A weekly newsletter from the Institute for Policy Studies |
|
|
In an unfortunate twist of fate, this week’s May Day edition of our newsletter is appearing just days after we all lost one of our world’s most fearless pro-labor advocates, the globally lauded musician, actor, and activist Harry Belafonte.
Over nearly seven decades, Belafonte fiercely and tirelessly supported struggles for civil and worker rights at every level. He had an especially close relationship with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — who was murdered in Memphis, Tennessee during a visit to support striking sanitation workers, still fighting for safer working conditions today — and A. Phillip Randolph, who founded the first Black-led union, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.
Belafonte served for many years as a board member of the Institute for Policy Studies, our Inequality.org home base. We feel his loss deeply. We treasured this warrior for peace and justice as a dear friend.
Ever militant in his support for unions and working people, Belafonte would no doubt want us to see our current moment in labor history — we now have the lowest level of union workplace density since the 1920s — as motivation for redoubling our struggles for ever-greater equality. We have lots more on those carrying on Belafonte’s legacy in this week’s issue. Chuck Collins and Rebekah Entralgo,
for the Institute for Policy Studies' Inequality.org team |
|
| INEQUALITY BY THE NUMBERS |
|
|
Fighting for a Historic Black Worker Bill of Rights With union membership at modern-era lows, workplace organizing has never been more necessary. But Black workers, who face widespread workplace discrimination, are often targeted by corporatist efforts to stifle worker power.
“The Black working class is up against a well-organized, well-funded, racist, and sexist opposition,” notes Nzingha Hooker, the National Black Worker Center's policy director. “They internalize a narrative that tells them: ‘You should be happy with what you have, there are people who are less deserving of a living wage, and if you keep your head down, things will work out better for you.’”
To empower and protect Black workers, Nzingha and her colleagues are advocating for a Black Worker Bill of Rights that would close the loopholes in anti-discrimination and labor law that let employers continue to treat Black workers unfairly. Watch this Progressive Caucus Action Fund webinar to learn more. |
|
|
App Companies Can Protect Drivers Against Rising Crime
In 2022, murders took the lives of at least 31 drivers for Uber and other app-based corporations. What makes app work so dangerous? Many drivers rely on bonuses and surge pay to get by. They’re constantly racing to meet high quotas for rides or orders within narrow set timeframes. This model pressures drivers to work when they feel unsafe and put up with abusive customers. If they file a complaint, drivers fear, they could get fired. Three worker-advocate groups — Gig Workers Rising, PowerSwitch Action, and ACRE — are releasing a report today that calls on employers to do more to protect their employees. Last year, the groups point out, Uber gave top execs huge bonuses for supposed “safety improvements” — even though the corporation had failed to meet its own narrow safety metrics.
ACRE’s Veronica Avila and PowerSwitch Action’s Mariah Montgomery have more on how to address the ongoing safety crisis for app workers. |
|
|
Harry Belafonte Never Ever Danced to a Billionaire Beat
Last Tuesday, right after Harry Belafonte’s death, almost every major U.S. media outlet immediately ran glowing appreciations of his remarkable career. The obituaries saluted his artistry and life-long commitment to achieving full civil rights for us all. But both Belafonte and his close friend Martin Luther King Jr. saw their civil rights advocacy as the cutting edge of a still broader struggle for equality. Let’s all smile when we remember Harry Belafonte’s wondrous art. Let’s all, even more importantly, take inspiration from his struggle for a more economically equal tomorrow. Inequality.org’s Sam Pizzigati has more.
|
PETULANT PLUTOCRAT OF THE WEEK |
What We Really Ought To Get When We Google 'Greed'
This week’s dour deep pocket: Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet, the Google parent company.
What has him sour: With Google losing the “artificial intelligence” arms race and Alphabet’s share price tumbling, Alphabet shareholders haven’t been too happy with Pichai of late. But Pichai is insisting he has a “'significant multi-year effort” underway to control costs, and Alphabet, he says, will “continue to use data to determine additional areas for durable savings.” A good place to start those “durable savings”? Pichai’s paycheck. Last week brought news that Pichai pocketed $226 million in 2022, 808 times his typical employee's pay.
The last word: Alphabet workers, now facing 12,000 company-wide job cuts and work rule changes that have employees sharing desks and losing company-supplied laptops, have begun protesting in California, New York, and the United Kingdom. Alphabet is treating employees, says one engineer fired via an “automated account deactivation at 3 A.M.,” as “100-percent disposable.”
|
|
|
This week on Inequality.org
Rebekah Entralgo, Why We Need a Black Worker Bill of Rights. From warehouses to board rooms, from the Deep South to Silicon Valley, workers of color face discrimination in hiring, promotions, treatment, and pay.
Britni Cuington, When Broadband Companies Hire Low-Wage Contractors, They Put My Life at Risk. New federal funding will expand access to broadband, but we need to make sure the job gets done right — by skilled union workers, not low-wage contractors.
Sarah Anderson, Defend the Postal Service, Defend Good Jobs for Black Workers. The U.S. Postal Service is a vital source of decent jobs for Black workers. Instead of cutting or privatizing services, this public agency should be expanding to meet 21st century needs.
Bella DeVaan, The Gilded Glamour Met Gala Was a Fantasia of Inequality. Today’s May Day Met Gala may succeed in becoming as ironic as last year’s Gilded Age-themed affair.
Elsewhere on the Web
Ethan Baron, ‘Excessive wealth disorder’: Should the ultra-rich pay more to help solve America’s problems? San Jose Mercury News. Taxing the richest 0.1 percent of Americans appropriately, the Excessive Wealth Disorder Institute estimates, could generate $10 trillion over the next decade.
Chris Maisano, The Constitution Is a Plutocratic Document, Jacobin. A new book by political scientist Robert Ovetz examines why our constitutional system is failing to address the many crises we face. Troy Farah, The ultra-rich are ultra-destroying the planet. Two studies illustrate the climate crisis, Salon. Our wealthiest may well be doing more damage to the world’s poor than climate change is.
Kevin Blackistone, Daniel Snyder’s exit will be a relief, but it doesn’t feel like justice, Washington Post. Dan Snyder is just “the latest in a line of reprehensible billionaire owners of sports franchises to profit from the sale of teams they sullied — with little or no punishment, financial or otherwise.”
Timothy Noah, The Stock Market’s Down—but Guess Which Direction CEO Pay Is Going, New Republic. Over one-third of the S&P 500 companies with proxy statements filed as of April 14 gave top execs a raise, even as shareholder returns in these same companies declined.
Derek Seidman, Fossil Fuel Giants With Most Emissions Paid $1.18 Billion to CEOs in Last Decade, Truthout. ExxonMobil, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and Anadarko (now Occidental) enriched their chief execs big-time between 2013 and 2022.
Levi Sumagaysay, Why can bosses seem so out of touch? The growing CEO-to-worker pay gap may offer a clue, Morningstar. The gap between U.S. CEO and worker pay has expanded over 1,460 percent since 1978.
Jan Weir, Investing in Innovation: Confronting Predatory Value Extraction in the U.S. Corporation, Medium. An expert in the games the super-rich play to transfer wealth upwards looks at an important new book from economic analyst William Lazonick. Brendan Ballou, Private Equity Is Killing Your Pets, The Nation. Even pooches get the short end of the stick when we let wealth concentrate. John Anderer, Swimming pools in rich neighborhoods leave poor communities without basic access to water, StudyFinds. Social inequalities are driving urban water crises even more than environmental factors like climate change or the continual growth of urban populations.
|
Why the debt ceiling matters to YOU!, MomsRising.org. Republicans in Congress are putting our families and economy at risk and playing political chicken with our healthcare, nutrition assistance, and childcare funding. |
Asher Miller, Rob Dietz, and Jason Bradford, Overproduction of Elites and Political Upheaval, or… the Story of Rich People Doing Stupid Things, Crazy Town. Inequaity.org's Chuck Collins joins the hosts to discuss the physics of inequality, the myth of deservedness, and how "wealth and power use their influence to rig the rules to get more wealth and power."
RJ Eskow, Linda Benesch on How Inequality Undermines Social Security, The Zero Hour. Benesch, the communications director of Social Security Works, joins Eskow to discuss the legislative horizons for making Social Security more equitable. Read her Inequality.org piece referenced in the episode here.
|
|
|
In honor of May Day, a visual reminder of the powerful role unions can play in reducing inequality. In the 1940s and 1950s, with union membership soaring, the share of national income going to our richest 1 percent fell. We have, the data show, markedly reversed extreme inequality in the past. We can do that again. |
|
|
Inequality.org | www.inequality.org | inequality@ips-dc.org Managing Editor: Rebekah Entralgo
Co-Editors: Sarah Anderson, Chuck Collins, Sam Pizzigati, and Isabella DeVaan Production: Isabella DeVaan |
|
|
|