Recommended Reads

It’s important to stay in touch with the pulse of labor’s battles and advances. Not only are California’s state employee unions negotiating and ratifying contracts, we’re reading news from across the nation ranging from a single Starbucks store winning union representation to nationwide strikes.

Here’s some stories that caught our attention:

Hot Union Summer: Hype or a real shift in mood?

Roughly 11,500 Hollywood writers and 65,000 actors are out on strike together for the first time in 63 years. Starbucks baristas are flexing the strike muscle almost weekly on short-term walkouts demanding a fair first contract. And 340,000 Teamsters at UPS just won historic gains as the company backed down in the face of their enthusiastic preparations to shut the company down. Read this piece in the Northwest Labor Press about the long, hot, labor summer.

Unions Score Big Win as NLRB Eases Path to Representation

The National Labor Relations Board handed unions a victory with a decision that borrows from a long-dormant legal doctrine allowing unions to represent workers without a formal vote. Read the story from Bloomberg Law

Kaiser Permanente unions will vote on strike authorization

The Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions, which represents more than 85,000 healthcare workers in seven states and the District of Columbia, announced Thursday that its members would vote between Aug.26 and Sept. 13 to authorize a strike.. Read about what the union calls “the largest strike of health care workers in US history in this article seen in The Hill.