CostCo, Starbucks And Whole Foods Offer Fake EFCA Compromise

The fight over the Employee Free Choice Act has been a tough one, with pro-union forces looking for more freedom to start unions and corporations wanting to stifle worker collectivity. For decades corporations have largely been winning, evidenced by a long-term decline in union membership. With a majority of people supporting the Employee Free Choice Act, some companies are trying to pull a fast one on union supporters by offering a fake compromise.

From ThinkProgress:

The Wall Street Journal reports today that Costco Wholesale Corp., Starbucks Corp. and Whole Foods Market Inc. are seeking to compromise with union groups to support a modified version of the Employee Free Choice Act. The compromise would allow a union to be formed if 70 percent — instead of the current bill’s 50 percent proposal — sign a card favoring unionization. However, the anti-union lobby refuses to back the deal:

“These huge companies are apparently willing to sell out hundreds of thousands of small ones under the guise of making some phony and misguided compromise with Big Labor,” Mix said in a statement. “We believe we have this draconian bill defeated outright, so these actions may well lead to the bill’s passage.”

The Workforce Fairness Institute’s (WFI) Danny Diaz slammed the proposal in his morning e-mail, Politico reports, calling it a “non-starter” and “even worse” for workers. WFI’s executive director Katie Packer said, “Calling a proposal which exposes 70% of employees to intimidation instead of 50% a ‘compromise’ is beyond absurd.”

Basically this is a last-ditch effort by corporate America, who are using the names of somewhat progressive companies to tout a "compromise" that is anything but. I wonder what group of PR flacks hatched this convoluted plan? Trying to trick us is simply a waste of everyone's time. Now imagine if all the money that goes into subverting the working class from getting better represenation at the companies they work for were used for helping employees. Now that would be a novel idea.

McCain Needs Nine Car Motorcade To Go To Starbucks

I admit, I like Starbucks. My girlfriend refers to it as my crackhouse. So its a little more than just 'like.' Having the free internet is great and being that I live in NYC, I can walk to the one on my corner (literally). I also brew my own at home when I have the time, and I get it from a local store in the Village that has been around for more than a hundred years. So I try to balance out the corporate coffee. John McCain also likes coffee, but this is just ridiculous.

From The LA Times:

McCain, who huddled with advisors at his desert compound in Sedona, Ariz., said nothing in public. A nine-car motorcade took him to a nearby Starbucks early in the morning, where he ordered a large cappuccino. McCain otherwise avoided reporters.

Forced into damage-control mode, his campaign aides counterattacked to reinforce their claim that Obama is an elitist.

Um Senator McCain? Calling your opponent elitist after taking a nine car motorcade to a nearby Starbucks is absolutely ridiculous. Add that to yesterday's story of your twelve houses, and it is just over the top. Obama came from a single-parent family and worked hard to get where he is. And while it was your wife and your choice, you married into your money. The two stories are not even close.

Now maybe you can try and get in touch with your inner-middle classness and buy a coffeemaker.

East Village Is Looking To Protect Itself

While crime has dropped significantly throughout the city and even the "scary" Alphabet City is no longer a place where you must be loaded to walk past Avenue B, there is a huge problem in the neighborhood. It doesn't have anything to do with violence, but everything with having to preserve the character of the area. As anyone who has gone to Astor Place knows, there are two Starbucks within a few hundred feet of each other and a third that lurks nearby. Starbucks and other corporations (especially banks) are trying to take over the East Village as much as they have across the rest of the city. Well now the community is trying to do something to stop it.

From The Villager:

To address the encroachment of chain stores, some members of the East Village Community Coalition have taken the first steps toward what they hope will be a “formula retail” zoning plan for the neighborhood that could limit or change the character of chain stores opening in the area.

The concept — initiated by Michael Rosen, E.V.C.C.’s co-founder and a 19-year East Village resident — seeks to eventually implement changes to the city’s Zoning Resolution that would prevent so-called formula chain establishments such as Starbucks from displacing local businesses or appearing out of context with the neighborhood.

The organization has only just begun to investigate the idea, after publishing its second annual pocket guidebook featuring hundreds of independently owned shops in the East Village to encourage locally based commerce. E.V.C.C. also recently enlisted the help of the Pratt Center for Community Development to research possible solutions in the increasingly gentrified area, which Rosen worries could become like “your basic strip mall” if preventive action is not taken.

Strip malls may be the fixture of suburbia, but they have no place in communities such as the East Village. Thankfully they, the community, is fighting back against the corporatization of America. If we can't save (some) of the character of New York, what chance does the rest of the country have?

NYC Starbucks' Accused Of Union-Busting

The Seattle-based coffee company is literally everywhere in New York City. The stores can be seen from almost any spot in the city. Setting aside the issue of corporate over-development versus local businesses for a second, lets take a look at how they treat their employees. Starbucks is going to have to defend itself in front of the New York Labor Relations Board for allegedly intimidating activists at four different locations in Manhattan.

From 1010 WINS:

An NLB trial looking into the matter began yesterday, with some of the peeved baristas showing up to express their anger about the Seattle-based company's labor practices.

The board says the company fired pro-union employees, banned workers from wearing union pins and gave unfair negative performance reviews.

The coffee company could be asked to reinstate fired employees and publicly state it will not try to break unions if it is found guilty at the hearing.

A spokeswoman for the coffee giant said the claims are baseless. Of course the board will answer that question. Starbucks claims to treat their employees great, so why no unionizing? Why would employees talk about horror stories like these? Starbucks acts like any other retail giant by giving employees limited work hours to avoid dealing with overtime as well as keeping them disorganized.

While Bush fights against labor for his corporate buddies, unions are still legal entities in this country. They have been the force that has afforded Americans a decent wage and safe working conditions. Even in the sanitized retail world that consumers see, there is an ugly side to any company that puts profits above their workers.