Word: labor
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Think of mergers and you typically imagine captains of industry egged on by big bankers. But this week's most significant consolidation is happening on the other side of the working world: between labor unions. The United Steelworkers (USW), America's largest private-sector union, is joining up with Unite, Britain's largest national union, to form the world's first transatlantic union. The deal, set to be inked on Wednesday at the Steelworkers' International Convention in Las Vegas, will create the grandiosely named Workers Uniting: The Global Union. Says USW President Leo W. Gerard: "We're creating...
...rationale for the ocean-spanning super union is obvious and ubiquitous: globalization. Most of the companies that labor deals with are globe-straddling multinationals, yet unions remain national organizations. That's widely considered one reason why organized labor has endured decades of decline in overall membership and in clout. Thomas A. Kochan, co-director of the Institute for Work and Employment Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is convinced the Steelworkers and Unite will make the merger work, he says, "but it will take time; it's uncharted territory." He points out that since t he USW already...
...lines, but says the food companies should be honest with their customers about it. "If they're transparent and open, consumers are less willing to think [manufacturers] are trying to pull one over on them," says Waldrop. The changing product sizes are part of the reason the Bureau of Labor Statistics says groceries cost 5.8% more than the same time last year. Price checkers in the department measure more than 2,000 food items to determine overall food inflation, and when they notice product size changes, they adjust the inflation index accordingly, according to Ephraim Leibtag, an economist with...
...because the Taliban controls the only road leading into Kajaki, all the equipment and all the labor have to be flown in by helicopter. John Shepherd, who manages the project for the Louis Berger Group, which was contracted by USAID, says he would be ready to push the start button today if it weren't for the security problems. His warehouse in Kabul is packed with hundreds of crates of equipment that have to be transported to Kajaki, along with some 300 tons of cement. It would take a convoy of trucks just a few days to bring the materials...
...Sugar currently produces 9% of America's sugar - thanks to a massive federal water-control project that its executives helped design and a lucrative federal sugar program that artificially boosts its prices. The company has always been popular in its headquarters of Clewiston ("The World's Sweetest Town"), but labor activists have accused it of mistreating its workers and environmental activists constantly blame the firm for ravaging the Everglades...