundle of techniques to maximize profit, including ratcheting up workloads and pace to the point of breakdown, and inviting workers to brainstorm ways to increase their own exploitation ..read more

Michael Göbel, president and CEO of Mercedes-Benz U.S. International, stepped down from his post today, according to a video message that workers were shown. Göbel had groused in an April captive-audience meeting about a worker’s claim that Mercedes had come for the “Alabama discount”: low wages. His departure is another win for Mercedes-Benz workers, who already scored pay bumps and an end to wage tiers—and they haven’t even voted on the union yet ..read more

Video Links Scroll down for embedded videos. Thanks to Act.tv and More Perfect Union for their work to livestream and circulate these sessions ..read more

“As a young union activist I had another bible," United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain said on Sunday in the final main session of the 2024 Labor Notes Conference. "It was this book right here, called A Troublemaker's Handbook, from Labor Notes. "This was my bible when I became a union rep, and it taught me how to fight the boss, how to fight company unionism, all at the same time ..read more

In a watershed victory, workers at the Volkswagen factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee, voted tonight "UAW, yes!" The company's sole non-union plant will finally join the rest of the world. “If Volkswagen workers at plants in Germany and Mexico have unions, why not us?” said equipment operator Briam Calderon in Spanish, ahead of the vote. "Just like Martin Luther King had a dream, we have a dream at Volkswagen that we will be UAW one day," said Renee Berry, a logistic worker on the organizing committee who's worked at the plant for 14 years ..read more

In a watershed victory, workers at the Volkswagen factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee, voted tonight "UAW, yes!" The company's sole non-union plant will finally join the rest of the world. “If Volkswagen workers at plants in Germany and Mexico have unions, why not us?” said equipment operator Briam Calderon in Spanish, ahead of the vote ..read more

Workers at Mercedes-Benz in Alabama were forced to attend 20-minute anti-union meetings with the company’s top management today. Recordings obtained by Labor Notes show top management dangled carrots and put on a contrite-boss act, promising to do better. Workers filed with the National Labor Relations Board on April 5 for the first-ever election to unionize the 5,200 people who work at the plant ..read more

Friends and family of legendary labor singer Anne Feeney have announced the first in-person events celebrating the life and work of “Pittsburgh’s hellraiser,” who passed away following complications from Covid in 2021. The events are fittingly planned to coincide with May Day: a 12 p.m. panel discussion on women in the Pittsburgh labor movement at Heinz History Center, and a memorial concert and gathering at Mr Smalls Theater at 6 p.m ..read more