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Yahoo
6 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
American manufacturing needs labor reform, not tariffs
For the first time since the Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930, tariffs are not just a tool of U.S. economic policy – they're its most expansive and aggressively used tool. So far, markets have responded harshly to a costly gamble aimed at reviving American industrial might. Even if trade barriers eventually succeed at bringing back some jobs, the gains won't stick unless we reform antiquated labor policies. Otherwise, we risk rebuilding factories only to watch them shrink under the same outdated union-bargaining system that hollowed them out in the first place. Look no further than Boeing. The company announced it would shrink its workforce by 10%, mostly at commercial airliner manufacturing sites, mere weeks after reaching a new agreement with its machinists union. The settlement ended tensions but added major cost burdens. Workers who cheered the deal now sadly face pink slips. Or consider Stellantis, which slashed more than 1,000 jobs at its Jeep plant in Ohio just months after United Auto Workers secured hefty raises through a costly strike. The ink had barely dried before layoffs arrived, as the automaker scrambled to maintain profitability amid escalating wage bills. Us Trade With The Eu Is Out Of Whack. Trump Needs To Stay Tough On Tariffs To Fix It These headlines echo a long-standing pattern. When contracts overshoot what companies can sustainably pay, the predictable responses are fewer jobs, automation and offshoring. Read On The Fox Business App In new research, we reviewed 147 economic studies spanning three decades. What we found was striking: While unions can secure higher short-term wages, those gains often come at the cost of slower employment growth, reduced capital investment, and higher risk of future layoffs or shutdowns. America's heartland offers a stark example. In 1950, the Rust Belt held 51% of U.S. manufacturing employment. By 2000, its share had fallen to 33%. One recent study from a top economics journal found that labor conflicts and union-driven cost pressures – which took effect long before Chinese imports surged – explain 55% of the plunge. Trump Emerges As 'Closer-in-chief' To Push 'One Big, Beautiful' Tax Bill Through Congress Postwar factories were strike zones. Unions wielding exclusive bargaining rights extracted wages far above market rates and blocked productivity-boosting technologies. The strategy lifted members' pay, yet it discouraged investment, slowed productivity and nudged companies to build plants in the non-union South or abroad. When foreign competition arrived in force, many Midwestern mills were already financially brittle. Globalization merely finished the job. A big part of the problem is a New Deal-era rule granting any union that wins a workplace election a virtual monopoly. The National Labor Relations Act designates any such union as the sole representative for all of a firm's employees – supporters or not. Workers can't negotiate individually or choose a different union. Trump's Tariff Strategy Can Work But America Still Needs Deeper Economic Reform Without ongoing competition, labor leaders overreach. If management concedes, costs explode; if it resists, production halts. Either way, the workforce eventually pays the price. Imagine a worker in Richmond, Virginia, who lives comfortably on a company-wide wage agreement, while their counterpart in New York City struggles to cover rent. New York's cost of living is nearly 80% higher, with housing more than twice as expensive. Applying identical contracts across diverse local economies that are worlds apart is economically incoherent. Other industrial democracies offer smarter models. In Germany, manufacturers set broad wage frameworks but tailor pay at the plant level. In Britain, membership is voluntary as unions compete for members within the same company. These systems preserve workers' voices without forcing one-size-fits-all contracts. The Surprising Way Trump Can Unleash America's Economic Comeback The U.S. could adopt similar discipline through "members-only" bargaining. Unions would simply and fairly represent only employees who opt in. No one would be bound by a contract they didn't approve. Unions would have to maintain support through concessions that grow jobs, not risk them. Reform is especially important now that AI is reshaping the workforce and threatening to make certain roles outdated more quickly than in the past. Unions that are fully responsive to more than 51% of membership in occasional elections would have more motivation to focus on retraining workers and offering new skill development. In addition to protecting existing jobs, they could even guide workers toward higher-paying, future-ready careers. Washington is pouring resources into semiconductor facilities, battery plants and "Buy American" mandates. Layering those investments on top of Depression-era labor law builds monuments to protectionism instead of engines of lasting growth. True re-industrialization starts with modernizing the rules on the shop floor. Fix that, and the next generation of Rust Belt jobs might actually stay put. Click Here To Read More On Fox Business Revana Sharfuddin is a predoctoral researcher with the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. They are authors of a new study, "Do More Powerful Unions Generate Better Pro-Worker Outcomes?"Original article source: American manufacturing needs labor reform, not tariffs Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
PHOTOS: Arkansas Historic Preservation program adds nine sites to National Register of Historic Places
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – The Arkansas Historic Preservation program announced that nine new sites are now listed in the National Register of Historic Places. National Register of Historic Places adds several Arkansas sites to roster The sites are: Big Spring, in the vicinity of Bull Shoals in Baxter County. Located within the Bull Shoals-White River State Park, the site underwent improvements in the late 1970s by the Green Thumb program. The Green Thumb program helped impoverished families by providing them with financial aid and skills training. Fine Arts Building at the University of Arkansas at Monticello, in Drew County. The Fine Arts Building was built in 1934-1935 with assistance from the Public Works Administration. It is one of several buildings on the campus constructed with PWA assistance. Smith Creek Bridge, in the Webb City vicinity of Franklin County. The bridge is located southwest of Webb City and was built in 1941 by the Works Progress Administration, one of Roosevelt's New Deal-era agencies. Porter-McClure Paint Company Store, in Texarkana, Miller County. The Porter-McClure store was initially built circa 1886 and modified circa 1953 with its current terra cotta façade. The façade is a significant example in Texarkana, which was designed in the Late Gothic Revival style, an unusual choice for a commercial building. Gibson & Company's Blue Star / Horizon Home, in Little Rock, Pulaski County. The home was designed by architect F. Eugene Withrow in the Wrightian style and built in 1964. The house was an award-winning design in the Horizon Homes program, which encouraged the use of concrete for home construction. Robert H. and Martha Johnson House, in Little Rock, Pulaski County. Built in 1926-1927, architect H. Ray Burks designed the house for Robert and Martha Johnson, representing an excellent example of the Tudor Revival style, one of several revival styles that gained popularity after World War I. James Johnson Boys Club Building, in El Dorado, Union County. El Dorado architect John B. Abbott designed the building, and it was constructed between 1961 and 1963, providing a Boys Club facility for El Dorado's African American community. William and Marion Orton House, in Fayetteville, Washington County. Designed by noted architect Fay Jones and completed in 1959, the Orton House is an outstanding example of the Organic style of architecture that Jones was known for. Rose Hill Cemetery, in Harrison, Boone County. The cemetery was officially established in 1878 and contains over 1,000 burials, including the graves of many prominent individuals from Harrison's past. Downtown Searcy added to National Register of Historic Places Details about the National Register of Historic Places in Arkansas can be found on the Arkansas Historic Preservation website. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Upstate orchard putting new farmworker protections to the test
Earlier this month, about a dozen workers arrived in Wolcott, a small town halfway between Rochester and Syracuse, to grow apple trees. At this time of year, farmworkers are grafting and budding, and planting long rows of seedlings. They traveled to Wafler Farms, an apple orchard and fruit tree nursery, from Jamaica. Some have been making the journey for many years, living on the farm for up to three seasons and earning money to support their wives and send their children to school back home. It's a precarious arrangement: They can only return to the farm, and therefore to the US, if their boss brings them back. 'Sometimes you have to see something being done wrong and shut your mouth — you can't say nothing. Because if you say something, you just might not come back next year,' said Christopher, a seasonal worker who has been returning to the farm for a decade. (Four Wafler Farms workers spoke with New York Focus and asked to have their names changed to protect them from retaliation.) Things were supposed to be different this year. A long-awaited union contract took effect in April, granting workers benefits including higher pay and the right to return each year if there is work for them. So far, the contract is not being followed, according to the farmworkers. Wafler Farms never agreed to the contract. The family-run farm refused to bargain with the union, which was formed in 2022 by a majority of the approximately 90 people working there during the peak of the harvest, and is affiliated with the United Farm Workers of America, a national labor union. So negotiations were moved to an independent arbitration process, as stipulated by state law. Wafler declined to participate in that process, as well, and a contract was finalized without the employer's input. It's among the first few union contracts that farmworkers have won in New York since 2019, when the state legislature granted them collective bargaining rights as part of a package of landmark protections for agricultural workers. They are excluded from unionizing under federal law — a legacy of New Deal-era politics. The fruit farm is now a testing ground for what workers can achieve under New York's law, and how far the state will go to help them. Wafler Farms is arguing in a Wayne County Supreme Court case that the union is not legitimate, on the basis that the farm owner did not have the chance to discourage it from forming and that employees on guest worker visas do not have the right to unionize. (A handful of farms and the New York State Vegetable Growers Association brought a lawsuit making a similar argument in October 2023, but the court upheld the right of guestworkers to organize, and the case is now being appealed.) Wafler has sought to halt contract negotiations while the case proceeds, but has so far failed to do so. Wafler Farms and its attorney did not respond to requests for comment. On April 30, the union filed a charge against Wafler Farms with the state Public Employment Relations Board for failing to follow the contract. The labor board, set up to resolve disputes for state public workers, is tasked with enforcing the farmworker union law. The charge is awaiting a hearing at the board. If it rules against the farm, it may still be up to the union to enforce the contract. 'We would prefer that PERB would say, 'Hey, we issued this order and the company is refusing to abide by it, we're going to take them to court,'' said Armando Elenes, secretary treasurer of the United Farm Workers. But Elenes isn't optimistic that the board will be that aggressive. 'We are testing the law in real time,' he said. New York's more than 50,000 farmworkers had long been excluded from many of the labor protections that other workers in the state enjoy. They didn't get overtime pay, benefits like disability and family leave, or the right to unionize. Then, in 2019, the legislature passed the Farm Laborers Fair Labor Practices Act, ending those exclusions. The law guarantees farmworkers a day of rest each week. It grants them overtime pay after 56 hours of work in a week (unlike the 40 hour threshold for other workers). and it gives them the right to unionize, although they can't legally go on strike, limiting their power to extract concessions. Since then, workers on fifteen farms in New York have formed unions. Eight have formed with the United Farm Workers, the union best known for its 20th century boycotts and worker organizing in California. The UFW has struggled in recent decades to retain members and win contracts, and labor experts have hailed its recent organizing successes in New York as a potential turning point. 'It's really hard to organize folks in rural areas, because folks are really isolated,' said Reverend Richard Witt, executive director of the Rural & Migrant Ministry, a New York organization that helped pass the 2019 reforms. 'And then you add into that the power dynamics, and economic dynamics … within agriculture, it makes it really, really hard to organize.' The United Farm Workers and two other unions — the United Food and Commercial Workers and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union — have been organizing workers across the state, including on apple orchards, a dairy farm, and Long Island vineyards. Many of those workers are immigrants, often undocumented, or migrants who come to the US for a portion of the year through a guest worker program called H-2A. That program allows employers to hire temporary workers from other countries and requires them to provide housing and pay a minimum wage on par with the industry's wages in the region. More than 10,000 workers were approved for the visas in New York last year. At Wafler Farms, nearly all of the workers are Jamaicans on H-2A visas. They say the work offers a pathway to a better life. 'The wages here are a lot better than what we get in Jamaica,' said Christopher, who has a wife and two children back home. 'To send your family to a good college, to live a standard life, it's difficult in Jamaica. A regular nine to five cannot do it.' One of the workers works as a DJ during his months in Jamaica, another as a tour guide, a third in construction. While the money supports their families, the farm work comes with challenges. 'For a lot of guys, your relationship gets ruined because of leaving your family for so long,' said George, another worker. 'We take the chance because we want betterment for our family.' The H-2A program does not provide a path to citizenship, and workers are excluded from the Social Security system. Their presence in the US is contingent on their employer, meaning they can't seek out better pay and conditions by switching jobs, and they risk losing their livelihoods if they aren't rehired. 'You just don't know if you're coming back until they call you,' said Christopher. 'You could be in Jamaica, you don't have a primary job that you can depend on, you're depending on this job that you have now.' In 2022, workers at Wafler decided to unionize with United Farm Workers. They hoped that a union would protect their jobs, even when they spoke up about working conditions. They also hoped it would stop the verbal abuse they faced from their boss. A video taken by one of the workers that year shows the owner screaming and repeatedly swearing at a group of them. 'Everybody was tired of this type of situation where if you see something wrong, and you try to talk about it, there is a backlash coming,' said Christopher. The United Farm Workers has charged that some workers were called back later than usual last year in retaliation for union organizing. Those charges are awaiting a decision by the state labor board. At Wafler and on other farms, the union efforts have been 'extremely contentious,' said Richard Stup, the director of the Agricultural Workforce Development Program at Cornell University. 'When you have a closely-held business like a farm, where people have been personally invested in it sometimes for generations, the idea of a union coming in and lodging itself in the middle of your business is almost inconceivable.' Farm owner Paul Wafler 'was really pissed when he found out' about the union, Chistopher said. 'He was like, 'You stabbed me in the back.'' A couple of miles down the road from Wafler Farms, workers at Cahoon Farms, which grows apples and cherries, also organized with the United Farm Workers and won the union's first contract in New York. Management at Cahoons Farm agreed to follow it. The Wafler contract is the first in the state to be imposed through arbitration. Under the 2019 law, if the union and employer can't reach a contract through bargaining, the matter can be brought to an arbitrator selected by both sides. Since the unions aren't allowed to strike, the process is meant to ensure that employers can't indefinitely delay negotiations. The Wafler Farms contract includes the recall rights that the workers had sought: they will be brought back every year in order of seniority. They'll get a small wage increase for the two years of the contract, paid holidays and vacation, and some employer matching for a retirement plan. But right now, that contract isn't being followed, the union charges. The workers are not being paid the more-than-$19 hourly wage stipulated by the contract, and the owner has changed their working conditions without negotiating with the union. Under the 2019 reforms, farmworker unions are under the purview of the Public Employment Relations Board, which oversees New York public sector unions as well as private sector workers who can't unionize under federal law, like at horse racing tracks and religious organizations. The board has the power to certify unions, oversee the bargaining process, and rule on charges of unfair labor practices. Employers who violate the law face fines of up to $5,000 and up to a year in prison. The board can also petition the state Supreme Court to enforce the law. (No unfair labor practice charges in agricultural workplaces have yet reached that point.) 'PERB is used to dealing with public employers, which operate in a much different manner than not only private employers, but agricultural private employers,' said Elenes of the United Farm Workers. 'I think they're having a wake up call that this is a different animal — this is agriculture.' The union's charge against the farm for violating the contract is awaiting a hearing at the board. The union is seeking back pay for the workers, among other remedies. 'Our goal is the prompt resolution of certification and ULP matters and helping the parties build a healthy and productive collective bargaining relationship,' board chairperson Timothy Connick told New York Focus in a statement. Even without the contract being followed, some things have changed since the workers unionized. For one, they now get paid for orientation. And the swearing has abated. 'They talk to us much different,' said George. 'There's a lot of respect now,' said Christopher.
Dominion Post
20-05-2025
- Business
- Dominion Post
BOPARC putting a new roof on the Wiles Hill Community Center
MORGANTOWN — The Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners recently purchased a new lid for the Wiles Hill Community Center. During its most recent regular meeting, the board approved a contract with Sutter Roofing for $155,500 to replace the old building's roof. BOPARC Executive Director Melissa Wiles said she was pleased to see the bids come in under the project's original $200,000 budget. She hopes it stays that way. 'You never know with an old building. Keep your fingers crossed for no change orders,' she said. Sutter Roofing was one of five bidders to make an offer on the job. The same company is currently replacing the roof of the Morgantown Ice Arena as part of a larger renovation of that facility. Built in 1910, the Fourth Ward School – more commonly referred to as the Wiles Hill School – served its educational mission for 89 years. In 1939, it received an addition thanks to FDR's New Deal-era Public Works Administration. Shortly after consolidation forced the school's closure in 1999, the 14,000 square-foot building was sold to BOPARC. It's served as a community/senior center, artist haven, dance studio, fitness space, concert hall, cafe and all-around gathering spot since 2005 or so. The building was added to the National Registry of Historic Places in 2004.
USA Today
26-04-2025
- Business
- USA Today
Whistleblower says DOGE may have caused 'significant cyber breach' at labor watchdog
Whistleblower says DOGE may have caused 'significant cyber breach' at labor watchdog Show Caption Hide Caption How did Elon Musk become so powerful in Washington? As leader of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Elon Musk has made major changes, but who is Elon Musk and how did he rise in Washington? WASHINGTON - A whistleblower complaint says that Elon Musk's team of technologists may have been responsible for a "significant cybersecurity breach," likely of sensitive case files, at America's federal labor watchdog. The complaint, addressed to Republican Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton and his Democratic counterpart Mark Warner and made public Tuesday by the group Whistleblower Aid, draws on the testimony of Daniel Berulis, an information technology staffer at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The NLRB, a New Deal-era agency that is tasked with protecting workers' rights to organize and join unions, has for years been a target of America's corporate titans, including Musk, some of whom are now seeking to have the agency's powers declared unconstitutional. In an affidavit, Berulis said he had evidence that DOGE staffers were given extraordinarily sweeping access to the NLRB's systems, including to sensitive case files. He said that beginning in early March, logging protocols created to audit users appeared to have been tampered with, and that he had detected the removal of about 10 gigabytes worth of data from NLRB's network sometime thereafter. "That kind of spike is extremely unusual because data almost never directly leaves NLRB's databases," Berulis said in his affidavit. A spokesperson for Musk's team - officially known as U.S. DOGE Service - didn't immediately return a message seeking comment. A message left with the NLRB also wasn't immediately returned, although NPR, which first reported the story, quoted an NLRB spokesperson as disputing Berulis' claims and saying there had been no breach. Cotton and Warner didn't immediately return messages seeking comment. NPR, which said it interviewed 30 sources in government, law enforcement, the cybersecurity industry, and the labor movement about the complaint, said that the disabling of logging software was reminiscent of cybercriminal behavior. Berulis' affidavit said that an effort by him and his colleague to formally investigate and alert the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) was disrupted by higher-ups without explanation. A message left with CISA wasn't immediately returned.
