Download the march and rally poster RIGHT HERE!
Budgets and Jobs at Stake in Fight Over Knox County Schools’ Outsourcing Plan
The Metro Pulse published a good article about proposed Knox County Custodian outsourcing and our fight against it.
After a temporary reprieve last spring, Knox County School custodians and their allies are girding themselves to fight the outsourcing of their jobs to a local firm come next year.
“At this point, people like us who are concerned about this are just waiting to see what they would pay,” says Lance McCold of Jobs With Justice, a worker advocacy group that has taken up the custodians’ cause. “This is supposed to be a cost-saving measure. As it stands, the custodians aren’t particularly well-paid.
“There are only two ways to save money in custodial service—you reduce service, or you reduce the compensation of the people doing the work. And when you hire a private firm you have to pay for management, for the firm to make a profit. Presumably, this comes on the backs of already poorly paid custodians…”
Read the rest of the article here.
We keep hearing that America’s broke, but the hard truth is that the 400 richest households are richer than ever before. This report shows that if they wanted—or if we made them—the 400 richest households in America could:
- pay off all the student loan debt in the United States
- triple the number of teachers in the United States
- pay rent for every renter in the United States for three years
- give every worker a $10,000 bonus
- replace 70% of all money lost in the financial crisis, which they continue to profit from
…and more. So America isn’t broke, just its poor & working people.
What’s happening to our economy? Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich breaks it down in two minutes. It’s pretty simple: the rich keep getting richer, and make sure that they’re the ones who stay on top. Please watch!
Jobs with Justice of East TN members went to Vestival on May 7 to collect petition signatures and testimonials from Knoxvillians against the Knox County School Board’s scheme to outsource its lowest paid workers: the custodians.
Here’s what they had to say.
Members of Jobs with Justice’s Public Knoxville group picket outside a meeting between Knox County Schools Superintendent Jim McIntyre and prospective corporate bidders who want to help outsource custodial services from our school system so they can make a profit.
We say no!
(photo by Holly Rainey)
Remember when teachers, public employees, Planned Parenthood, NPR and PBS crashed the stock market, wiped out half of our 401Ks, took trillions in TARP money, spilled oil in the Gulf of Mexico, gave themselves billions in bonuses, and paid no taxes?
Yeah, us neither.
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Kentucky High School Students Stand Up For Teachers, Public Employees
In the general battering that teachers have received from opportunistic right wing governors like Walker of Wisconsin, an untold story is the support of students. This action in Kentucky shows that students are prepared to stand up for teachers even at the risk of punishment from the very system they support. As student Nash Walley said during the April 4 We Are One rally: “When I thought about the history of the American labor movement…striking workers are being threatened with loss of their jobs, imprisonment and even violent opposition, I decided that several days of suspension was well worth doing what I thought was right.” Watch the video here of students in solidarity with teachers.
Posted by wd
Don’t Punish the Poor: Economist Jeffrey Sachs on the Obama-GOP Budget Deal
From today’s DemocracyNow!, economist Jeffrey Sachs interrogates the Obama-GOP compromise and America’s continued defunding of poor peoples’ communities to fund rich peoples’ pockets:
…This is a miserable step in the wrong direction. It started last December, when Obama and the Republicans agreed to cut a trillion dollars of taxes by extending the Bush tax cuts. And now, even though the details aren’t even worked out, apparently, they’re slashing into programs for the poor. So this is all going in the wrong direction, and many of us who supported President Obama just feel that he’s abandoned the field.
