"Give Workers the Right of First Refusal" by Bhaskar Sunkara

https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/80/give-workers-the-right-of-first-refusal/

~~ recommended by newestbeginning ~~

The Rhode Island Worker Cooperative Alliance launches ~~ Steve Ahlquist Nov 16

 https://substack.com/app-link/post

~~ recommended by collectivist action ~~

What If Labor Owned Its Workplaces? AN INTERVIEW WITH ALEX HEMINGWAY

 https://jacobin.com/2024/04/canada-worker-ownership-policy-democracy?mc_cid=de761322df&mc_eid=2206b60e8c

~~ recommended by emil karpo ~~

The Habitation Economy ~~ Dissent Magazine

 https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/the-habitation-economy/

~~ recommended by emil karpo ~~

The Dishonest Defense of Non-Competes Big corporations don't like worker freedom, so they lie about it. PAT GAROFALO OCT 26

 

https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=13744&post_id=138277431&utm_source=post-email-title&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=rovhk&token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo0NjUxMDE4NCwicG9zdF9pZCI6MTM4Mjc3NDMxLCJpYXQiOjE2OTgzMjk2NTYsImV4cCI6MTcwMDkyMTY1NiwiaXNzIjoicHViLTEzNzQ0Iiwic3ViIjoicG9zdC1yZWFjdGlvbiJ9.8pIZvQzKhYPLj-tBhVHrsv20_wTOy0rVilH_8oWdBR0 ~~ recommended by newestbeginning ~~

Time Is the Universal Measure of Freedom - Boston Review

 https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/mike-konczal-tk/?utm_source=Boston

~~ recommened by collectivist action ~~

Worker Ownership Builds Community Wealth and a More Just Society ~~ Pamela Haines ,

 https://truthout.org/articles/worker-ownership-builds-community-wealth-and-a-more-just-society/

~~ recommended by collectivist action ~~

INTERVIEW: To the Point of Production: An Interview with John Watson of the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, 1969

 https://www.blackagendareport.com/interview-point-production-interview-john-watson-league-revolutionary-black-workers-1969

~~ recommended by collectivist action ~~

On the picket line ~~ Marie Kelly posted on August 12, 2022

 https://www.workers.org/2022/08/66040/

~~recommended by collectivist action ~~

UAW Convention/Militants open struggle against business unionism ~~ Martha Grevatt posted on August 4, 2022

UAW Convention/Militants Open Struggle Against Business Unionism

~~ recommended by collectivist action ~~

BRITAIN’S RAIL WORKERS ARE POISED TO STRIKE AGAINST AUSTERITY ~~ BY KARL HANSEN JUNE 1, 2022

https://therealnews.com/britains-rail-workers-are-poised-to-strike-against-austerity?utm_medium=email&utm_source=The+Real+News+Network&utm_campaign=6e14a527e5-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2022_06_01_04_14_Prison&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_020676f7fe-6e14a527e5-425023606&mc_cid=6e14a527e5&mc_eid=2d87b78d52 

Forty thousand rail workers across 16 companies in Britain have voted to strike. Their strike would be the biggest rail walk-off in decades, against funding cuts that would destroy Britain’s rail system as we know it.

~~recommended by emil karpo ~~ 

'Defund the Police' Is Dead But Other Reform Efforts Thrive In U.S. Cities ~~ STEVE FRIESS ON 05/24/22

https://www.newsweek.com/2022/06/24/defund-police-dead-other-reform-efforts-thrive-us-cities-1709393.html?utm_source=PushnamiMailing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=automatic&UTM=1653478141852&subscriberId=613fc0137aeb51cecb2f7be1

~~recommended by emil karpo ~~

Abolition Democracy W.E.B. Du Bois and the making of Black Reconstruction. ~~ Gerald HorneMAY 3, 2022

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/web-du-bois-black-reconstruction/

~~recommended by emil karpo ~~

The Supreme Court Just Dealt a Blow to Farmworkers — And All Other Workers, Too ~~ MEAGAN DAY

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/07/cedar-point-nursery-v-hassid-ufw-california-labor-relations-act-migrant-labor-farmworkers-agriculture?mc_cid=adc29952cd&mc_eid=2206b60e8c

Agricultural bosses won a Supreme Court case barring California unions from talking to farmworkers on the job site. It’s a major setback not just for farmworkers but all other workers, too.

~~recommended by emil karpo ~~

The Amazon Warehouse Walkout Is Just the Latest Push

https://www.wired.com/story/amazonians-unite-walkouts/

~~ recommended by emil karpo ~~

Supply chain crisis: Driven by deregulation ~~ Betsey Piette

 https://www.workers.org/2021/11/59936/

BERLIN’S ‘NEW ECONOMY’ WORKERS FIGHT EXPLOITATION AND UNION BUSTING. ~~ Molly Shah

https://therealnews.com/berlins-new-economy-workers-wont-stop-fighting-for-a-union

Workers at Gorillas, the Berlin-based grocery delivery service, secured a major court victory as they continue their fight against “new economy” exploitation and rampant union busting.

Capitalist success vs proletarian success ~~ The Hampton Institute

https://tinyletter.com/hamptonthink/letters/capitalist-success-vs-proletarian-success

~~ posted for collectivist ~~

Can ordinary people run society? ~~ Paul D'Amato

https://socialistworker.org/2007-1/620/620_11_RunSociety.php

A COMMON argument against socialism is that the majority is incapable of ruling collectively. We need educated, intelligent experts to run such a complex system.

The legendary stupidity of George W. Bush, whose rich parents and crony friends bought him passing grades and much more, or the incompetence of Federal Emergency Management Agency bureaucrats during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 are both strong arguments against this view.

"I think we are welcomed," said Bush when asked about Vice President Dick Cheney's predictions that U.S. troops would be greeted with thanks by Iraqis. "But it was not a peaceful welcome." When Brazilian President Luiz Ignácio "Lula" da Silva showed him a map of Brazil, Bush exclaimed, "Wow! Brazil is big."

There are many other examples that could be cited of presidents, industrialists and bureaucrats with limited, if non-existent, abilities.

Most people at the very top of society, the multimillionaires and billionaires, play no direct function in its running--they merely collect the rewards of ownership. The ruling class today has become entirely parasitic, siphoning wealth, but serving no useful social function.

As early as 1881, Frederick Engels wrote that the capitalists do little but cash in dividend checks. "The social function of the capitalist here," he says, "has been transferred to servants paid by wages; but he continues to pocket, in his dividends, the pay for those functions though he has ceased to perform them."

"We [can] manage very well without the interference of the capitalist class in the great industries of the country," Engels concluded. "Stand back! Give the working class the chance of a turn."

Bankers and investors don't make steel. It hardly takes intellectual brilliance for some who inherits a million to double it. Society could do away with the ruling class and suffer no more than when an appendix is removed from a human body.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

BUT DO workers possess the capacity to rule? Won't they still depend on experts?

Often, it is workers' own hard-won, first-hand knowledge that engineers and managers use to figure out how to improve production--that is, to squeeze as much out of workers as possible.

Not to deny the genius of a Newton or an Einstein, but "if science is understood in the fundamental sense of knowledge of nature," writes Clifford Connor in his People's History of Science, " it should not be surprising to find that it originated with the people closest to nature: hunter-gatherers, peasant farmers, sailors, miners, blacksmiths, folk healers and others forced by the conditions of their lives to wrest the means of their survival from an encounter with nature on a daily basis."

Given the opportunity, everyone is capable of learning the scientific, administrative and mathematical skills necessary to play a direct role in running society, just as in pre-class society, knowledge of terrain, plants and animals or tool-making was shared by the group, and not treated as the monopoly of a minority.

Experts and scientists would still be needed for a time even under socialism, until the education system was improved to the point that the majority received education which today is reserved only for the privileged few. For a time, workers would have to exercise democratic control over the bookkeepers, managers and engineers.

But with society's vast resources diverted toward education, the distinctions between mental and manual work would break down, and the majority would be capable of doing many different kinds of jobs, from manual work to scientific work to administrative work.

If workers, through their own directly elected representatives, were to seize control of production, mistakes would no doubt be made. But they would be the mistakes of the collective rather than the blind workings of the market--and could quickly be remedied by experience.

For example, if the workers of Chicago ran the city instead of corporate bigwigs and their corrupt political hirelings, they would immediately begin solving the city's most pressing problems.

The homeless would be quickly housed in unused homes, excess hotel space, and the requisitioned second and third homes of the rich. Meanwhile, unemployed construction workers would be organized to begin building more houses.

The ill-gotten gains of the city's patricians and their hangers-on would be seized and used to provide jobs, feed the hungry, improve dilapidated schools and provide better park services, improved transportation and real after-school programs for all.

In our society nothing is done if it isn't profitable. In a society run by the collective producers, these problems could be solved because social need, rather than the market, would determine how decisions are made.

CDC’s maskless mandate puts workers at risk

https://www.workers.org/2021/05/56453/

~~ posted for collectivist ~~

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recklessly capitulated to pressure from U.S. corporations in issuing their latest guidelines lifting masks requirements. They announced May 13: “Fully vaccinated people can resume activities without wearing a mask or physically distancing, except where required by federal, state, local, tribal or territorial laws, rules and regulations, including local business and workplace guidance.” 

While the percentage of adults getting vaccinated continues to rise, only 1 in 3 people in the U.S. are fully inoculated. The CDC guidelines contain no mandate stating individuals must provide proof they are fully vaccinated. This puts the lives of essential workers at serious risk. 

Since the start of the pandemic in early 2020, scientific studies have shown that  mask wearing and social distancing are the most effective ways to limit the spread of COVID-19. Removing mandatory mask wearing is bound to result in new spikes of viral infections and deaths, particularly among the poorest and most oppressed communities, whose access to vaccines has been more limited. 

The CDC’s guideline, which came as a surprise to many people working in public health, conflicts with the views of many scientists. A New York Times informal survey of 723 epidemiologists found that 80% said individuals need to wear masks in indoor public areas for at least another year, and 88% responded that even fully vaccinated people should wear masks at large outdoor gatherings.

Vivian Towe, program officer at the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, said to the Times, “Unless the vaccination rates increase to 80% or 90% over the next few months, we should wear masks in large public indoor settings.” (May 13)

States, bosses coerce workers

Some states are beginning to cut off access to unemployment insurance benefits to force workers to return to jobs in dangerous environments lacking adequate safety measures to protect them from the virus or where they are paid subsistence wages.  Already burdened with enforcing mask mandates, frontline workers are now being put in the impossible position of determining if customers or others whom they encounter are truly vaccinated. 

Even with mask mandates implemented, there have been multiple incidents of workers being harassed and even injured while trying to enforce the protocols.  Most at risk are workers in jobs with heavy exposure to the public, in grocery and retail stores and warehouses, and those toiling in the service sector in transit, health care, postal or sanitation jobs or employed in restaurants, hotels and other hospitality businesses. Children under 12, not yet eligible for vaccines, now account for 22% of new cases.

The year-plus history of the coronavirus pandemic is rife with examples of large gatherings where unvaccinated people deliberately flout mask mandates, further fueling the spread of COVID-19. Throughout the pandemic, the right-wing, anti-mask movement has ignored protocols by appearing in public without the vital protection of masks. Many are vocally anti-vaccine.

With mask mandates in place, workers in restaurants and other businesses open to the public could restrict access for these individuals. Now the door is wide open for anti-maskers and anti-vaxxers to fill public spaces without restraint, endangering people’s lives.

People who are immunocompromised, not yet immunized, or who lack access to, or eligibility for, the vaccine will pay the consequences. This affects the many Latinx immigrants, who want to be inoculated as soon as possible but are afraid of risking their jobs, or their immigration status, if they take time off to get vaccinated.