Labor

Utica, NY: Today about 40  local citizens and representatives of community, labor, and human service organizations held a vigil in Downtown Utica to ask that Congress repeal Sequestration, immediately adopt a fair budget, and protect Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare from benefit cuts.

Thanks to Occupy, most working people are well aware of the growing inequalities in wealth. But for those who lack the specifics, former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich provides a useful overview:
“…the rich have been getting a larger and larger portion of total income. From 9 percent in 1980, the top 1 percent's take increased to 23.5 percent by 2007. CEOs who in the 1970s took home 40 times the compensation of average workers now rake in 350 times.” (“Confessions of a Class Warrior,” August 22, 2010).

On Friday, July 6, President Obama signed into law a bill that would renew transportation programs and extend low interest rates on student loans for one year. While this minimal gesture resulted in, no doubt, sighs of relief from those burdened by student debt, tucked away within the bill's pages was a little-noticed proposal to further erode the funding of workers' pensions. The bill was a brilliant sleight of hand where what it appeared to be giving with one hand distracted the public from what it was taking away with the other.

There has been much talk recently about the impact of money on politics, especially in the wake of the Citizens United ruling that has ratcheted up the role of corporate money in political campaigns. Organized labor was quick to blame this ruling for its defeat in Wisconsin. And many have assumed that the relation of money to politics is like a law of nature: the more money one has, the more political power one can wield.

One of Rochester's most memorable May Days May 1 2006 as hundreds march from the Federal Building to St Michael's Church to protest raids and deportations, and also right wing hate radio.  Sadly due to the political and legal climate in 2012 a demonstration like this would not take place.