Category: Labor

Axios San Diego reports that on Tuesday, Feb. 13, hundreds of flight attendants, pilots and other airline workers will be picketing outside the San Diego Airport as part of a nationwide demonstration over their pay and working conditions amid ongoing contract negotiations.

They’re asking for raises and challenging their pay structure and will be joining picketers from multiple unions representing 100,000 flight attendants for Alaska, United, American, Southwest and other airlines who are expected outside 30 airports nationwide. The industry norm is they don’t get paid until the plane doors close.

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By Thomas Fudge / KPBS / December 15, 2023

There are still taxi drivers in San Diego despite the storm of changes to the industry brought by ride-hailing companies. You can still call a dispatcher to get a ride from drivers with the United Taxi Workers of San Diego (UTWSD). But now those taxis also have an app, just like Uber and Lyft.

“You can go to your Apple App store, your Google Play store and just search for Ride United. You’ll see ‘Ride United (Passengers)’, and just click download like with any other app,” said UC San Diego communication professor Lilly Irani.

By Kristina Houck / Patch San Diego / Dec. 5, 2023

After the New Year, employment discrimination for off-duty cannabis use will be illegal in California. Assembly Bill 2188 and Senate Bill 700 amend the California Fair Employment and Housing Act to protect employment rights for people who use marijuana.

Beginning Jan. 1, it will be against the law under AB 2188, with certain exceptions, for California employers with five or more employees to discriminate against current or potential workers for cannabis use off the job and outside of the workplace.

Starbucks’ annual “Red Cup Day” may be accompanied with long wait times Thursday, Nov. 16 instead of holiday cheer.

Thousands of workers, including some in San Diego, are planning to strike while demanding the coffee giant comes to the bargaining table in regards to staffing and scheduling concerns.

The Workers United union proclaimed the day as the “Red Cup Rebellion,” choosing the date because it’s one of Starbucks’ busiest days of the year. Annually, those who order a holiday drink of this day receive a reusable cup.

Thousands of Kaiser Permanente health care workers went on strike this morning, Wed., Oct. 4 at hospitals and medical offices in San Diego and across the country.

Kaiser has failed to reach a deal with a coalition of unions to renew a contract that expired Sept. 30. Union leaders are fighting for more staffing and higher annual pay raises, arguing their wages have not kept up with the rising cost of living and inflation.

 Only one thing can save us from predatory AIs: our own data

by John Robb and Jacob Siegel / Tablet / Sept. 25, 2023

As Hollywood recycles comic book remakes with funding from China, the once-great cultural capital appears to be in a state of steep decline. But in one area, at least, the movie industry is offering a bold and inspiring vision for the future. The writers and actors who went on strike to prevent studio owners from using artificial intelligence (AI) to exploit and expropriate their work are on the front lines of a new data war triggered by the explosive growth of AI. This past July, Fran Drescher, former star of the popular sitcom The Nanny, and now president of the SAG-AFTRA union,

By Ken Stone / Times of San Diego / Sept. 6, 2023

Ten years after Greenpeace saw one of its ships seized by Russia, the same 166-foot icebreaker is docked at San Diego’s Broadway Pier.

The mission of the Arctic Sunrise is less dangerous this time.

By KPBS/ July 10, 2023 The arrests of three UC San Diego student workers accused of vandalizing campus property drew a large crowd to the San Diego Central Courthouse Monday in protest of potential criminal charges.

The workers, Jessica Ng, William Schneider, and a third person whose name has not been disclosed, were arrested about a month after the discovery of what UC San Diego police has described as vandalism

By Peter Lucas / The Intercept / July 11, 2023

On May 5, as Chancellor Pradeep Khosla began his opening remarks at the 44th University of California, San Diego Alumni Awards at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, some 60 academic worker activists took the stage carrying a cardboard sign.

They were there to present him with UC’s “Most Overpaid Worker” award; Khosla had received a $500,000 raise while, the union says, the university was simultaneously refusing to fully implement their recently ratified collective bargaining agreement.

By Colleen O’Connor

More than 1,000 campuses were closed Tuesday and Wednesday, affecting about 420,000 students in the nation’s second largest school district, the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD).

Tuesday at 4:30 a.m., more than 60,000 LAUSD workers and teachers began walking picket lines in the rain.

To which I respond, good for them.  It is long overdue.

By CBS8 Staff / March 9, 2023

It took less than two days for the jury to come to a decision in the civil trial of former news anchor Sandra Maas against KUSI.

The jury was split on the claims but did award Sandra Maas more than $1.5 million for the difference in pay attributed to gender, past and future lost wages, and past and future emotional distress.

By Sonali Kolhatkar / Nation of Change / February 27, 2023

Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz, in a recent interview with CNN’s Poppy Harlow, proudly showed off his newest invention: a tablespoon of olive oil added to a cup of coffee to bring out rich, complex flavors. The conversation took place in Italy and was meant to showcase Schultz’s commitment to the innovation and quality of Starbucks coffee as he gets ready to step down as CEO of the company for the third time.