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By jwjnational, on June 22nd, 2011
Today, Jobs with Justice and the United Students against Sweatshops released an “investor alert” showing how Rite Aid’s mismanagement and corporate greed have contributed to the company’s poor performance during the past four years. The release of the investor alert coincides with Rite Aid’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 23 at the Hilton Hotel in Harrisburg, PA. The alert is available on the Jobs with Justice website here.
Jobs with Justice has been an active supporter of Rite Aid workers across the country who have struggled to form unions and to win union contracts. Over the last several years, Jobs with Justice has leafleted stores, met with store managers, sent emails to top Rite Aid executives, and held rallies in support Rite Aid workers in their local communities.
Rite Aid has been struggling to return to profitability since the disastrous acquisition of the Brooks and Eckerd chains in 2007, which left the company deeply in debt. Rite Aid has consistently under-performed its top competitors, CVS and Walgreens, and has reported losses in 15 straight quarters (results for the 16th quarter ended on 5/31, will be reported on June 23). Despite sagging share prices, Rite
Continue reading Mismanagement & Corporate Greed Plague Rite Aid
By James Haslam, on May 25th, 2011
The Vermont Worker’s Center invites you to tune into a special presentation on Vermont’s new universal health care law, to be signed by Governor Shumlin on May 26 at 10am. As a direct result of a highly energized and organized grassroots people’s movement for the human right to healthcare, Vermont has become the first state in the country to pass a bill for a universal, publicly financed healthcare system that commits to providing healthcare as a public good.
Join the Vermont Workers Center/JwJ at the Vermont Statehouse Room 11 at 9:00AM E.S.T. Thursday, May 26, 2011 or tune into the live stream here.
Immediately before the bill signing ceremony in the Vermont Statehouse, the Healthcare Is a Human Right Campaign will give a presentation to the press and the public, live-streamed online to a national audience, to explain the significance of this new law and provide a human rights assessment of its key provisions. Leading members of the Campaign will also look ahead at the challenges Vermonters face as powerful special interests, led by the deep-pocketed insurance industry, gear up to derail the transition to universal healthcare over the next few years.
The Vermont Worker’s Center
Continue reading Live Streamed Press Conference on Signing of Vermont Universal Healthcare Bill H.202
By rand wilson, on May 4th, 2011
Rite Aid Negotiating Committee after signing Tentative Agreement on May 1, 2011.Rite Aid workers at the company's massive Southwest Distribution Center in Lancaster declared victory on Sunday, May 1 in their five-year effort to form a union and improve working conditions.
Workers signed a 3-year tentative agreement with management on May 1 – subject to a May 12 ratification vote – that will improve conditions at the million-square-foot facility in California’s high desert by guaranteeing:
Health insurance rates that are fair for both individual workers and their families,
Job security provisions to prevent work from being sub-contracted,
A worker voice in production standards and ability to challenge unfair standards,
Protection against intense summer heat and winter cold, using innovative indoor-temperature standards,
A fair and impartial process for resolving disputes,
Wage increases in each of the next 3 years.
“We’re excited about winning this victory, even if it took longer than it should have,” said Carlos “Chico” Rubio, a 10-year warehouse worker who helped negotiate the union contract with a team of eight co-workers.
Employees decided to form their union
Continue reading Rite Aid workers win 5-year campaign to form union at giant Rite Aid distribution center
By rand wilson, on April 6th, 2011
 Cross-posted from In These Times.
Last Friday, more than two dozen Rite Aid drugstores across the country had some unexpected visitors. Activists in 10 states converged on 30 stores on April 1 to protest the company’s unfair labor practices and management’s efforts to impose unaffordable healthcare costs on employees.
Workers at six Cleveland Rite Aid stores—whose employees are members of United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 880—have been on strike since March 14. After nearly a year of fruitless contract negotiations, the strike started because Rite Aid management committed dozens of unfair labor practices, violating members’ rights through illegal threats, harassment, retaliation, surveillance and refusing to bargain in good faith.
Rite Aid resorted to these illegal tactics in Ohio as part of a nationwide effort to convince workers to move into a more expensive company health insurance plan. Many Rite Aid retail employees are paid such low wages that if their union accepted Rite Aid’s plan, they would be forced to decline company coverage and instead rely on taxpayer provided benefits such as Medicaid for their medical needs.
According to UFCW
Continue reading Rite Aid Workers’ Strike in Cleveland Sparks Nationwide Protest
By James Haslam, on March 31st, 2011
On Thursday, March 24, members of the grassroots Healthcare Is a Human Right Campaign cheered on as the Vermont House of Representatives voted 92 – 49 to pass the universal healthcare bill, H.202. The House bill passed as a result of thousands of Vermonters speaking out and demanding that healthcare be treated as a human right and provided as a public good.
“This bill puts Vermont on a path to a system in which every Vermonter can get the healthcare they need when they need it, and the financing of that system is shared equitably by all. This is a huge step forward,” says Peg Franzen, President of the Vermont Workers’ Center.
The Healthcare Is a Human Right Campaign still hopes to strengthen the bill in the Senate based on its human rights principles of universality, equity, accountability, transparency and participation.
“This bill is a road map and it gets Vermont started down that road. We are fighting hard to have human rights principles be the guidelines for this bill, because we must have a system that works for everyone,” says Franzen. “We’re asking the Senate to specify that Green Mountain Care will be financed equitably, which means that people
Continue reading Vermont House Passes Universal Healthcare Bill
By Margaret Butler, on March 28th, 2011
Portland Jobs with Justice has led the building of a statewide network to strengthen the movement for a single payer health care system. With the addition of all the Oregon Jobs with Justice chapters (Southern OR, Central OR, Eugene Springfield Solidarity Network, and Mid-Willamette Valley) adopting single payer health care as a priority campaign, Oregon JwJ activist are gearing up to fight for a just healthcare system that puts people before profits.
Single Payer Conference a Huge Success
On January 29, over 450 single payer advocates from around the state of Oregon gathered at the First Unitarian Church in Portland to network and advocate for an improved, expanded Medicare for All program to fix our broken health care system.
The conference opened with a plenary talk by Dr Margaret Flowers, Physicians for a National Health Program’s Congressional Fellow. She presented the basics of what a single payer plan does and explained why the recent federal reform, while making a few positive changes, further entrenches the for-profit insurance industry, while failing to provide universal access to good care or to control skyrocketing insurance and care costs for individuals, families, businesses, governments and society as a whole. Flowers
Continue reading Fighting for Single-Payer Health Care in Oregon
By Central Indiana JwJ, on March 9th, 2011
Labor and faith leaders joined women’s rights activists in calling on Hoosiers across the state to continue their courageous effort to defend the Hoosier majority from the anti-worker, anti-woman, anti-immigrant, anti-student legislative attack.
Continue reading “Protect Our Patients” rally kicks off week of Indiana Protests
By jwjnational, on December 20th, 2010
Health & Pharmaceutical Industry, Hyatt runners-up in national contest to determine who did the most harm to workers and their families this year.
 Senator Mitch McConnell took 42% of the thousands of votes cast in Jobs with Justice’s eleventh annual national contest to determine the greediest, most cold-hearted person or company of the year. A small number of Senators, led by conservative Senate Minority leader Mitch “puppet of the rich” McConnell, have spent this Congressional session aggressively blocking almost all legislation from passing, especially laws that would help working people. McConnell could have shown great leadership to support people in need at a time when so many are struggling, but this Scrooge doesn’t care about governing or making this country a better place to live. McConnell’s goal is to do whatever is necessary to hoard power for himself and his party.
“We hope that by being elected national Scrooge of the Year, Senator McConnell will see the ‘Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come’ and understand the dire consequences that his actions will have for generations of Americans,” said Sarita Gupta, National Jobs with Justice Executive Director.
The Kentucky chapter
Continue reading Senator Mitch McConnell Elected 2010 Scrooge of the Year
By rand wilson, on December 10th, 2010
Rite Aid employees backed by Jobs with Justice and other community supporters are organizing a nationwide “Day of Action” on Wednesday, December 15 to focus public attention on the company’s culture of corporate greed and its assault on workers’ living standards and job rights.
Dozens of actions are scheduled at Rite Aid locations across the country, including stores in California, Massachusetts, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington. At each store, Rite Aid customers will be informed about:
Rite Aid’s decision to hike its CEO’s compensation to $4.5 million despite the company’s poor performance.
The company’s effort to impose huge cost increases on workers for health insurance.
Rite Aid’s disturbing pattern of delays and difficulty in reaching fair agreements with workers.
The company’s conversion of good jobs into low-wage positions with few benefits and no rights on the job.
The nationwide actions were sparked by a rash of recent decisions by Rite Aid officials:
In Cleveland, OH, executives are trying to dramatically increase employee health care costs. The company announced plans to impose higher costs on Jan. 1 that could lead to a possible strike.
In Lancaster, CA, Rite Aid executives stalled talks with 500 warehouse employees for nearly
Continue reading Rite Aid Workers Set to Mobilize Nationwide on Dec. 15th
By Jonathan Kissam, on November 12th, 2010
 For more than two years, the Vermont Workers’ Center/Jobs with Justice, a community-based workers’ rights organization, has been leading a statewide campaign to implement a universal and equitable healthcare system in the state of Vermont, the Healthcare Is a Human Right Campaign. This campaign won legislation in the 2010 legislative session which commits the state to implementing a new healthcare system which meets the human rights principles of universality, equity, accountability, transparency and participation. Dr. William Hsiao, who designed Taiwan’s single-payer system, is designing three options for the state, one of which will be a single-payer system and all of which must meet the human rights principles. While there are many struggles ahead to make sure that the state chooses and implements a new plan that actually meets human rights principles, Vermont is certainly headed in the right direction.
The contrast with the national situation is stark, especially in light of last week’s election results. The 2008 election of Barack Obama as President and majorities for the Democratic Party in both houses of Congress
Continue reading Vermont as a Catalyst for National Change in the Struggle for Health Care
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