In today’s News and Commentary, faculty and staff of the Center for Labor and a Just Economy appeared before the Washington State Senate Labor and Commerce Committee, Boeing’s machinists union says that the company’s latest pay increase offer is not enough, and the NLRB General Counsel pressured Trader Joe’s to bargain with their workers’ union in Manhattan.

Faculty and staff of the Center for Labor and a Just Economy appeared before the Washington State Senate Labor and Commerce Committee at a work session on Monday, September 23rd. Presenters from the Center included Sharon Block, Benjamin Sachs, CLJE Fellow Rajesh Nayak, and CLJE:Lab Project Manager, Yoorie Chang. Topics included the rules of labor law preemption, the implications of recent Supreme Court decisions on worker protections and the administrative state, and the importance of state and local action in protecting workers. The presenters also shared an overview of CLJE’s new resource, “Building Worker Power in Cities and States: A Toolkit for State and Local Policy Innovation.”  Watch the session here. 

Boeing offered it’s striking machinists a pay increase of 30% on Monday in what the company claims is their “best and final offer.” However, leaders of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers District 751 told their members that the company announced the offer while refusing to meet with the union. The union also claims that the 30% increase is not enough. The union originally demanded a 40% increase in salary for workers over the next three years.

The NLRB General Counsel issued a complaint consolidating unfair labor practice charges against a Lower East Side Manhattan Trader Joe’s. The complaint seeks an order requiring the Trader Joe’s store to recognize and bargain with the union under the new Cemex framework. This legal framework requires a company to bargain with a union if it has committed enough unfair labor practices to set aside the results of a unionization vote.