Submitted on Wed, 11/01/2006 - 2:36pm
Resolution on the IWW Starbucks Workers UnionPassed, October 30, 2006, at the TAA General Membership Meeting, Madison, WI
WHEREAS Starbucks baristas have built an organizational presence at seven Starbucks Coffee locations in New York City and Chicago; and
WHEREAS the Starbucks Coffee Company has maintained a virulent practice of illegal, unjust, and anti-union campaigning, resulting in an order of the National Labor Relations Board that Starbucks reinstate workers who were unlawfully fired and cease and desist from interfering with workers’ rights to organize; and
WHEREAS Starbucks has continued to interfere with its workers’ rights, by firing four more workers in New York City for protected, legal union activity; therefore be it
Submitted on Fri, 10/27/2006 - 9:32pm
New York, NY- Holding picket signs and handing out Howard Schultz “Most Wanted” flyers, union baristas and supporters protested the visit of the Starbucks Chairman to promote the coffee chain's first bookselling venture. Two campaign supporters entered the Park Avenue store where one of 25 promotional events around the country took place and unfurled a "Stop Union-Busting" banner. The two campaigners were forcibly removed by a Starbucks Regional Director. The baristas crashed the event to demand an end to the relentless anti-union campaign overseen by Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz who opted not to attend.
“Four IWW members are currently out of a job because of Howard Schultz’s animosity towards unions,” said Isis Saenz, a New York barista and IWW member. “Schultz is a billionaire and just made the list of the world’s richest people. What more does he want?”
While Starbucks is set to profit handsomely from its expansion into bookselling, baristas continue to languish in poverty with fluctuating work hours each week. Starbucks has fallen far short of the socially responsible image it seeks to create. Despite referring to itself as a leader in employee health care, the coffee giant insures a lower percentage of its workforce than Wal-Mart.
Starbucks has waged a fierce anti-union campaign against baristas joining the Industrial Workers of the World to gain an independent voice at work. The company agreed to refrain from spying, bribing, threatening, and terminating workers in a March settlement with the U.S. government triggered by charges from the IWW Starbucks Workers Union [www.StarbucksUnion.org]. However, Starbucks has continued union-busting with impunity including terminating workers for exercising their right to join the union.
Despite the unlawful anti-union campaign, baristas have won wage increases, more secure scheduling, and safety improvements through direct action on the job and in the community. The union currently has an organized presence at seven Starbucks locations in New York City and Chicago.
Submitted on Fri, 10/27/2006 - 9:08pm
Oxfam revealed today that Starbucks has been working to block Ethiopian coffee farmers from asserting the right to their own cultural heritage. Ethiopia is seeking to control its own coffee names- Sidamo, Harar, and Yirgacheffe- against Starbucks' opposition. The company's maneuvering is depriving Ethiopian coffee farmers of tens of millions of dollars a year in much needed revenue.
The revelation is further evidence that Starbucks' socially-responsible claims regarding coffee farmers and baristas is nothing but spin.
Visit the Starbucks campaign homepage at Oxfam's website: here
Take a stand with workers across the Starbucks supply chain with the Justice from Bean to Cup!
Submitted on Tue, 10/17/2006 - 10:24pm
The Nation - Tuesday Oct 17, 5:37 PM ET
The Nation -- Yesterday, more than 200 Wal-Mart workers held a demonstration in front of a Wal-Mart store in Hialeah Gardens, Florida. In the first significant protest ever organized by Wal-Mart employees in the United States, workers objected to managers cutting their hours, and to the company's insistence on employees' "open availability," as well as to a new, more stringent attendance policy.
It's courageous of these workers, who are part of a Florida group called "Associates at Wal-Mart," to speak out publicly and demand better treatment. Let's hope their protest is a turning point in the fight for workers' rights at Wal-Mart, and that more workers will be emboldened by the Florida workers' example and begin to organize. Too much of the debate over Wal-Mart takes place without the perspective of the true experts -- the workers themselves.
Speaking of retail workers, the IWW's Starbucks campaign -- which I've mentioned on this blog before -- is growing, and having some encouraging effects. Workers have organized in New York City, and, this summer, Chicago. Last week, the company raised its Chicago workers' wages, increasing starting pay by thirty cents (to $7.80) and promising that if an employee gets a favorable performance review, her pay will go up to $8.58 after six months. New York City workers will make $9.63 an hour after six months on the job (and a favorable review), which means that the IWW campaign will have raised many employees' wages by nearly 25% in two and a half years.
Submitted on Tue, 10/17/2006 - 10:11pm
Published On Tuesday, October 17, 2006 2:26 AM - By VIRGINIA A. FISHER and NICHOLAS K. TABOR, Harvard Crimson Staff Writers.
Disclaimer - Contrary to the authors' remarks, the IWW is not an "anarcho-syndicalist" organization. It is in fact, a revolutionary industrial union.
You may soon be able to get a shot of “anarcho-syndicalism” with your mocha Frappuccino, if the Cambridge City Council has its way.
In its meeting last night, the council passed a resolution supporting the right of Starbucks employees to organize under the aegis of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), or "Wobblies," a union made famous in the early 20th century for a brand of radical socialism known as “anarcho-syndicalism.” The IWW advocates “aboliton of the wage system” on its website.
