Public Sector Environmentalists vs. Jobs

By Steve Malanga
11/03/2014
On October 24th I observed in the WSJ that private and public unions were increasingly in conflict this election season, particularly as left-leaning public union leaders align with members of the Democratic coalition like environmentalists, whose no-growth economic policies cost blue-collar workers jobs. One example I didn’t discuss in that piece is a campaign transpiring in California,...

TAGS: Chris Christie, environmentalists, Northern California District Council of Laborers

Unions Await Fantastic Return on High-Speed Rail Political Investments

By Kevin Dayton
01/22/2013
It’s a heady time to be a top construction union official in California, as the California High-Speed Rail Authority presumably now holds proposals from as many as five design-build consortiums to build the first segment of the $68 billion project. If this project moves forward, it will become part of the pantheon of huge American infrastructure projects...

TAGS: California Construction Industry Labor-Management Cooperative Trust, California high speed rail, California High-Speed Rail Authority, Community Benefits Policy, Gray Davis, high speed rail, Labor-Management Cooperation Act of 1978, Northern California District Council of Laborers, Project Labor Agreements, State Building and Construction Trades Council of California

California’s “Prevailing Wage” – Floor Vacuuming at $45.93/Hour

By Kevin Dayton
01/08/2013
California State Assemblyman Curt Hagman (R-Chino Hills) is introducing a bill to address one of the numerous absurdities in California’s prevailing wage law: the $38-46 per hour wage paid to laborers who clean up construction sites after taxpayer-funded construction is finished. As revealed in a 2009 state wage enforcement action against a construction company working...

TAGS: Northern California District Council of Laborers, Prevailing Wage