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Corporate Responsibility, Economic Justice, Legislation, Macy's and Bloomingdale's, Retail, UFCW Industries, UFCW Values, Walmart

Tell D.C.’s Mayor Gray: Sign the Living Wage Acountability Act

Jul 16, 2013

Adapted from Making Change at Walmart

Last week, Washington D.C.’s City Council voted 8-5 to approve a living wage bill despite threats by Walmart. The bill requires large retailers in the District, like Walmart, to pay their employees no less than $12.50 an hour.

photoWhile the bill enjoyed the support of a majority of the members and many district residents, Walmart threatened at the last minute to cancel the construction of three stores slated to open in the District if the bill became law. Interestingly, the company made this threat after publicly stating that it would pay District Walmart employees $13 an hour if the stores were approved to be built.

While many are shocked by Walmart’s clear hypocritical stance, groups like OUR Walmart and Making Change at Walmart have shown that Walmart is a company that likes to say one thing but do another. Walmart has a history of making promises but then reneging.

Not only are Walmart’s promises empty, but when they are held to their commitments they threaten the communities who hold them accountable. Walmart comes into communities, says one thing and does another. If they don’t get their way they threaten and bully communities the same way they bully their workers. Walmart proclaims to embody and promote American values, but when those values become inconvenient to their bottom-line they do everything in their power, including firing workers and reneging on promises, to get their way.

The DC Council sent a powerful message to not only Walmart but to companies that choose to do business in the city: you must fulfill your promise and treat DC residents with dignity and respect, while paying them a wage that allows them to care for their family. The living wage bill comes at a time when a family of four living in D.C. needs over $88K a year just to get by, according to a recent study.

With so much at stake, D.C. workers need your help to make sure the bill gets finalized. Please click here and send an email to D.C.’s Mayor Gray, asking him not to veto the bill.

D.C. is just the beginning–cities around the country are pushing for living wages, and the corporations are beginning to realize that the people have a say in how businesses operate on their turf. Let’s all tell Walmart that if they want to be in D.C., they need to pay a living wage.

Corporate Responsibility, Press Releases, Retail, UFCW Industries, UFCW Values, Walmart, Workplace Safety & Health

Joint Statement by Richard L. Trumka (AFL-CIO) and Joe Hansen (ChangetoWin) on the Walmart and GAP Bangladesh Safety Alliance: Weak and Worthless

Jul 10, 2013

UFCWnewsThe so-called Global Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, announced today by Walmart, Gap and the Bipartisan Policy Center, was developed without consultation with workers or their representatives and is yet another “voluntary” scheme with no meaningful enforcement mechanisms. Companies that sign onto the alliance but fail to meet a commitment face no adverse consequences beyond expulsion from the scheme. Instead, workers will continue to pay.

In stark contrast, more than 75 corporations from 15 countries, including the United States, have signed the binding Accord on Fire and Building Safety negotiated with Bangladeshi and international unions. The Accord has rules to make real improvements in the safety of garment workers.  Workers, unions and worker rights organizations negotiated this agreement with employers and integrated worker safety efforts by governments and the International Labor Organization (ILO).  The AFL-CIO and Change to Win,  along with global unions IndustriAll and UNI and numerous organizations representing Bangladeshi workers, also endorse it. The AFL-CIO and Change to Win reject the Walmart/GAP plan as a way to avoid accountability, limit costs and silence workers and their representatives.

Rather than sign the binding Accord, Walmart and Gap are pushing a weak and worthless plan that avoids enforceable commitments. The Bipartisan Policy Center, which has clear financial and political connections to Walmart, is releasing the document, which is the product of a closed process and has been signed only by the same corporations that produced it.

The Accord departs from the broken system of voluntary corporate responsibility in supply chains that has so often failed to protect workers. It makes a clear commitment to worker safety and rights, and to transparency. It expresses values that most countries uphold.

The Accord has been endorsed by the United Nations, the ILO, the government of Bangladesh, both the parliament and commission of the European Union, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Members and leaders in both houses of the U.S. Congress have also endorsed the Accord.

In the last eight years, more than 1,800 Bangladeshi garment workers have been killed in preventable factory fires and building collapses while producing mostly for European and U.S. markets.  This tragic loss of life requires more than a wink and a nod from two of the richest corporations in the world. It means taking responsibility for the safety of workers by entering into a legitimate, binding process that will save lives.  Seventy-five brands have taken that important step.  It is time for Walmart and GAP to join them, rather than trying to undermine those efforts and maintain a system that has a long and bloody record of failure.

Statement online here: http://www.aflcio.org/Press-Room/Press-Releases/Joint-Statement-by-Richard-L.-Trumka-AFL-CIO-and-Joe-Hansen-ChangetoWin-on-the-Walmart-and-GAP-Bangladesh-Safety-Alliance-Weak-and-Worthless

For the latest udates, follow @AFLCIO and @RichardTrumka on Twitter.

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Economic Justice, Legislation, Retail, UFCW Industries, UFCW Values, Walmart

One Step Closer to Living Wage for DC Workers in Big Retail

Jun 27, 2013

Yesterday,  workers in the District became a bit closer to seeing the vision of a living wage fulfilled.

The D.C. Council gave its initial approval to a bill, called The Large Retailer Accountability Act, that would raise the minimum wage of workers at large retail stores from the D.C.’s current minimum of $8.25 an hour to $12.50–a rate that would significantly improve the quality of life for many employees. The 8-5 vote came after a nearly hour-long debate.

dccouncil

If passed, this legislation will ensure that the jobs at D.C.’s large retailers and “big box” stores will be good jobs that are enable employees to provide for themselves and their families.  The Large Retailer Accountability Act would also mean that new jobs at 6 planned Walmart’s coming to the District in the next few years will be better for Walmart associates than typically seen in their thousands of other locations across the country.

An article from dcist quotes those who voted for the bill:

“The District government has an obligation not just to encourage the development and growth of jobs, but to encourage the development and growth of quality jobs,” D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson said before the vote, according to Housing Complex. Joining Mendelson in supporting the bill were Vincent Orange (D-At Large), Anita Bonds (D-At Large), David Grosso (I-At Large), Jim Graham (D-Ward 1), Jack Evans (D-Ward 2), Kenyan MacDuffie (D-Ward 5), and Marion Barry (D-Ward 8).”

The next step for the bill is to go through a second vote at the Council’s July 10 legislative session.