Trade Minister Simon Birmingham said “you can’t reflect society if 90% of your members of parliament were chosen from trade unions and worked in trade unions”. Let’s take a look at the numbers.
Google employees protest outside the company’s Mountain View, California, headquarters.
AP Photo/Noah Berger
The walkout by thousands of Google employees around the world was historic, both because of who was protesting and what their demands were. It may even mark the start of something new.
Workers’ falling share of national income is helping to fuel the trade union campaign to ‘change the rules’.
Dan Himbrechts/AAP
While government payments and programs go some way to reducing inequality, the transformation of the labour market and its institutions has cut workers’ share of the pie to historic lows.
Demonstrators at one of many ‘Change the Rules’ rallies in October, this one outside parliament house in Adelaide.
Kelly Barnes/AAP
As political and legal fights over casual work crank up, it’s worth busting some myths, such as the idea that it is becoming more common.
McManus says the present industrial relations system has “excessive, unnecessary and sometimes confusing rules” that hamper parties reaching agreement.
Julian Smith/AAP
There are 750,000 fewer workers under enterprise agreements now than when the Coalition was elected, McManus says in her speech to the John Curtin Research Centre.
The UK desperately needs a more robust system to lift standards in low paid sectors and protect workers.
Interviewed on 2GB Morrison seized on an offensive Father’s Day tweet from John Setka, Victorian state secretary of CFMMEU’s construction and general division.
Joe Castro/AAp
The Liberals have for years sought to make Shorten’s union background and associations work for them. They haven’t so far had anything like the success they hoped. The question is, can Morrison?
Fighting for a $15 an hour wage in Pittsburgh.
AP Photo/Keith Srakocic
Thomas Kochan, MIT Sloan School of Management; Duanyi Yang, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); Erin L. Kelly, MIT Sloan School of Management, and Will Kimball, MIT Sloan School of Management
Americans want more say about their benefits, training and other important issues at work.
After a long industrial campaign, Amazon workers in Italy have persuaded their employer to reach an agreement with them.
FILCAMS CGIL
While the Supreme Court’s Janus ruling dealt a blow to organized labor, three lessons from Nevada’s unions suggest things aren’t as bleak as they appear.
Plaintiff Mark Janus, right, speaks outside the Supreme Court
AP Photo/Andrew Harnik
The Janus decision by the Supreme Court is a serious legal and financial blow to unions and their hundreds of thousands of members. But it will not kill public-employee unions or teachers’ unions.
Unions negotiate for improved employment security and training opportunities.
Alex Murray/AAP
The Supreme Court could kill collective bargaining throughout the country, making workers worse off and exacerbating inequality.
One of the paradoxes of wage policy is that ultimately governments are held responsible and blamed for poor results, but governments are but one player in a complex system of wage adjustment.
Lukas Coch/AAP
Although over 200 CEOs have promised to share windfalls from the recent tax cut with their employers – something the president is likely to bring up in the State of the Union – research suggests workers aren’t holding their breath.