We start this week with congratulations for workers at REI, Barnes and Noble, and the Chicago Nature Museum who all won union elections last week. Our first full story covers an ongoing strike by San Diego bus drivers over being forced to work split shifts that take up 13 hours of their day. In DC, workers with UNITE HERE are protesting the move to close one of the most popular and acclaimed new restaurants in the country just to crush a union drive. An investigation by The Nation this week revealed the widespread levels of exploitation and hazardous working conditions in the legal weed business. Tech workers at Amazon have moved to escalate the class struggle at the company in response to recent layoffs. The National Eating Disorders Association decided that rather than continue to operate a helpline used by thousands every year if the workers unionized, they'd rather replace the workers with a chatbot that doesn't work. Finally, resident doctors in Queens struck this week for the first time in over three decades over low wages and disparities with other hospitals.

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Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

Ep 159 - You Can't Automate Empathy

We've got another supersized episode this week! We start with headlines from Japan, Chile, Chicago, Chattanooga, Missouri, Rhode Island, and San Jose. For our first store we discuss the fight by Indian tech workers to have a right to time outside of work.  Next, a recent report from IGN reveals how video game companies are working to cut actors out of the business with AI. The war on student workers escalated again this week as Columbia works with the Trump Administration to attack anti-genocide speech. Finally, we close with a roundup on the attacks on federal workers, attempts to shut the Department of Education and gut the Department of Labor, and the growing fight back against the gutting of the government.

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Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

More info on the show at http://workstoppagepod.com/

Ep 250 - Halfway to Halfway to 1000!

If you're not a patron, you can get full access to this episode by supporting us at patreon.com/workstoppage.

We were very excited to be joined this week for a special interview episode by Dr. Erik Baker, lecturer at Harvard University and author of the great new book, Make Your Own Job: How the Entrepreneurial Work Ethic Exhausted America. The book is a fascinating intellectual history of how the concept of "entrepreneurialism" came to dominate ruling class narratives about the economy. This ideology of the individual business owner charting their own course, being their own boss, and "making their own job" has also had deep impacts on the labor movement through mechanisms such as independent contracting. So it was wonderful to get a chance to discuss this history, how it has impacted the union struggle, and how we see it manifesting today!

Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

More info on the show at http://workstoppagepod.com/

Interview Preview: Make Your Own Job by Erik Baker

We start this week with headlines on organizing in healthcare, logistics, airlines, construction, software development, video games, and trading cards. We did a deeper dive on a set of stories from Canada last week, this week we have three big stories from workers and farmers in India fighting against neoliberal exploitation. The next major step forward for Mexico's young independent labor movement may be coming up, as Labor Notes reports on efforts to bring new union SINTTIA to a second major plant from GM. The Supreme Court took a major step towards dismantling the NLRA and the entire post-Depression regime of contractual collective bargaining this week, and unions will need to shift tactics to respond. Finally, we discuss how the 4 day workweek is going in Iceland.

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Follow the pod at instagram.com/workstoppage, @WorkStoppagePod on Twitter,  John @facebookvillain, and Lina @solidaritybee

New tracks tagged #Tech Workers