Advocates sound off on whether worker safety will survive under Trump; an intimate interview with a waitress highlights inconsistent income and sexual harassment; a court blocks Obama’s overtime rule from taking effect; and United Food and Commercial Workers pushes for health and safety training for California’s marijuana workers.
Denver Post reporters investigate the lives and deaths of Colorado’s oil and gas workers; employees from Donald Trump’s California golf club say he only wanted to hire “pretty” women; cobalt mining in Congo comes with dangerous risks for adult and child workers; and Harvard’s dining staff goes on strike for living wages.
New Jersey’s growing temp industry is rife with labor violations, worker mistreatment; advocates in North Carolina demand safer conditions for poultry plant workers; former Wells Fargo workers sue over aggressive sales quotas that led to fraud; and an investigation into northern California’s marijuana industry finds rampant sexual abuse and assault.
Slate investigates a little-used Fair Labor Standards Act provision that could improve conditions for farmworkers; Syrian child refugees face exploitation in Turkey’s textile industry; OSHA cites a Wisconsin shipyard for exposing workers to high levels of lead; and researchers offer new insights into the effects of Seattle’s $15 minimum wage law.
In a new national survey, about one in every four U.S. workers rates their workplace as just “fair” or “poor” in providing a healthy working environment. And employees in low-paying jobs typically report worse working conditions than those in higher-paying jobs — in fact, nearly half of workers in low-paying jobs say they face “potentially dangerous” conditions on the job.
Child Labor
In the fight for a rest break, Dallas construction workers find their voice: ‘This is not the end, but a stepping stone to something bigger’
Last summer, 25-year-old Roendy Granillo died of heat stroke while he installed flooring in a house in Melissa, Texas, just north of Dallas. His tragic and entirely preventable death marked a turning point in advocacy efforts to pass a rest break ordinance for local construction workers.
It seems obvious that workers with paid sick leave are more likely to stay home and seek out medical care when they or a family member is ill. But it’s always good to confirm a hunch with some solid data.
The Center for Investigative Reporting exposes discriminatory hiring practices within the temporary staffing industry; a worker dies in another chemical facility explosion in Houston; a new Amnesty International report links tech giants to child labor; and Amazon is cited for failing to report workplace injuries.
Manufacturing workers in the border city of Ciudad Juárez organize for better working conditions; a stretched OSHA struggles to ensure safe workplaces in Houston; Fight for $15 makes it to the U.S. Capitol; and OSHA investigates the death of a FedEx worker in Memphis.
Child Labor
7-Eleven workers organize against workplace violence: ‘Convenience store workers deserve to be safe’
In February 2015, a group of 7-Eleven night shift workers in Buffalo, New York, filed a complaint with OSHA. Sick of enduring regular bouts of verbal harassment, racial slurs and even death threats from customers — threats they often experienced while working alone with no security guard — they hoped OSHA could help bring about safer working conditions. Unfortunately, the agency decided not to investigate.