Inside the Teamsters’ Preparations for a UPS Strike
This summer could see 350,000 UPS workers walk off the job, the United States’ largest strike in the 21st century thus far. The Teamsters are getting ready. Here’s a look at how.
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Jane McAlevey’s Plan for How to Build a Fighting Labor Movement
As a longtime labor organizer, scholar, and writer, Jane McAlevey has repeatedly articulated how mass numbers of workers can organize, negotiate, strike, and change the world. In an extended interview with Jacobin, McAlevey reflects on her life and work.
Unions Are for Fighting the Boss. Don’t Turn Them Into Toothless Guilds.
Manhattan Institute fellow Allison Schrager argues in a nationally syndicated opinion piece that unions can best serve their members by focusing on insurance schemes and cooperating to find boss-friendly solutions. That’s nonsense.
Christmas in July
When and where organized labor’s been on the move.
US Labor Should Act Boldly and Choose Solidarity With Palestine
While some US unions and many labor activists are calling for a cease-fire in Gaza, most union officials are keeping silent. They're forgetting the old labor adage: “an injury to one is an injury to all.”
The United Auto Workers Are Looking to Unionize the Whole Auto Industry
In the wake of its historic strike victory, the United Auto Workers says thousands of nonunion autoworkers have reached out asking for support in organizing their plants. The UAW already has plans in motion to unionize the whole US auto sector.
The US Labor Movement Experienced a Breakthrough Year in 2023
In 2023, half a million workers, including machinists, teachers, baristas, nurses, hotel housekeepers, actors, screenwriters, and autoworkers, went on strike and won. Their historic gains underscore the momentum of a rising reform movement in US unions.
In 2023, the US Working Class Fought Back
More than half a million workers in the US went on strike this year, winning gains not only for themselves but for nonunion workers too. While there’s much more work to be done, 2023 was a year when the working class punched back at the capitalist class.
What’s Ailing New York City’s Labor Unions?
New York City is often thought of as a stronghold of organized labor. But the city’s unions look worryingly passive as their strength erodes.
Amazon Is on the Attack Against Kshama Sawant
Since first winning office in 2013, Seattle socialist city councilmember Kshama Sawant has pushed a $15 minimum wage, landmark renters’ rights legislation, free public transit, and more. Which is why Amazon has declared war on her.
Under Capitalism, There’s No Such Thing as a “Fair Day’s Wage for a Fair Day’s Work”
We’ve got some bad news for you on Labor Day: your boss is exploiting you. Karl Marx explains how.
In Defense of Slavoj Žižek
Slavoj Zizek has made some serious missteps in recent years — but he remains an important theorist for the Left in our postmodern, neoliberal era.
The Don Gives 2021 a Barely Passing Grade
Jacobin troll Donald Hughes sent in 18,000 words grading major events in 2021. What follows are brief selections from his treatise. The verdict: 2021 sent in some poor work, but he's letting it through.
Workers in British Columbia Just Won Single-Step Union Certification
Before the anti-labor onslaught of the 1980s, union recognition in Canada was straightforward and democratic — all it took was a workplace majority to sign authorization cards. Now, decades later, workers in BC have won back this fundamental right.
Montana’s Rivers and Streams Belong to Everyone. We Have to Protect Them From the Rich.
Montana’s beautiful, serene rivers were sites of life-changing experiences for me. The rights of all Montanans to those rivers were won through working-class struggle — a history we can draw on today as Montana’s rich aim to hoard those rivers for themselves.
The Prison-Industrial Complex Goes Beyond Cops and Jails. It’s All Around Us.
Police and mass incarceration are only the most visible and obvious manifestations of the prison-industrial complex. Ruth Wilson Gilmore argues that the prison-industrial complex is a holistic social organizing principle that pervades life under capitalism.
Socialist Kristen Gonzalez: We Defeated the Democratic Machine
In this summer’s New York state primaries, DSA’s Kristen Gonzalez defeated the Queens Democratic machine candidate in a 25-point blowout. She spoke with Jacobin about how she did it and what comes next as she joins the growing bloc of socialists in Albany.
Brandon Johnson Is Looking to Go From the Public School Classroom to Mayor of Chicago
Brandon Johnson spent a decade as a rank-and-file Chicago teacher and organizer for the Chicago Teachers Union before winning county-level elected office. Now, he’s running for Chicago mayor with the union’s backing. We spoke to Johnson about his campaign.
Workers at Pittsburgh’s Biggest Newspaper Have Been on Strike for Nearly Three Months
Multiple unions representing Pittsburgh Post-Gazette employees have been on strike since October. Workers say they’ve been without a contract for six years, and many are being denied health care by the company. Jacobin spoke with two workers about the strike.