The World of Labor - January 3, 2009



	THE WORLD OF LABOR — January 3, 2009 By Harry Kelber Female Factory Workers in Korea Wage Three-Year Strike As they wage a tireless battle against Sirius Satellite Radio, a small band of Korean unionists offer a grim lesson on how corporations have put the screws to workers. A group of women who assemble radios for Sirius in Seoul, South Korea, organized a union three years ago after the company made the women work 13-hour days, six to seven days a week. Pay was only $3.62 an hour in the capital city, where the cost of living is similar to that of New York. Three years ago, when the Kiryung Electronics Factory tried to break the union by firing almost everyone in the plant, the women occupied the factory for 55 days. The company called in riot police who drove them out of the plant. The strikers set up camp outside the main gate where they have remained for three years. This past summer, 35 workers launched a hunger strike, and the union’s leader stretched it to 94 days until she was carried to the hospital in late September. She then started her fast anew. At the Kiryung plant, all but 10 of the 250 factory workers were “dispatch” people — “temps” sent to companies by agencies, and who can be fired for any reason. Today, there are about 8.6 million dispatch workers in the country. They earn about half of the pay of permanent employees. Close to two-thirds of the work force does not have permanent employment status. German Unions Warn of Strikes by 800,000 in Public Sector Public sector strikes could hit Germany in early 2009 if wage talks next month, on behalf of 800,000 workers, fail to produce a satisfactory outcome, the head of one of the main unions warned Dec. 30. The DNB and fellow union Verdi will press for an eight percent raise or a minimum increase of 200 euros ($285) in talks starting Jan. 19. “I fail to understand how the state, while providing billions to rescue the economy, wants to leave its own workers out in the rain,” said Peter Heesen, head of the DNB union. In November, a strike by 3.6 million metal and electronics sector workers that had threatened to deal a blow to Germany’s ailing economy was narrowly averted after unions and employees agreed on a 4.2 percent pay raise. The accord followed nationwide warning strikes in which more than 500,000 workers took part. Germany’s powerful unions have been criticized for seeking large wage increases at a time when Europe’s largest economy is in recession and firms are struggling to stay afloat in the face of weak demand and scarce credit. But the DNB’s Heesen rejects this, saying that after three years of no increases, a decent wage hike would put cash in people’s pockets and boost consumer spending. Immigrant Workers in Central Asia May Form Muslim Union Most of the immigrants working in the Urals region of Russia are from the former republics of Central Asia and they are united by their Islamic faith. As a result, local union officials are promoting the idea of forming a Muslim trade union. Vasily Derkach, the development director of the Federation of Trade unions of Sverdlovsk oblast, said that his group supports the idea of creating such a union and the notion that its leadership should consist of “a protégé of the Muslim clergy” with ethnic deputies. The federation has approached the imams of mosques in Verkhnaya Pushme and Pervouralsk to help the union body identify those who would be most capable of leading the new Muslim union, a task made more complicated by the skepticism about the idea of this union expressed by some Islamic leaders. Sibgatulia Saydullin, chairman of the Muslim Spiritual Directorate of Sverdlovsk, says, “Labor law should not consider nationality and faith.” Since there is sufficient interest in forming the group, employers are already thinking what it might mean. They believe the creation of such a union won’t have much of an impact because the financial crisis has reduced the number of workplaces, and immigrants, desperate for income, will be willing to work under any conditions offered. French Unions Losing Influence in Economic Downturn When the financial crisis in the United States washed onto Europe’s shores and pushed the economy into recession, the workers at the Peugeot car plant in the village of Sochaux in eastern France were afraid — and angry. Waving the red banner of the biggest French trade union, the CGT, they staged prolonged strikes to demand not only an end to unemployment, but shorter workweeks and longer vacations, even as the economy continued to drag. That was in the 1930s Today, with the global economy once again in a tailspin, the strike weapon has lost much of its potency, as the biggest French multinationals like Citroen, the country’s No 1 carmaker, have temporarily halted production in dozens of factories. “Striking is hardly a threat when management doesn’t want you to work, ”Bruno Lemerle, the head of CGT at Sochaux said gloomily. There are eight unions competing for members at the plant, mirroring the national labor membership rate of eight percent, which is lower than the 12 percent in the United States. Bangalore Faces Loss of 60,000 Jobs from U.S. Firms The term “getting Bangalored” or having jobs outsourced from the West to the international IT hub, is acquiring another connotation — this time of professionals being fired in Bangalore. The Union of Information, Technology and Enabled Services (UNITES) anticipates at least 60,000 job losses in the first half of the new year. Fifty percent of UNITES members are from Bangalore, pointing to the city’s large concentration of India’s entire BPO information processing sector, higher than the world’s emerging BPO centers in developing countries. Ever since United States majors, like General Electric and American Express, shifted their back office processing operations to India in 1994-96, the world’s biggest corporations, from the airlines to banking industries, resorted to business process outsourcing (BPO) to this country, raising jobs from 553,000 in 2007 to the current 1.6 million jobs. About 50 percent of the BPO workforce consists of women and so does 28 percent of the IT sector. The industry’s link with the U.S. and Britain’s recessions have played havoc on the local scene, with at least 10,000 jobs lost in 2008, between September and December. India has no labor laws regarding severance pay for laid-off workers, Companies that pay out severance pay in their home countries can avoid doing so in India. Taiwan Union Members Protest over Unpaid Leave Several hundred angry union members gathered in front of the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) building on Dec. 30 to urge the council to penalize businesses that force employees to take unpaid leave. Labor associations from all over Taiwan participated in the protest. The group said that the consent of both workers and unions must be required before an employer can order unpaid leave. They also demanded that unpaid leave not be allowed to affect a worker’s health insurance and other benefits. They urged the council to subsidize individual workers when the worker’s unpaid leave results in salaries dipping below the monthly minimum wage. The council came under fire after it said that a worker may be paid below the minimum wage when on unpaid leave. It reversed that decision a day later. The council met with union representatives at the Legislative Yuan on Dec. 29, but the meeting failed to reach any consensus. A Healthy and Happy New Year to you and working families around the world. Harry Kelber Check our web site: http://www.laboreducator.org

THE WORLD OF LABOR — January 3, 2009

By Harry Kelber

Female Factory Workers in Korea Wage Three-Year Strike

As they wage a tireless battle against Sirius Satellite Radio, a small band of Korean unionists offer a grim lesson on how corporations have put the screws to workers. A group of women who assemble radios for Sirius in Seoul, South Korea, organized a union three years ago after the company made the women work 13-hour days, six to seven days a week. Pay was only $3.62 an hour in the capital city, where the cost of living is similar to that of New York.

Three years ago, when the Kiryung Electronics Factory tried to break the union by firing almost everyone in the plant, the women occupied the factory for 55 days. The company called in riot police who drove them out of the plant. The strikers set up camp outside the main gate where they have remained for three years. This past summer, 35 workers launched a hunger strike, and the union’s leader stretched it to 94 days until she was carried to the hospital in late September. She then started her fast anew.

At the Kiryung plant, all but 10 of the 250 factory workers were “dispatch” people — “temps” sent to companies by agencies, and who can be fired for any reason. Today, there are about 8.6 million dispatch workers in the country. They earn about half of the pay of permanent employees. Close to two-thirds of the work force does not have permanent employment status.

German Unions Warn of Strikes by 800,000 in Public Sector

Public sector strikes could hit Germany in early 2009 if wage talks next month, on behalf of 800,000 workers, fail to produce a satisfactory outcome, the head of one of the main unions warned Dec. 30. The DNB and fellow union Verdi will press for an eight percent raise or a minimum increase of 200 euros ($285) in talks starting Jan. 19. “I fail to understand how the state, while providing billions to rescue the economy, wants to leave its own workers out in the rain,” said Peter Heesen, head of the DNB union.

In November, a strike by 3.6 million metal and electronics sector workers that had threatened to deal a blow to Germany’s ailing economy was narrowly averted after unions and employees agreed on a 4.2 percent pay raise. The accord followed nationwide warning strikes in which more than 500,000 workers took part.

Germany’s powerful unions have been criticized for seeking large wage increases at a time when Europe’s largest economy is in recession and firms are struggling to stay afloat in the face of weak demand and scarce credit. But the DNB’s Heesen rejects this, saying that after three years of no increases, a decent wage hike would put cash in people’s pockets and boost consumer spending.

Immigrant Workers in Central Asia May Form Muslim Union

Most of the immigrants working in the Urals region of Russia are from the former republics of Central Asia and they are united by their Islamic faith. As a result, local union officials are promoting the idea of forming a Muslim trade union. Vasily Derkach, the development director of the Federation of Trade unions of Sverdlovsk oblast, said that his group supports the idea of creating such a union and the notion that its leadership should consist of “a protégé of the Muslim clergy” with ethnic deputies.

The federation has approached the imams of mosques in Verkhnaya Pushme and Pervouralsk to help the union body identify those who would be most capable of leading the new Muslim union, a task made more complicated by the skepticism about the idea of this union expressed by some Islamic leaders. Sibgatulia Saydullin, chairman of the Muslim Spiritual Directorate of Sverdlovsk, says, “Labor law should not consider nationality and faith.”

Since there is sufficient interest in forming the group, employers are already thinking what it might mean. They believe the creation of such a union won’t have much of an impact because the financial crisis has reduced the number of workplaces, and immigrants, desperate for income, will be willing to work under any conditions offered.

French Unions Losing Influence in Economic Downturn

When the financial crisis in the United States washed onto Europe’s shores and pushed the economy into recession, the workers at the Peugeot car plant in the village of Sochaux in eastern France were afraid — and angry. Waving the red banner of the biggest French trade union, the CGT, they staged prolonged strikes to demand not only an end to unemployment, but shorter workweeks and longer vacations, even as the economy continued to drag.

That was in the 1930s

Today, with the global economy once again in a tailspin, the strike weapon has lost much of its potency, as the biggest French multinationals like Citroen, the country’s No 1 carmaker, have temporarily halted production in dozens of factories. “Striking is hardly a threat when management doesn’t want you to work, ”Bruno Lemerle, the head of CGT at Sochaux said gloomily.

There are eight unions competing for members at the plant, mirroring the national labor membership rate of eight percent, which is lower than the 12 percent in the United States.

Bangalore Faces Loss of 60,000 Jobs from U.S. Firms

The term “getting Bangalored” or having jobs outsourced from the West to the international IT hub, is acquiring another connotation — this time of professionals being fired in Bangalore. The Union of Information, Technology and Enabled Services (UNITES) anticipates at least 60,000 job losses in the first half of the new year. Fifty percent of UNITES members are from Bangalore, pointing to the city’s large concentration of India’s entire BPO information processing sector, higher than the world’s emerging BPO centers in developing countries.

Ever since United States majors, like General Electric and American Express, shifted their back office processing operations to India in 1994-96, the world’s biggest corporations, from the airlines to banking industries, resorted to business process outsourcing (BPO) to this country, raising jobs from 553,000 in 2007 to the current 1.6 million jobs. About 50 percent of the BPO workforce consists of women and so does 28 percent of the IT sector.

The industry’s link with the U.S. and Britain’s recessions have played havoc on the local scene, with at least 10,000 jobs lost in 2008, between September and December. India has no labor laws regarding severance pay for laid-off workers, Companies that pay out severance pay in their home countries can avoid doing so in India.

Taiwan Union Members Protest over Unpaid Leave

Several hundred angry union members gathered in front of the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) building on Dec. 30 to urge the council to penalize businesses that force employees to take unpaid leave. Labor associations from all over Taiwan participated in the protest.

The group said that the consent of both workers and unions must be required before an employer can order unpaid leave. They also demanded that unpaid leave not be allowed to affect a worker’s health insurance and other benefits. They urged the council to subsidize individual workers when the worker’s unpaid leave results in salaries dipping below the monthly minimum wage.

The council came under fire after it said that a worker may be paid below the minimum wage when on unpaid leave. It reversed that decision a day later. The council met with union representatives at the Legislative Yuan on Dec. 29, but the meeting failed to reach any consensus.

A Healthy and Happy New Year to you and working families around the world.

Harry Kelber

Check our web site: http://www.laboreducator.org