Recent Articles of Interest

In this section of the union's website, we provide links to a number of articles from the corporate and alternative media that we think are worth your time. The most recent articles will appear at the top of the list of links. Most will be in PDF format in order to avoid the problem of articles being removed from external websites after the posting here.


October 10, 2022

  • Privatization Is War on Our Freedom w/Donald Cohen


    November 13, 2021

  • Why The Media Loves Labor Now - New York Times

  • Deere Reaches Third Tentative Deal With Union in Attempt to End Strike - New York Times

  • Inside the rise of 'antiwork,' a worker's strike that wants to turn the labor shortage into a new American Dream - Insider

  • Kaiser Permanente Reaches Tentative Deal With Unions, Averting Strike - New York Times

  • Why Columbia Graduate Workers Like Me Are on Strike -Jacobin

  • Meet the 18-year Kellogg's veteran who's leading workers in a month-long strike that's still going: 'What's at stake here is the American middle class'-Insider


    April 1, 2019

  • A Blow But Not Fatal: 9 Months After Janus - In These Times

  • How "illegal" Teacher Strikes Rescued The American Labor Movement


    March 1, 2018

  • The Two Faces of Janus - In These Times

  • Interview with Mary Bottari, the author of the "Two Faces of Janus" article - Counterspin/Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting

  • OSA Chair Bob Croghan interviewed by ACT TV at the February 24th Working People's Day of Action in Foley Square, Manhattan. He explains the motive behind the Janus v. AFSCME DC31 Supreme Court case and what it means for OSA and other public sector unions.


    January 23, 2017

  • Amid Populist Fury, Elite Mull Inequity, but Avoid Talk of Sacrifice - NY Times

  • Rage Against the Machines - Smithsonian Magazine

  • Why Developers of Manhattan Luxury Towers Give Millions to Upstate Candidates - ProPublic


    January 20, 2016

  • The Destruction of Progressive Wisconsin

  • Senator Sanders' Bold Plan to Expand Social Security


    July 25, 2014

  • Wealthier New Yorkers Aren't Fleeing the City For Tax Havens - NY Times

  • A New Gameplan For Taking Down Privatizers - Too Much

  • An Idiot's Guide to Inequality - NY Times

  • Workforce Is More Divided, Report Shows - Wall Street Journal

  • Losing Sparta - Virginia Quarterly Review

  • Get Out of Jail, Inc. - New Yorker

  • Moaning Moguls - New Yorker

  • Letter to the Editor: Face to Face With Unions - The Chief

  • NYCOSH Recognizes Those Who Go Extra Mile On Job Safety - The Chief

  • Letter to the Editor: Joint Award on Safety - The Chief


    May 12, 2014

  • Cartoon: Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Patsis

  • Microstrikes for the Modern Workplace


    April 21, 2014

  • Reading Elizabeth Warren A review of Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren's new autobiography, "A Fighting Chance."

  • Looking For Mr. Goodpain: Austerity Works Where?


    April 14, 2014

  • The Decision To Contract Out

  • Wall Street Bonuses and the Minimum Wage

  • 2013 Workforce Profile Report An overview of who works for New York City in all of our demographic glory -- 93% of us belong to a union, by the way.

  • Work, Money and Power: Unions in the 21st Century -- download a pdf copy at the link for your individual use or order multiple printed and bound copies.

  • Invisible Social Security Cuts

  • Pension Costs in Context Who gets more -- corporations through subsidies and tax breaks or public pension recipients?

  • Chattanooga: Political Pressure Pushes Out UAW


    December 5, 2013

  • They're Watching You At Work

  • Out of Control - Privatization

  • Pension Theft: Class War Goes To the Next Stage

  • Google Funding A Slew of Right Wing Groups

  • Detroit Bankruptcy: City Pensioners Pay the Cost

  • De Blasio Picks First Deputy Mayor


    November 18, 2013

  • Wal-Mart Asks Low-Wage Workers To Donate Food To Low-Wage Workers

  • Scott Stringer Rolls Out Comptroller Transition Team

  • Many High End New York City Apartments Have Modest Tax Rates

  • Toll Authority Out of Control


    October 29, 2013

  • How Much Do Schools Get From The Lottery?

  • Rule DDC Went Too Far In Response To Possible OSA Grievance

  • Widow's Bankruptcy Case Poses Risk To Rent Stabilized Tenants

  • Rhode Island - How Wall Street Is Stealing From The State's Public Pensions

  • The Road From Here - What About Social Security and Medicare?


    October 9, 2013

  • Outsourcing America Exposed

    After you watch the video, visit Outsourcing America for information on the way government services are being privatized.

  • Juan Gonzalez: Controller John Liu Has Saved Taxpayers Millions of Dollars


    September 30, 2013

  • And The Poor Get Poorer - The Nation

  • How The NFL Fleeces Taxpayers - Atlantic

  • How Equitable Are NYC Property Taxes? - Daily News

  • IRS Leaves $385 Billion Uncollected - AARP

  • Tech Guild Charges NYCHA On Waste - Local 375 DC37 AFSCME

  • Looting Public Pensions - A New Study - Rolling Stone

  • Looting The Pension Funds - Rolling Stone

  • By The Numbers - The Incredibly Shrinking American Middle Class - Bill Moyers & Co.


    September 5, 2013

  • The Pay Is Too Damn Low

  • Unions Might Find A Friend In City Hall

  • Pinching Pensions to Keep Wall Street Fat and Happy

  • The Trans-Pacific Partnership Is Not About Free Trade

  • Among The Poorest Paid A New Labor Revival

  • The State Of The Unions 2013


    June 7, 2013

  • A Novel Idea: Fiction For Labor Activists - Labor Notes

  • Movies We Love About Workers, Work and the Workplace - Labor Notes

  • Food Stamp Nation


    May 16, 2013

  • White Collar Workers Are Turning To Labor Unions

  • Middle Class Workers' Retirement At Risk

  • Good Place To Work, Hard Place To Live

  • Juan Gonzalez: Hudson Yards Development Fails To Deliver Promise of Affordable Housing

  • The Biggest Takers and Social Parasites Are the Rich Not the Working Class and Poor

  • Real Affordability: Evaluation of the Bloomberg Housing Program

  • Who Will Lead the US Working Class?

  • Labor's Plan B


    May 6, 2013

  • Welcome To The Gilded City of New York

  • What Happened To Working Class New York

  • The Legacy of the 1970s Fiscal Crisis

  • Wanted: A Progressive Mayor

  • A Wall Street Street State Of Mind

  • How The One Percent Rules

    An interesting quote from the article linked below: "The mayor, together with a set of wealthy philanthropists, successfully lobbied to have the cap raised on charter schools in 2007 and again in 2010. Recently, it was revealed that he plans to start his own chain of such schools when he leaves office and has assigned city employees to the task of designing them."

  • The Education of Michael Bloomberg

  • Resurrecting Brownsville

  • Low Wage Workers Unite

  • New York LGBT Purists to Christine Quinn: We'd Love a Gay Mayor. Just Not You

  • Dan Loeb Simultaneously Solicits, Betrays Pension Funds


    March 4, 2013

  • Inequailty of income in America represented graphically.

  • Who is Pete Peterson and "Fix the Debt" and Why Are They Coming After Your Social Security and the Social Safety Net - Democracy Now


    February 25, 2013

  • Economist Richard Wolff on Fighting for Economic Justice and Fair Wages - Moyers and Company

  • The Great Tax Cut Experiment


    February 20, 2013

  • Workers of the World, Sit Tight - The Nation

  • Why Gender Equality Stalled - NY Times

  • The Great Regression

  • Minimum Wage: Who Decided Workers Should Fall Behind?

  • Forty Percent Of Americans Now Make Less Than 1968 Minimum Wage

  • Comptroller John Liu: Times Square Giveaway Cost $344 Million

  • Corporations Advise School Closings, While Private Charters Suck Public Schools Away

  • How Can Labor Be Saved? A Forum in The Nation

  • 1. Put Organizing First

  • 2. Make Organizing a Civil Right

  • 3. What Labor Can Learn From The Obama Campaign

  • 4. Build A Democracy Movement

  • 5. Become A Movement Of All Workers

  • 6. Time For Labor To Mobilize Immigrants

  • 7. Fight For The Whole Society


    January 24, 2013

  • The Real Reason For The Decline Of American Unions

  • Union Membership Drops Despite Job Growth - NY Times

  • Scorn For Unions Threatens Bloomberg's Educational Legacy - NY Times

  • To The Wall Street Journal, You Don't Exist


    January 21, 2013

  • Juan Gonzalez: Mayor Bloomberg Should Stop Blaming Bus Workers - NY Daily News

  • It's A War On the Workers - The Chief

  • Mayor Chooses Strike Over Job Protections - The Chief

  • New York School Bus Strike - Labor Notes

  • Bloomberg's Stubborness Costs NYC $450 Million in Education Aid - AFL-CIO


    January 16, 2013

  • NYC Bus Strike Kicks Off - The Nation

  • What the Looming NYC School-Bus Strike Can Teach Us About the Real Impact of Austerity - Alternet

  • The Surprising Unknown History of the NRA


    January 15, 2013

  • Freedom Works Putting Its War Chest To Work For Anti-Union Agenda

  • Chained CPI - The 3% Cut to Social Security - Dean Baker

  • Public Goals, Private Interests in Debt Campaign - NY Times


    January 10, 2013

  • The Fiscal Times: How Democrats Became Liberal Republicans

  • Counting Pennies - Cory Booker Roughs It For A Week - The Economist

  • In Need of Help - The Poor in America - The Economist

  • Surprise, Surprise: The Banks Win - Gretchen Morgenson - NY Times

  • Lure of Green Cards Bring Investments - NY Times

  • Too Much Midtown - Justin Davidson - New York Magazine

  • Health Insurers Raise Some Rates by Double Digits - NY Times

  • Inside the Hostess Bankery - Bluebarnstormer

  • Corporate Gold on the Fiscal Cliff - Bill Moyers

  • Eight Corporate Subsidies in the Fiscal Cliff Bill - Matt Stoller

  • Fact Sheet: The Tax Agreement - The White House

  • From Fat Tales to Fat Tony


    December 24, 2012

  • America's Teachers: Heroes or Greedy Moochers at the Public Trough - Dave Lindorff - This Can't Be Happening

  • For Poor, Leap to College Often Ends in a Hard Fall - Jason DeParle - NY Times

  • Welcome to the Future of Your Health Insurance. It Sucks. - Yves Smith - Naked Capitalism

  • The Money-Empathy Gap. - Lisa Miller - New York Magazine

  • Unions: How They Lost Their Power - The Week


    December 17, 2012

  • Children of the Storm: Education and Social Mobility - The Nation

  • Austerity Economics Doesn't Work - The New Yorker

  • Economist Dean Baker on the Mythology of the "Fiscal Cliff" - Video From Democracy Now

    December 13, 2012

    Earlier this week, Michigan became the 24th state to pass so-called "right to work" legislation during a lame duck session of their state legislature. In January, a Republican majority would have been replaced by a Democratic one; hence the rush to passage. The bills were immediately signed into law by Republican Governor Rick Snyder who had earlier this year testified before Congress that "right to work" was a divisive issue and not something he contemplated for Michigan in 2012.

    Passage of these laws are part of an orchestrated national campaign by a well-healed and well-coordinated group of right wing anti-union idealogues led by the Koch Brothers, other corporate interests, and a network of think tanks and policy shops funded by those interests. The result amounts to a right to work for less. They are a threat to the rights of all workers, but especially unionized workers and they undermine organized labor's ability to represent its members.

    It is important for all workers to become familiar with this issue. Here is some background:

  • Video Clip From Democracy Now on the Legislation

  • Michigan Adopts ALEC Model For Diminishing Democracy.

  • How the Legislation Came to Be and Who Was Behind It

  • Michigan Legislature Approves Laws Making State "Right To Work" For Less

    You can learn more about the truth behind Right to Work legislation at the website of American Rights At Work, a pro-labor group, where you can sign a petition against Right to Work legislation. Think it can't happen here in New York? No sooner had the legislation passed in Michigan than an op-ed appeared in the NY Post extolling the virtues of right to work legislation and suggesting New York join Michigan in adopting these labor rights restrictions.

    Finally, here's a decent overview of "Right to Work" written by Paul Cole, the Executive Director of the American Labor Studies Center:

    Representatives designated or selected for the purposes of collective bargaining by the majority of the employees in a unit appropriate for such purposes, shall be the exclusive representatives of all the employees in such unit for the purposes of collective bargaining in respect to rates of pay, wages, hours of employment, or other conditions of employment. (National Labor Relations Act (Sec. 9))

    Under American labor law, unlike many other countries, when a majority of workers in a determined bargaining unit, vote to be represented by a union, that union becomes the exclusive representative of all workers in that unit. The purpose is to provide employees with a single, unified voice in determining their conditions of employment and the opportunity for employers to deal with one entity, instead of many competing ones, to establish the rights and responsibilities of both the employer and employees.

    Federal law that governs private sector workers, as well as many state public employee laws, guarantees every worker who is represented by a union equal and nondiscriminatory representation � meaning unions must provide the same services, vigorous advocacy, and contractual rights and benefits. The guarantee applies regardless of whether the employee is a union member or not. All non-dues-paying employees are provided full union representation at no charge.

    If you are not a member of the union, you are fully covered by the collective bargaining agreement that was negotiated between the union and your employer including wages, pensions, vacations, health insurance, seniority, and working hours.

    The statutory right of exclusive representation mandates a �duty of fair representation� on the part of the union. It has the obligation to represent all employees fairly, in good faith, and without discrimination. The right to speak for all employees in the bargaining unit carries with it the corresponding duty to protect them as well.

    Federal and state laws also guarantee that no one can be forced to be a member of a union, or to pay any amount of dues or fees to a political or social cause they do not support.

    �Right-to-Work� laws make it illegal for employers and unions to mutually agree to require nonunion employees to pay fees to cover the benefits they legally receive under the collective bargaining agreement.

    Fees have nothing to do with �forced unionism.�

    Organizations such as the Chamber of Commerce, billionaire-funded conservative foundations and their Republican allies, want unions to be the only organizations in America that are required to provide benefits and services to individuals who pay nothing for them. This is the same as enabling some American citizens to opt out of paying taxes while making available all government services.

    The real reason for the recent wave of �right-to-work� legislation, and other union weakening laws, has nothing to do with economic competitiveness but the weakening of the labor movement and its political influence. The only institution that stands in the way of the right wing�s domination of our nation�s political and economic system is the American labor movement.

    This agenda was unmasked when Wisconsin State Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald explained that �this battle� is about eliminating unions so that �the money is not there� for the labor movement.

    Last year, the Michigan director of Americans for Prosperity, chaired nationally by David Koch, said, �We fight these battles on taxes and regulations but really what we would like to see is to take the unions out at the knees so they don�t have the resources to fight these battles.�

    In virtually every case, the state legislation is taken straight out of the Koch-funded American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) playbook.

    It was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who said, �In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, such as �right-to-work.� It is a law to rob us of our civil rights and job rights. Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and working conditions for everyone� we demand this fraud be stopped.�


    December 6, 2012

  • The Big Budget Mumble - Paul Krugman - NY Times

  • Tom Toles Cartoon: Negotiating With Oneself

  • Tax The Rich: An Animated Fairy Tale

  • The Trans-Pacific Partnership: What Free Trade Actually Means - Truthout.org

  • The Trans-Pacific Partnership: This Is What Corporate Governance Looks Like

  • New York Fast Food Workers Walk Off The Job - Labor Notes

  • Poor Management, Not Union Intransigence, Killed Hostess - Michael Hitzik - LA Times

  • The Twinkie Manifesto - Paul Krugman - NY Times

  • A Glittering Yet Unequal City - Leonard Quart - Berkshire Eagle

  • Why Let Rich Hoard Toys - Nicholas Kristof - Berkshire Eagle

  • Unmanned Aerial Vehicles - Death From Afar - The Economist

  • Grandma's Curse

  • Free Exchange - Land of the Corporate Giants -The Economist

  • Buttonwood: Marshmallows and Markets - The Economist

  • Corporate Savings - Dead Money - The Economist

  • The Path Through The Fields - Bangladesh and Development - The Economist

  • No Place Like Home - Ethnic Cleansing in Myanmar - The Economist

  • If You Build It, They May Not Come - The Risky Economics of Sports Stadiums

  • Don't Tell Anyone, But The Stimulus Worked

  • If Labor Dies, What's Next

  • Cartoon: A Few of Mitt Romney's Moochers

  • Texas Firm Must Pay Disabled Workers $1.4 Million

  • The State of the Unions 2012: A Profile of Organized Labor in NYC, NYS and the US

  • Greed and Debt: The True Story of Mitt Romney and Bain Capital - Matt Taibbi in Rolling Stone

  • Five Ways Privatization Degrades America

  • America For Sale: A Report on Billionaires Buying the 2012 Election

  • Wealth and Income Inequality: Who Gets Left Behind

  • Harder for Americans to Rise From Lower Rungs

  • Comparing Economic Mobility Graphic

  • What A Tangled Web

  • Who's Very Important

  • News Release From NYC Comptroller Liu About NYC Income Inequality

  • Report From NYC Comptroller Liu About NYC Income Inequality

  • "New York, New York, A Most Unequal Town

  • Economic Policy Institute Criticizes NY Times Pension Reporter As Biased

  • The Message From Wisconsin - NY Times Editorial

  • The Austerity Agenda - Paul Krugman - NY Times Column

  • For Sallie Mae, The Student Debt Crisis Is Enormously Profitable - Minyanville

  • NYCHA Payments To City Are Under Scrutiny

  • We Don't Need No Education - Paul Krugman - NY Times Column

  • The Safest Bank - Joe Nocera - NY Times Column

  • (Loop)Hole In One - Elite Private Golf Clubs Do Not Pay Federal Taxes

  • Government Is The Solution - E.J. Dionne - The Miami Herald

  • Reagan Was A Keynesian - Paul Krugman - NY Times Column

  • Where Public Employees Aren't "American People" - Richard Steier - The Chief Leader

  • Ideas on Company Pensions Include Turning To States

  • Behind Super-Sized Sodas, A Deeper Danger - Too Much Blog

  • Anti Union Air Grows - Rekha Basu - Des Moines Register

  • Cartoon: Use the Verb "Sacks"

  • The Tiny Tax That Terrifies Wall Street - Sam Pizzigati - Campaign For America's Future

  • How Banks Could Return The Favor - Gretchen Morgensen - NY Times

  • $12 Million To Help Cuomo Came From Just 20 People

  • The Deal Not Taken - Editorial - Berkshire Eagle

  • Why You Vote The Way You Do - Jonathan Haidt - The Week

  • A Politics For The 99 Percent - Robert Borosage and Katrina Vanden Heuvel - The Nation

  • Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau - May 17, 2012 (Read This One First)

  • Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau - May 18, 2012 (Read This One Second)

  • Myths About Government Why government is important and needed. You can find more at the website of the Roosevelt Institute at this link: Rediscovering Government

  • We Have Your City, Pay Up, Or Else - Dollars and Sense

  • The Scam Wall Street Learned From The Mafia

  • William M Diefenderfer: The Financial Hit Man of Student Loans

  • America's Long Slope Down

  • The Case For Raising Top Tax Rates Why raising taxes on the wealthy is not only the right thing to do, but it won't harm the economy.

  • Reclaim Wisconsin Rally Draws More Than 60,000 Daily Kos reports on a 62,000 person rally in the Wisconsin State Capitol in Madison. Scroll down the page at Kos for a link to a YouTube video with coverage.

  • Confessions of a "Bad" Teacher A New York City public school teacher's op-ed in the NY Times about what it means to be labelled a "bad" teacher.

  • New York Pensions Are Worth Defending by New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli.

  • Global Centralization of Elections, Privatized by Bev Harris of Black Box Voting which exposes and fights efforts to undermine our electoral process.

  • Public Pensions Are Not The Enemy by Mario Cilento, President, New York State AFL-CIO.

  • The Postal Service Lies to the People of the Bronx by Chuck Zlatkin, legislative and political director of the New York Metro Area Postal Union.

  • Public Employees Need the Right To Strike by John Samuelsen, President, Transport Workers Union Local 100

  • MTA's Giveback Demands in the Current TWU Negotiations And a response from the TWU: "On January 9, The MTA presented Local 100 with 19 giveback demands.These demands break down into six broad areas: 1. Health benefits: Pay higher co-pays AND 10% of the premiums. 2. Sick Leave Control: Anyone with less than 50% of their possible sick leave with be subject to sick calls and visits, will have to have doctor�s lines every time they are sick and will not be paid for the first day sick for each time out. 3. Overtime: Payment only after you�ve worked 40 hrs in the week. Pay for only 8 hrs/day when out sick or on vacation. 4. A lower top rate of pay for new CTAs 5. Work rules: a dozen sweeping changes up to and including part-time B/Os and split runs in RTO. 6.Five unpaid vacation days in the first two years. What is management willing to give in wages in exchange for these givebacks? Three zeroes. They made this clear in their presentation at the bargaining table. All told, these measures would cost the average transit worker thousands of dollars per year and significantly degrade the quality of work life. The demand for unpaid furlough days raises questions about where these demands are coming from. Did anyone notice that state employees accepted furloughs as an alternative to layoffs, whereas transit workers already took the layoffs? These giveback demands do not take account of the real conditions and real history of transit. They are non-starters."