Day Labor Center First to Join AFL-CIO

[Omaha Steve]

Source: Associated Press

Associated Press 06.28.07, 6:35 PM ET

A center representing immigrant workers who do temporary jobs announced its affiliation with the AFL-CIO Thursday, becoming the first day labor center to act on an agreement between the largest U.S. federation of unions and a network representing immigrant laborers.

The Centro Legal de la Raza hopes the association with the AFL-CIO's Alameda County Central Labor Council will help improve working conditions for the immigrant workers it represents. Like other day laborers who solicit jobs by standing on corners and waiting for employers to pick them up, these workers often have little recourse when an employer refuses to pay or expects them to work under dangerous conditions.

"This could be a first step in unionizing day laborers," said Patricia Loya, the center's executive director. "We see our values as being very much in line with organized labor."

Under the deal signed last year in Chicago between the AFL-CIO and the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, which represents 40 worker centers, the day laborers would not become union members for now.



Read more: http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2007/06/28/ap3869472.html

---

[youngdem]

1. If I already belonged to the Union, I would be PISSED OFF at this

They are recruiting a direct threat to Union job security.

Americans need to realize that instantly adding 12 million people to the legal work pool in the opening act of a major recession is fucking suicidal for the middle class.

I know we would all feel like really nice, wonderful liberals for allowing this, but it is going to FUCK wages up for the middle class as these illegal immigrants are then allowed to go after your job....WHY DO YOU THINK REPUKES WANT THIS LAW IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Now, ask yourself, sincerely, are you worried that one of these 12 million would take your job for less than you make now? Your employer might be interested to see.

We are destroying our own country with this shit. We cannot afford it. And I wonder how stupid many on this board are gonna feel when the American middle class is destroyed, from one end by inflation, and on the other, by negative wage pressure by a flood of illegal immigrants suddenly allowed to knock on your bosses door and compete for your job - happy to take it for far less than you are.

[Virginia Dare]

2. So you think 12 million people should be deported?

I'm not sure I understand your point--if they unionize these jobs, then they can't take the work for less, they can't be denied benefits. Everybody would be on the same playing field. How is that a bad thing?

[originalpckelly]

3. You're a Mexican. You were born south of the border.

Your country is shit in comparison to the USA. You know you can make money up north, but you'll have to leave your family and go to a foreign country where you don't speak the language. You could go through legal channels of immigration, but that takes so long, it would be almost impossible. On the other hand you know about the coyotes who'll sneak you in faster, but outside the law.

Realistically, what would you do?

What I just tried to do is get to you to understand how hard it is for these people as well. That doesn't mean we have to commit national suicide just to help them, but the way you and so many others are talking is just so inhumane. Absolutely no empathy or caring for your fellow human beings in this world.

I know what's going on is not going to be stopped by a wall or a tough law. We should invest in Mexico's infrastructure with a Marshall plan.

The better their life is, the less draw there will be to come to America.

It's got to be pretty scary to leave your own country and come to America, where one doesn't know the language.

I don't think many people, if they had the honest choice, would do it. So by helping them in their own home countries, we'll be preventing more hardship and the scariness of immigrating to America when they don't know the language or the customs.

[amandabeech]

4. I wonder what the construction trade unions think about this,

if there are any of them left in southern California. Or anywhere for that matter.

[youngdem]

5. I think the Northeast is the last stronghold of the construction unions

And perhaps in the Midwest.

They used to exist here in Louisiana, but they are a shell of their former selves.

Texas pretty much forbids them, in practice.