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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March 15
A U.S. District Court issues a preliminary injunction against the Department of Veterans Affairs for terminating its collective bargaining agreement, and SEIU files a lawsuit against DHS for effectively terminating immigrant workers at Boston Logan International Airport.
March 13
Republican Senators urge changes on OSHA heat standard; OpenAI and building trades announce partnership on data center construction; forced labor investigations could lead to new tariffs
March 12
EPA terminates contract with second-largest union; Florida advances bill restricting public sector unions; Trump administration seeks Supreme Court assistance in TPS termination.
March 11
The partial government shutdown results in TSA agents losing their first full paycheck; the Fifth Circuit upholds the certification of a class of former United Airline workers who were placed on unpaid leave for declining to receive the COVID-19 vaccine for religious reasons during the pandemic; and an academic group files a lawsuit against the State Department over a policy that revokes and denies visas to noncitizens for their work in fact-checking and content moderation.
March 10
Court rules Kari Lake unlawfully led USAGM, voiding mass layoffs; Florida Senate passes bill tightening union recertification rules; Fifth Circuit revives whistleblower suit against Lockheed Martin.
March 9
6th Circuit rejects Cemex, Board may overrule precedents with two members.