
Fred Wang is a student at Harvard Law School.
In today’s news and commentary, San Francisco airport workers approve a new contract after a 3-day strike, while new research reveals how unpaid labor affects women’s and men’s mental health differently.
After a thousand fast-food workers at San Francisco International Airport ended a three-day strike on Thursday, they’ve voted — by 99.5% — to approve a new contract that will, among other things, raise wages, provide family health insurance, and protect jobs when outlets change operator. The victory comes over nine months of negotiations with employers and after years without a raise.
Unpaid labor — think housework and childcare — hurts women’s mental health more than it does men’s, according to new research covered in the New York Times’s Upshot section. A recent literature review in the Lancet — a peer-reviewed medical journal — took a look at studies examining the relationship between unpaid labor and mental health in employed adults.
The review found “substantial gender differences in exposure to unpaid labour,” concluding that unpaid labor “is associated with poorer mental health in women.” That’s likely driven by the unequal volume of unpaid labor performed by men and women. Women tend to do much more housework and child care than men. But the difference in the kind of unpaid work that men and women do may matter too. Men, the Times piece notes, typically perform “less time-sensitive and more enjoyable, or at least more tolerable,” work. A chore like lawn mowing, for instance, is “done less often and on a more flexible schedule.” Cooking and cleaning, on the other hand, “need to be done at certain times.”
Daily News & Commentary
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August 29
Trump fires regulator in charge of reviewing railroad mergers; fired Fed Governor sues Trump asserting unlawful termination; and Trump attacks more federal sector unions.
August 28
contested election for UAW at Kentucky battery plant; NLRB down to one member; public approval of unions remains high.
August 27
The U.S. Department of Justice welcomes new hires and forces reassignments in the Civil Rights Division; the Ninth Circuit hears oral arguments in Brown v. Alaska Airlines Inc.; and Amazon violates federal labor law at its air cargo facility in Kentucky.
August 26
Park employees at Yosemite vote to unionize; Philadelphia teachers reach tentative three-year agreement; a new report finds California’s union coverage remains steady even as national union density declines.
August 25
Consequences of SpaceX decision, AI may undermine white-collar overtime exemptions, Sixth Circuit heightens standard for client harassment.
August 24
HHS cancels union contracts, the California Supreme Court rules on minimum wage violations, and jobless claims rise