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      Walmart expands abortion coverage for employees after Roe overturned

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      Walmart expands abortion coverage for employees after Roe overturnedMemo to staff says that new healthcare policy will also offer ‘travel support’ for workers seeking abortions The US’s largest private employer, Walmart, is expanding its abortion coverage for employees after staying largely mum on the issue following the supreme court ruling that in June scrapped a nationwide right to abortion.In a memo sent to employees Friday, the retail giant said its healthcare plans will cover abortion for employees “when there is a health risk to the mother, rape or incest, ectopic pregnancy, miscarriage or lack of fetal viability”. The plans will be “effective immediately”, the memo added.The company’s benefits plan had previously covered abortion only in cases “when the health of the mother would be in danger if the fetus were carried to term, the fetus could not survive the birthing process, or death would be imminent after birth”, according to a copy of the policy viewed by the Associated Press but not confirmed by Walmart.Walmart’s chief people officer, Donna Morris, said in the memo to staff that the new policy will also offer “travel support” for workers seeking abortions covered under its healthcare plans – as well as their dependents – so they can access services that are not available within 100 miles of their locations.“Given how recent events are resulting in state-by-state healthcare environments, we will expand our travel coverage,” the memo said.Walmart employs nearly 1.6 million people in the US. The company is headquartered in Arkansas, where abortion is banned under all circumstances unless the procedure is needed to protect the life of the mother in a medical emergency. There are no exceptions for rape or incest.That means under the revised policy, Walmart employees can travel out of the state – or any other state that bans abortion for rape and incest – to obtain the procedure through the retailer’s health plans.According to the memo, which CNN also reviewed, Morris said that Walmart decided to make the changes after “listening to our associates about what’s important to them”, adding that “we strive to provide quality, competitive and accessible health coverage that supports you and your families”.The company said it will also launch a center that provides employees fertility services, including in vitro fertilization. Additionally, it vowed to add surrogacy support and increase its financial aid for adoptions from $5,000 to $20,000. In June, Walmart said it would expand its offering of doulas – or people who assist women during pregnancies – to address racial disparities in maternal care.Some other large companies – including Meta, American Express and Bank of America – have said they will cover travel costs for their employees in the aftermath of the high court ruling that tossed out the federal abortion rights established by the landmark decision in the 1973 case titled Roe v Wade, including elective abortions. But a Walmart spokesperson did not immediately reply for a request for comment on whether any of the company’s revised policy will cover elective abortions as well.“It’s a step in the right direction, but it’s simply not far enough for a company that employs that many women,” said Bianca Agustin, director of the corporate accountability program for United for Respect, a group that advocates for Walmart workers. She said the organization will be incorporating “safe abortions” for employees in their list of demands pressing the company for better pay and benefits.TopicsWalmartAbortionUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      How a top US business lobby promised climate action – but worked to block efforts

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      How a top US business lobby promised climate action – but worked to block efforts Business Roundtable aims to weaken efforts that would enable investors to hold companies accountable for their climate promisesThree years ago today, in a statement that would be described as “historic”, “monumental” and “revolutionary”, America’s most powerful and politically connected corporations promised to “protect the environment by embracing sustainable practices across our businesses”.The “Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation” came from the Business Roundtable, an influential Washington DC lobbying group whose 200-plus members include the chief executives of some of the world’s biggest companies, including Apple, Pepsi, Walmart and Google.Today, on the statement’s third anniversary, the Business Roundtable and its member CEOs continue to issue earnest statements about the climate crisis. But the organization is also working diligently – and spending liberally – to weaken efforts that would enable investors to hold companies accountable for their climate promises.An analysis by the Guardian found the lobby group has worked hard to protect a status quo in which corporations:
      Generate goodwill and positive PR by publishing bold climate goals, with little fear of being held accountable or legally liable for achieving those goals.
      Can choose to selectively disclose certain parts of their carbon footprint, or none at all.
      Are not required to reveal the greenhouse gas emissions generated throughout their supply chains – which, for most companies, make up the majority of their emissions.
      Make high-profile pledges to fight climate change, while paying to maintain memberships in the Business Roundtable and other trade associations that spend millions of dollars to lobby governments against meaningful climate action.
      In public the Business Roundtable’s leaders are still committed to change. Doug McMillon, the CEO of Walmart and previous chair of the Business Roundtable, has called the climate crisis “one of the greatest challenges facing the planet today”. In a statement on the group’s website, Mary Barra, the CEO of GM and the Roundtable’s current chair, declared that “we must act” to tackle climate change. “Meeting the scope of this challenge will require collective global action – business and government,” Barra said.The challenge “isn’t the lack of business commitment” said Johnson Controls CEO George Oliver in a video published by the Business Roundtable in January. “What we need is to be aligned with the public sector to make sure that we’ve got the proper policies in place that will enable us to do what we do so well.”Yet when the US government has tried to put the “proper policies” in place, the Business Roundtable has worked to undermine those efforts.In 2021, the organization spent millions of dollars to stop the Biden administration’s Build Back Better agenda, which included significant efforts to reduce carbon emissions and promote clean energy.And this year, after the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed a long-anticipated rule that would require publicly held companies to disclose their carbon emissions and the risks that climate change poses to their business models, the Business Roundtable declared its opposition to central aspects of the SEC proposal, including provisions that experts say are vital for the rule to give investors comparable and consistent information about corporations’ climate risks.Before releasing the proposed rules in March, the SEC had asked the public what such rules might look like. In its response, the Business Roundtable acknowledged that “climate challenges are creating growing risks in many parts of the economy” and deemed it “appropriate” for the SEC to regulate climate disclosures.The group noted that the present system of corporate climate reporting, in which some companies issue voluntary climate-related disclosures, has proven inadequate. “There are many conflicting demands on companies to provide disclosures under different frameworks, which is unnecessarily costly and time-consuming for companies,” the Business Roundtable’s comments read.But when the SEC shifted from requesting voluntary input to proposing mandatory requirements for climate disclosures, the organization appeared to change its tune. In a 17-page letter, the CEO lobby announced its opposition to the proposal and asked the commission to “revise and repropose the rule.”In an email to the Guardian, the Business Roundtable denied that its perspective had changed. “[Business Roundtable] members are committed to combating climate change and are supportive of a rulemaking. Our goal is for a pragmatic, attainable, and successful rule,” the group said. “Our members believe it is worth the extra time on the front end to repropose the rule.”Since April 2021, according to meeting memoranda published by the SEC, the Business Roundtable has met at least three times with the SEC about climate disclosures. (GM’s Barra, the chair of the Business Roundtable, also met separately with SEC chair Gary Gensler.)In the first half of this year, the group spent more than $9.1m lobbying the federal government directly, according to reports compiled by Open Secrets. In its public disclosures, the Roundtable reported lobbying Congress, the White House and the SEC about the climate disclosure proposal. (In an email, the Business Roundtable said it “met with the SEC to directly communicate our concerns” and “shared our point of view with members of Congress and administration officials.”)Despite asking for a new, and thus delayed, proposal, the organization’s own members continue to assure the public that they see the climate crisis as an urgent challenge. “We’re out of time,” Cummins CEO and Business Roundtable member Tom Linebarger said in the organization’s January climate video. “We’re getting ready, to get ready, to get ready to do things. And the problem is that we have to move now.”But “now”, it seems, does not mean now.One provision the Business Roundtable has rejected as “unworkable” is a requirement for companies to measure and report the greenhouse gas emissions generated by suppliers and customers throughout their supply chains, or what are known as “Scope 3” emissions. The provision would apply only to companies that have published emissions targets that include Scope 3, or for which supply-chain emissions are considered “material”.Scope 3 includes all greenhouse gas emissions that companies neither generate directly (Scope 1) nor purchase for their own energy needs (Scope 2), which means everything from the raw materials that go into creating a product to the transportation that delivers that product to a consumer.For most companies, Scope 3 emissions represent the majority of their carbon output. As Addisu Lashitew, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, has pointed out, more than three-quarters of Amazon’s 2021 emissions were considered Scope 3.Diagram showing Scope 3 emissions are everything indirectly related to productionThe Business Roundtable supports mandating Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions disclosures, and many companies already report them, in part because these direct emissions are easier to calculate and easier to reduce (sometimes through the purchase of dubious carbon “offsets”).Perhaps more importantly, however, because most firms’ emissions are primarily Scope 3, limiting their reporting to Scopes 1 and 2 makes them appear greener.In its comments to the SEC, the Business Roundtable called the proposal to require companies to measure and report Scope 3 emissions “overly burdensome” because “many companies still have limited systems in place to identify and disclose Scope 3 emissions” and some aspects of reporting value-chain emissions “remain[] challenging”.But “if you don’t have Scope 3 as a requirement, then what you have effectively done is cut out most of the emissions from the top-emitting industries,” Allison Herren Lee, the former acting chair and commissioner of the SEC, told the Guardian. “With emissions arguably being the most important item of disclosure for investors, how is a rule without Scope 3 going to achieve what investors need?”“There is an inherent degree of uncertainty in some of the data the proposal would require companies to disclose, and much of it is largely outside their control,” the Business Roundtable said in an email.A number of experts familiar with the SEC’s climate disclosure rulemaking acknowledged that tracking and reporting Scope 3 emissions could indeed be difficult for some companies, or at least more difficult than not doing so.But they suggested that the more fundamental question was not whether complying with the SEC’s rules would be more difficult than doing nothing, but rather if doing so would provide investors with information that they have requested and that would help them make more informed investment decisions.This argument would appear to align with the stated position of the Business Roundtable, which has repeatedly expressed its support for “market-based” efforts to address climate change, a view it reiterated in its comments to the SEC.“Information is the lifeblood of the capital markets, and capital markets are a central institution of a capitalist market economy,” George S Georgiev, a professor at Emory University and an expert on securities law, told the Guardian. “Climate-related financial information is demanded by investors, not by environmentalists.”Moreover, “there is no unanimity that Scope 3 reporting is problematic”, Georgiev said, noting that Apple, whose CEO, Tim Cook, sits on the Business Roundtable’s board of directors, is among the companies that have endorsed the SEC’s Scope 3 requirement. Apple’s existing reporting “attest[s] to the feasibility of reasonably modeling, measuring, and reporting on all three scopes of emissions, including scope 3 emissions,” the company told the Commission.In its comments, the Business Roundtable said that its member companies had already set a “high bar…for voluntary ESG [environmental, social and governance] disclosures,” and that a voluntary approach to climate reporting was already “providing more valuable information for investors”.But many investors, analysts, academics, voters and experts – even companies themselves – disagree. “There is near-universal agreement among scholars that voluntary disclosure rules alone are not sufficient,” Emory’s Georgiev said. “The same logic applies to climate rules.”“Climate is one of the most significant risks facing companies and investors,” said Danielle Fugere, the president and chief counsel of As You Sow, a shareholder advocacy nonprofit. “For companies to say that it is too costly to gather Scope 1 through 3 data, we simply think that it shows signs of weak management.”In a March letter, a group of investors managing nearly $5tn of assets warned that failing to require companies to disclose their Scope 3 emissions would render the SEC rules doubly ineffective: insufficient for addressing the climate emergency, and inadequate for providing investors with useful information, because voluntary figures allow companies to publish only the information that paints them in the best light.“There is a great amount of confusion,” Larry Fink, the CEO of BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, said in a speech last year. “If we are really going to tackle this, if we want to have 100% participation, the easiest way you could do that is having unified standards.” Fink is also a member of the Business Roundtable.In an email, the Roundtable said it was “unlikely” that the proposed Scope 3 disclosure provisions “would result in comparable, investor-useful information”. The group “believes it’s important to have reliable climate risk and emissions data, and our companies are leaders when it comes to transparency.”The group’s objections to the SEC’s Scope 3 requirements are only one aspect of its multi-tiered opposition to the proposed climate disclosure rules. And its opposition to the proposed rules is, similarly, only one example of many in which it has rejected efforts to hold its member companies accountable for their social and environmental pledges.In the three years since the organization released the “purpose of a corporation” statement, a number of studies have shown that Business Roundtable companies have failed to follow through on their “fundamental commitment to all of [their] stakeholders”.One analysis from London Business School and Columbia Business School found that companies whose CEOs signed the 2019 statement subsequently received more federal environmental infractions and had higher carbon emissions than similar firms that did not sign the statement.In another study, two Harvard Law School professors reviewed more than 600 public documents filed by Business Roundtable companies since the statement’s publication. Time and time again, the researchers found that when firms were presented with an opportunity to formalize the pledge in their corporate governance, they declined.In addition, by advocating and lobbying against government action on issues like climate change, the Business Roundtable gives its members space to publicly endorse (and claim credit for endorsing) legislative and regulatory action – such as Apple’s support for mandatory Scope 3 reporting, or Cummins and GM’s support for Build Back Better –all while knowing that the Roundtable will work behind the scenes in opposition.“Some individual companies aren’t going to write in and rage against the proposal because they know that will raise concerns with their investors, so they let some of the trade groups do that work for them,” said Allison Herren Lee, the SEC’s former acting chair and commissioner.In its comments to the SEC, the Business Roundtable urged lawmakers to take the lead on tackling the climate crisis, arguing that “although important, disclosures simply will not solve the problem”.“These are complex issues that need to be solved through the legislative process,” the group wrote.But the Business Roundtable continues to oppose efforts to address the climate emergency through the legislative process. The latest effort to tackle the climate crisis, the Inflation Reduction Act, includes billions of dollars in clean energy tax incentives, paid for in part by making sure corporations pay at least a 15% tax rate on profits. The bill could cut America’s carbon emissions by 40% by 2030.Yet on 6 August, just shy of the third anniversary of the statement in which Business Roundtable CEOs committed to “protect[ing] the environment by embracing sustainable practices across our businesses”, the group declared its opposition to the bill, citing “tax provisions that would undermine American economic growth and competitiveness”.“I’m just so worried that our planet can no longer suffer from us debating and debating and debating,” said Cummins CEO Tom Linebarger, who, like all the CEOs named in this article, signed the 2019 statement. “It’s the existential crisis of our time.”TopicsClimate crisisApplePepsicoGoogleUS politicsanalysisReuse this content More

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      Republicans vote against insulin bill as price soars, dismaying diabetics

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      Republicans vote against insulin bill as price soars, dismaying diabeticsCost of the life-saving drug will remain many times higher than in other affluent countries after Republicans defeated the measure During the Covid-19 pandemic, Erin Connelly had to ration insulin while transitioning to a different health insurance plan. When Connelly heard the Biden administration was planning to cap the price of the life-saving drug, she was delighted. She was soon to be disappointed.The prices of insulin has soared in the US in recent decades and is more than eight times higher in the US than in 32 comparable, high-income nations, according to a Rand Corporation study.With an average list price of $98.70 per unit in the US, compared with $7.52 in the UK, US insulin sales account for nearly half the pharmaceutical industry’s insulin revenue, though the US makes up only about 15% of the global market.Many diabetics require several vials of insulin a month, in addition to the costs of medical supplies and monitoring equipment. A 2022 study by CharityRx found 79% of Americans with diabetes or who care for someone with diabetes reported taking on credit card debt to pay for insulin, with an average debt of $9,000. One in four Americans have reported rationing insulin due to the high costs, which can be fatal.As part of the Inflation Reduction Act passed in the Senate this week, the Biden administration proposed a $35 monthly cap on the cost of insulin in the private market. But the proposal was blocked by Republicans. Connelly, a type 1 diabetic from Illinois who was diagnosed at the age of 33, said she was “devastated”.“I believe the profit margin on my life must be really good, otherwise, we would be a bigger focus and a bigger part of these healthcare negotiations,” she said. “People are actually dying from this and it’s beyond price gouging. They’re holding us for ransom.“As we see things like Covid and different viruses come in and attack bodies in ways that we don’t understand, we’re seeing higher rates of people with type 1 diabetes later in life like I was, so this should be a primary concern for public health officials,” she said.Thanks to budgetary rules the proposal needed 60 votes to pass in the Senate. It received 57, with all Democrats and seven Republicans voting in favor of the proposal, though the Senate parliamentarian did allow the cap on co-pays for Medicare, the government health insurance program for those 65 and older.The vote incited criticism against Republicans from diabetes advocates who have been pushing for legislation to cap the cost of insulin in the US.But even a cap on private insurance co-pays wouldn’t have affected the real price of insulin in the US. The proposal would merely have limited the co-pay for the price of insulin to $35 for those with private insurance, with insurance expected to cover the difference. It would also probably have resulted in increases for insurance premiums. Those without insurance would still have been expected to pay exorbitant prices for insulin.“The co-pay caps aren’t price caps. All they effectively do is if you have insurance or Medicare, the $35 is your maximum co-pay,” said Laura Marston, co-founder of the advocacy group the Insulin Initiative and a type one diabetic. “That doesn’t change the underlying price of what someone without insurance pays for insulin, which in and of itself is concerning and scary from a patient’s point of view because I know first-hand how hard it can be as a type 1 diabetic in this country to get and keep health insurance.”Marston pointed out that pharmaceutical companies such as Eli Lilly have supported the insurance co-pay caps. While she was disappointed by the failure of the co-pay cap proposal, even if she feels it fell short of a real solution to the problem, she is also concerned about the lack of political will to take on the pharmaceutical industry and cap the actual prices of insulin.More than 100,000 Americans died in 2021 from diabetes. More than 30 million Americans are diagnosed with type 1 or type 2 diabetes and over 7 million require daily insulin – all type 1 diabetics and many type 2 diabetics.For now diabetics and their families who were hoping for some relief are back where they started – paying exorbitant fees for a life-saving medicine.“We’ve been trying to no avail to get an actual insulin price cap introduced that would say to insulin makers, you cannot charge more than say, we’ll just say $20 a vial, or basically you cannot charge more than what you charge in other countries for insulin. And it felt like it fell on deaf ears as soon as this co-pay cap was introduced,” said Marston. “I don’t know why they introduced something seemingly half hearted, not really designed to be a solution to the problem.”TopicsDiabetesPharmaceuticals industryBiden administrationUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      While Biden is tackling inflation and shaping a green economy for the US, Britain is being left behind | Carys Roberts

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      While Biden is tackling inflation and shaping a green economy for the US, Britain is being left behindCarys RobertsThe Inflation Reduction Act is a big win for jobs and the environment, but Truss and Sunak have nothing similar to offer Over the weekend, US Democrats overcame months of political struggle to pass the Inflation Reduction Act in the Senate, marking a major victory for the president, Joe Biden, and for “Bidenomics” before the US midterms.The bill makes the single largest climate investment in US history, with $369bn for climate and clean energy. It is expected to enable the US to get two-thirds of the way towards its Paris agreement commitments while reducing energy costs. It lowers health costs for millions of Americans. It seeks to tackle inflation by directly reducing costs for individuals and by reducing the deficit through closing tax loopholes and increasing tax on corporates and the wealthy.The act is far from perfect. It is the diminished descendant of the failed Build Back Better Act, a $2tn package that would have radically extended childcare, free community college and subsidised health insurance, but which ultimately failed to secure the support of the Democrat senator Joe Manchin (a necessity given the evenly divided Senate). Winning political support for the act has required rowing back on climate ambition and more extensive plans to reduce costs for families; allowing further drilling for fossil fuels; and carve-outs to protect private equity profits from the corporation tax element of the act. For this reason, the act will and already has come under intense criticism from activists and climate groups.However, in the face of fierce political opposition it is a major – even landmark – achievement. It is also a win for the activists and economists who have been persistently pushing and providing ideas for the Biden administration to pursue an alternative approach to the economy and environment: market-shaping green industrial strategy to create good, green jobs; social investment; worker power and incentives for employers to offer decent pay, apprenticeships and profit-sharing with communities; higher taxes on the wealthy to reduce inflation and contribute to the costs, including through a new tax on share buybacks which only serve to boost investors’ incomes. These ideas are no longer stuck on the bench.Historically the US and UK have taken a shared, leading role in the intellectual development and political implementation of new ideas and policy paradigms. Whether we think about the postwar Keynesian consensus, the neoliberal revolution of Thatcher and Reagan or the third way politics of Clinton and Blair, both countries have tended to move in lockstep. Yet right now, in the context of the Inflation Reduction Act in the US and the Conservative party leadership race in the UK, our policy paths are diverging.The US has further to go than the UK when it comes to reducing climate emissions and building economic justice. The US has significantly higher levels of emissions (on an absolute and per capita basis) than the UK and the US is also the world’s biggest producer of fossil fuels. Similarly, inequality in the US is starker, and poverty deeper than in the UK. Put simply: the land of opportunity is not delivering for too many American citizens.But Democrat leaders are pushing through a bold agenda to break through deep political polarisation and reset the shape and direction of what US economic success looks like. The irony when we compare this with the UK is that the conditions are far more favourable here for action commensurate to the scale of the climate and nature crisis, an economic strategy that prioritises everyday people and places over wealth and profits, and for extending collective provision of the things and services we all rely on. We have a head start in terms of the social democracy basics. In sharp contrast to the US, there is more consensus across parties on the need for the government to take action on the climate and nature crises. Action taken now would be far less likely to be wiped away by an opposition win than the fragile progressive gains in the US.Biden can still stop Trump, and Trumpism – if he can find a bold plan and moral vision | Robert ReichRead moreThe Conservatives, who have held power for more than a decade, have in recent years flirted with some of those ideas – from May’s mission-oriented industrial strategy to Johnson’s net zero and levelling up pledges – recognising the electoral benefits of doing so. Yet at this moment, the Conservatives are plunging in the opposite direction to their US counterparts, and debating – in the middle of sharply rising inflation and a cost-of-living emergency – policies that are catnip for the Tory membership such as grammar schools and corporation tax cuts, rather than looking around the world or at the evidence on how to address the pressing problems of our time. Truss, widely seen as the frontrunner, has fallen back on outdated tropes of financial support as handouts and has virtually nothing to say on how she would achieve net zero, both for its own sake and as a response to the cost-of-living crisis. Nothing of substance is being suggested to address the creeping, real privatisation of the NHS as those who can go private rather than languish on a waiting list.It would be wrong to point at the US and claim it has its house in order or that lessons can be read in a simplistic way. But Biden and the activists and researchers around him are ambitiously forging a new kind of economic policymaking that seeks to rapidly decarbonise, reduce pressures on family purses through collective provision, and tax wealth and profits to fund this and quell inflationary pressures. The UK government – whoever it is headed by – should take note of the new economics rather than be left behind.
      Carys Roberts is executive director of the Institute for Public Policy Research
      TopicsEconomicsOpinionUS politicsJoe BidenConservativesClimate crisiscommentReuse this content More

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      If Democrats want votes, they should rain fury on union-busting corporations | Hamilton Nolan

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      If Democrats want votes, they should rain fury on union-busting corporationsHamilton NolanWe supposedly have the most pro-union US president of our lifetimes. Let’s see him act like it In June, workers at a Chipotle restaurant in Augusta, Maine, became the first in the company’s history to file for a union election. Less than a month later, the company closed the store. In shutting down a location that was set to unionize, Chipotle was keeping company with Starbucks, which has suddenly undertaken a campaign to shut down several unionizing locations from coast to coast due to “safety” issues, and the health food company Amy’s Kitchen, which last month closed an entire factory in California where workers were organizing. It is, of course, impossible to “prove” that these companies closed these locations to try to crush the union drives, in the same sense that it is impossible to prove that a schoolyard bully meant to punch you in the face: he claims that he was merely punching the air while you happened to walk in front of his fist. Who’s to say what’s true in such a murky situation?Delta flights attendants race to unionize: ‘We’re the people behind the profits’Read morePlausible deniability aside, this is an extremely serious problem. Not just for the underpaid, overworked employees at all of these low-wage jobs, desperately hanging on to financial survival by their fingernails, but for all of us. America is mired in a half-century-long crisis of rising inequality that has been fueled, above all, by the combined erosion of labor power and the growth of the power of capital. The American dream enjoyed by the lucky baby-boom generation – buying a home and sending your kids to college on one income – is dead and gone, replaced by a thin crust of the rich sitting atop a huge swamp of once-middle-class jobs that no longer offer enough to sustain a middle-class lifestyle.The power of workers relative to the power of the investment class must be rebalanced. Rebuilding the power of unions is the only way out of this trap, unless you are credulous enough to believe that we will all be rescued by the sudden radicalization of the tax policymakers on the House ways and means committee. If you ever want to live in a country where the American dream is more than a cruel, tantalizing joke, you have a stake in the revival of organized labor.So when you see a big company closing down operations because workers there want to unionize, you should be pissed. Such coldhearted retaliation against people exercising a fundamental right on the job goes to the very heart of how we got all this inequality in the first place. It is meant not just to derail one union drive, but to strike fear in all the other workers who see it happen: if you ask for what you’re worth, this could happen to you. Shut up and eat your gruel, and be happy that the kindly billionaire CEO is allowing you to earn enough not to starve today. Even if you don’t work at a fast-food outlet or a factory, this should enrage you, as a human being. It is an assault on human dignity.America’s convoluted and hostile labor laws actually do allow a business to shut down in response to unionization, unless (and this is important) the company is doing so in order to scare its remaining employees out of unionizing – in other words, exactly what big employers like Chipotle and Starbucks would be doing by closing stores where workers have organized, as workers at many other stores across the country looked on. (Government regulators have not yet ruled on the legality of the recent closures by those companies.) Unfortunately, the evil, high-priced union-busting attorneys these companies hire are well aware that the gears of justice in labor law grind so slowly that even on the off chance that they were found to have closed the stores illegally, it would be far too late for it to mean anything to the workers who were laid off and forced to go find other jobs. The scary, unsubtle message to the company’s workforce would have already been sent.That’s why this stuff is not really a question of law, but of power. The working class, galvanized by the near-death experience of the pandemic, is busily organizing in new industries across the country; the labor movement today is as energized as it has been in two generations. Corporate America is determined to stop this. In the mid-1950s, one in three Americans was a union member; today, that figure is one in 10. Companies know that their ability to extract excess profits will go down as union density goes up. This is going to be a hard, nasty fight. As all of those recently laid-off Chipotle and Starbucks and Amy’s Kitchen workers know, it already is.It is also a golden opportunity for a Democratic party that has spent the last six years wringing its hands about losing working-class voters to the pseudo-populist (and racist) appeal of Trumpism. Want to get working people enthusiastic about Democrats again? Then the Democrats should help working people. National Democratic politicians should be holding press conferences decrying the greedy chief executives closing these stores just because workers tried to stand up for themselves. Joe Biden should be screaming his head off about billionaire Starbucks chief Howard Schultz’s disgusting union-busting at the same volume that Ron DeSantis is blathering about “woke corporations”.Republicans are insincere ghouls who want to harvest working-class votes while their policies stab working-class people in the back – but Democrats are ceding the terrain to these scumbags by failing to match their fervor. We don’t need our politicians making anodyne statements about how unions are nice. We need a rain of zeal and fury emanating from Washington, to terrify companies away from closing down their union stores with threats of merciless retributions from the state.History shows that organized labor thrives when it has the government’s support, and suffers without it. We are supposedly living under the most pro-union president of our lifetimes. So? Let’s hear some damn fire, man. The only reason companies feel so free to abuse their workers is that they don’t believe anyone will make them pay for it.
      Hamilton Nolan is a writer based in New York
      TopicsDemocratsOpinionUS unionsUS politicsJoe BidenStarbuckscommentReuse this content More

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      Biden hails ‘most significant legislation to tackle climate crisis’ after Manchin says yes – as it happened

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      Joe Biden hailed the Inflation Reduction Act as “the most significant legislation in history to tackle the climate crisis” in a White House address welcoming the wide-ranging legislative package.The president outlined the benefits to Americans during his remarks, which followed the surprise announcement of a deal last night between Democratic Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and holdout West Virginia senator Joe Manchin..css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}This bill will be the most significant legislation in history to tackle the climate crisis and improve our energy security right away, and give us a tool to meet the climate goals… we’ve agreed to by cutting emissions and accelerating clean energy. It’s a huge step forward.
      This bill will reduce inflationary pressures on the economy. It will cut your cost of living and reduce inflation, it lowers the deficit and strengthens our economy for the long run as well.
      This bill has won the support of climate leaders like former vice-president Al Gore, who said the bill is, quote, long overdue and a necessary step to ensure the United States takes decisive action on the climate crisis that helps our economy and provides leadership for the world.Climate activists have broadly welcomed the bill which, if passed by Congress, would give Biden a massive victory ahead of November’s midterms. Inflation at 40-year highs and soaring prices in supermarkets and at gas pumps have contributed to the president’s low approval ratings.It also follows months of stalling on Biden’s agenda, specifically by Manchin, who didn’t like the cost of $1.8tn Build Back Better spending package featuring measures like extended child tax credit.Biden acknowledged: .css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}This bill is far from perfect. I know the bill doesn’t include everything that I’ve been pushing for since I got to office. For example, I’m going to keep fighting to bring down the cost of things for working families and middle class families by providing for things like affordable childcare, affordable elder care, the cost of preschool, housing, helping students with the cost of college, closing the health care coverage gap…
      My message to Congress is this. This is the strongest bill you can pass to lower inflation, cut the deficit, reduce health care costs, tackle the climate crisis and promote energy security, all the time while reducing the burdens facing working class and middle class families.
      So pass it. Pass it for the American people. Pass it for America. We’re closing the politics blog now on a rollercoaster Thursday for President Joe Biden. The day began with depressing economic news that the US was technically in a recession, but was brightened considerably by a bipartisan vote in the House that sends the $280bn Chips Act to his desk.And then there was the unexpected development that Democratic West Virginia senator Joe Manchin, blamed for single handedly blocking the majority of Biden’s first term agenda on the climate emergency and the economy, had reversed his position.The Inflation Reduction Act Manchin negotiated with Democratic Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer is, Biden said, “the most significant legislation in history to tackle the climate crisis.”Thanks for joining us today. Before you go, please have a read of my colleague David Smith’s report on the reconciliation bill here. Here’s what else we followed today:
      Former treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin has spoken with the House panel investigating Donald Trump’s January 6 insurrection, and the committee is negotiating to obtain testimony from other members of the former president’s cabinet, the Associated Press reported.
      Politico reported that the House panel and the justice department’s criminal inquiry had struck an testimony-sharing deal on witness transcripts and other evidence. The report came as Trump’s former chief of staff Mick Mulvaney spoke with the panel virtually.
      Biden and Chinese president Xi Jinping spoke for more than two hours by phone, in what was reported to have been a sometimes testy conversation including a discussion of Nancy Pelosi’s controversial upcoming trip to Taiwan.
      At least 43 abortion clinics in 11 states have closed since the supreme court eliminated federal protections for the procedure last month, and seven states no longer have any providers, a study published Thursday by the Guttmacher Institute revealed. Prior to the ruling ending Roe v Wade protections, the 11 states had a total of 71 clinics providing abortion care, the report says.
      The Miami Herald reported that a state operation touted last month by Republican governor Ron DeSantis as a successful law enforcement action to “keep illegals out of Florida” ended up arresting mostly legal residents. Of 22 arrests in a three-day sweep from 7 to 9 June, the “vast majority” were not related to immigration, the Herald said.
      While chief of staff to Donald Trump, the retired general John Kelly “shoved” Ivanka Trump in a White House hallway, Jared Kushner writes in his forthcoming memoir. The detail from Breaking History, which will be published in August, was reported by the Washington Post.Kushner, the Post said, writes that he and his wife saw Kelly as “consistently duplicitous”.“One day he had just marched out of a contentious meeting in the Oval Office. Ivanka was walking down the main hallway in the West Wing when she passed him. Unaware of his heated state of mind, she said, ‘Hello, chief.’ Kelly shoved her out of the way and stormed by. She wasn’t hurt, and didn’t make a big deal about the altercation, but in his rage Kelly had shown his true character.”Kushner writes that Kelly offered a “meek” apology about an hour later.Kelly told the Post: “I don’t recall anything like you describe. It is inconceivable that I would EVER shove a woman. Inconceivable. Never happen. Would never intentionally do something like that. Also, don’t remember ever apologising to her for something I didn’t do. I’d remember that.”A spokesperson for Ivanka Trump said her husband’s description was accurate, the Post said.The Post also said Kushner writes that Kelly gave his wife “compliments to her face that she knew were insincere.“Then the four-star general would call her staff to his office and berate and intimidate them over trivial procedural issues that his rigid system often created. He would frequently refer to her initiatives like paid family leave and the child tax credit as ‘Ivanka’s pet projects.’”Read the full story:Trump chief of staff ‘shoved’ Ivanka at White House, Kushner book saysRead moreBarack Obama’s presidential portrait will be unveiled at the White House in a September ceremony hosted by his former vice-president Joe Biden, the Associated Press reports.Portraits of the former president and first lady Michelle Obama will be presented in the East Room on 7 September, according to Obama’s office.It will mark the first time the former first lady has returned to the White House since her husband left office in January 2017. Barack Obama went back in April to mark the 12th anniversary of his signature health care law.The House of Representative has delivered a big win for Joe Biden, passing the $280bn Chips and Science Act that includes $52bn to boost the production of semiconductors.The bill cleared the Senate 64-33 in a bipartisan vote yesterday, the president urging the House to get the bill to his desk as soon as possible to help ease a shortage in semiconductors he said is holding back US defense, healthcare and vehicle manufacturing industries.Biden received the news of the bill’s House passage, 243-187 in a strong bipartisan vote, during a virtual round table with business leaders at the White House this afternoon.The moment @POTUS gets word that the CHIPS Act has enough votes to pass the House pic.twitter.com/2CqAnr8oVc— Andrew Feinberg (@AndrewFeinberg) July 28, 2022
      Biden earlier highlighted the Chips Act as a central plank of his agenda to boost American industry, as he also hailed the newly announced $739bn Inflation Reduction Act.In a statement, the president said the Chips Act “will make cars cheaper, appliances cheaper, and computers cheaper. It will lower the costs of every day goods. And, it will create high-paying manufacturing jobs across the country and strengthen US leadership in the industries of the future at the same time.”Republicans had threatened to whip members against voting for the Chips Act after they were angered by last night’s announcement of the reconciliation bill, brokered in a deal between Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and previously reluctant West Virginia senator Joe Manchin.Read my colleague David Smith’s report on the proposed new legislation here:Joe Biden hails Senate deal as ‘most significant’ US climate legislation everRead moreIt’s a double helping of Joe Biden today, the president just delivering remarks on the economy at an afternoon White House roundtable of business leaders.Once again, the president is downplaying the suggestion, bolstered by this morning’s dismal GDP figures, that the US is in a recession:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}There’ll be a lot of chatter today on Wall Street and among pundits about whether we are in a recession. But if you’re looking at our job market, consumer spending business investment, we see signs of economic progress in the second quarter as well.
      And yesterday, Fed chairman [Jerome] Powell made it clear that he doesn’t think the US economy is currently in a recession. He said, quote, there are too many areas of economics where the economy is performing too well.For the second time today, following his address earlier this afternoon on the Inflation Reduction Act, Biden listed positive factors, including job creation, low unemployment and foreign investment in US industry..css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}I applaud by the bipartisan effort to get the Chips Act to my desk, which would advance our nation’s competitiveness and technological edge by boosting our domestic semiconductor production and manufacturing.
      Another thing Congress should do is to pass the Inflation Reduction Act to lower prescription drug costs, reduce the deficit, help ease inflationary pressures and ensure 13m Americans can continue to save an average of $800 per year on health care premiums.
      Both of these bills are going to help the economy continue to grow, bring down inflation and make sure we aren’t giving up on all the significant progress we made in the last year. Former treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin has spoken with the House panel investigating Donald Trump’s January 6 insurrection, and the committee is negotiating to obtain testimony from other members of the former president’s cabinet, the Associated Press reports.The panel is looking into the days following the deadly Capitol riot and discussions between senior officials over whether to try to remove the then-president from office.The negotiations come as the committee was interviewing Trump’s former chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, on Thursday. The former South Carolina congressman was special envoy for Northern Ireland on January 6 2022, a post he resigned immediately after the riot.The AP says Mnuchin’s interview, and the negotiations with others, were confirmed by three people familiar with the committee’s work, who spoke on condition of anonymity.The agency says the committee asked Mnuchin about discussions among cabinet secretaries to possibly invoke the constitutional process in the 25th Amendment to remove Trump after the attack on the Capitol, according to one of the people, and is in talks to interview former secretary of state Mike Pompeo. The panel has already interviewed former acting attorney general Jeffrey Rosen, former labor secretary Eugene Scalia and former acting defense secretary Christopher Miller as it focuses on Trump and what he was doing in the days before, during and after the riot. We’ve written plenty about the Inflation Reduction Act today, and heard that Joe Biden believes it’s “the most significant bill to tackle the climate crisis in history”. So what’s actually in it?My colleague Oliver Milman has this handy explainer to what made it into the package. And what didn’t:What’s in the climate bill that Joe Manchin supports – and what isn’t Read moreWe now have the White House readout of Joe Biden’s two hour conversation with China’s President Xi Jinping this morning:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}The call was a part of the Biden administration’s efforts to maintain and deepen lines of communication between the US and PRC [People’s Republic of China] and responsibly manage our differences and work together where our interests align.
      The two presidents discussed a range of issues important to the bilateral relationship and other regional and global issues, and tasked their teams to continue following up on today’s conversation, in particular to address climate change and health security. It seems they also touched on Nancy Pelosi’s controversial upcoming trip to Taiwan, which has angered Chinese leaders. The White House readout said:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}On Taiwan, President Biden underscored that the United States policy has not changed and that the United States strongly opposes unilateral efforts to change the status quo or undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait. The Chinese take, according to the Associated Press, was equally defiant.The news agency quoted an account of the call by China’s ministry of foreign affairs.“Those who play with fire will perish by it. It is hoped that the US will be clear-eyed about this,” it said.“President Xi underscored that to approach and define China-US relations in terms of strategic competition and view China as the primary rival and the most serious long-term challenge would be misperceiving China-US relations and misreading China’s development, and would mislead the people of the two countries and the international community.” At least 43 abortion clinics in 11 states have closed since the supreme court eliminated federal protections for the procedure last month, and seven states no longer have any providers, a study published Thursday by the Guttmacher Institute has found.Prior to the ruling ending Roe v Wade protections on 24 June, the 11 states had a total of 71 clinics providing abortion care, the report says. 🚨 As of July 24, these 7 US states 👇 had banned abortion completely following the SCOTUS decision to overturn #RoeVWade:❌ Alabama❌ Arkansas❌ Mississippi❌ Missouri❌ Oklahoma❌ South Dakota❌ Texas#BansOffOurBodies https://t.co/6r9oaGNzqJ— Guttmacher Institute (@Guttmacher) July 28, 2022
      As of 24 July, there were only 28 clinics still offering abortions, all located in the four states with six-week bans. Across these 11 states, the number of clinics offering abortions dropped by 43 in just one month. The seven states no longer offering any abortion provision are Alabama (previously 5 clinics), Arkansas (2), Mississippi (1), Missouri (1), Oklahoma (5), South Dakota (1) and Texas (23 ).“Obtaining an abortion was already difficult in many states even before the supreme court overturned Roe,” Rachel Jones, Guttmacher’s principal research scientist, said.“These clinic closures resulting from state-level bans will further deepen inequities in access to care based on race, gender, income, age or immigration status since long travel distances to reach a clinic in another state will be a barrier for many people.”Joe Biden thanked Democratic senators Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, for their “extraordinary effort” in negotiating the reconciliation bill.It had looked like Manchin had killed hope of any of the president’s signature policy goals on the climate emergency or the economy passing when he withdrew from talks on Build Back Better earlier this year.The West Virginia senator, however, insisted earlier today he “never walked away” and was always open to renewed discussions, on parts of the package at least, which were finally concluded on Wednesday after weeks of secret meetings with Schumer and his staff.Biden said: .css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}I know can sometimes seem like nothing gets done in Washington. I know it never crossed any of your minds. But the work of the government can be slow and frustrating and sometimes even infuriating.
      Then the hard work of hours and days and months from people who refuse to give up pays off.
      History has been made. Lives have changed with this legislation. We’re facing up to some of our biggest problems. And we’re taking a giant step forward as a nation. Biden closed his address with remarks on data that came out this morning showing the economy had shrunk for a second successive quarter, and that the US was technically in a recession.He listed low unemployment, overseas investment in US manufacturing and yesterday’s passing by the Senate of the Chips Act boosting semiconductor production among a number of reasons why he believes the US economy is strong.“That doesn’t sound like a recession to me,” Biden said.Joe Biden hailed the Inflation Reduction Act as “the most significant legislation in history to tackle the climate crisis” in a White House address welcoming the wide-ranging legislative package.The president outlined the benefits to Americans during his remarks, which followed the surprise announcement of a deal last night between Democratic Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and holdout West Virginia senator Joe Manchin..css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}This bill will be the most significant legislation in history to tackle the climate crisis and improve our energy security right away, and give us a tool to meet the climate goals… we’ve agreed to by cutting emissions and accelerating clean energy. It’s a huge step forward.
      This bill will reduce inflationary pressures on the economy. It will cut your cost of living and reduce inflation, it lowers the deficit and strengthens our economy for the long run as well.
      This bill has won the support of climate leaders like former vice-president Al Gore, who said the bill is, quote, long overdue and a necessary step to ensure the United States takes decisive action on the climate crisis that helps our economy and provides leadership for the world.Climate activists have broadly welcomed the bill which, if passed by Congress, would give Biden a massive victory ahead of November’s midterms. Inflation at 40-year highs and soaring prices in supermarkets and at gas pumps have contributed to the president’s low approval ratings.It also follows months of stalling on Biden’s agenda, specifically by Manchin, who didn’t like the cost of $1.8tn Build Back Better spending package featuring measures like extended child tax credit.Biden acknowledged: .css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}This bill is far from perfect. I know the bill doesn’t include everything that I’ve been pushing for since I got to office. For example, I’m going to keep fighting to bring down the cost of things for working families and middle class families by providing for things like affordable childcare, affordable elder care, the cost of preschool, housing, helping students with the cost of college, closing the health care coverage gap…
      My message to Congress is this. This is the strongest bill you can pass to lower inflation, cut the deficit, reduce health care costs, tackle the climate crisis and promote energy security, all the time while reducing the burdens facing working class and middle class families.
      So pass it. Pass it for the American people. Pass it for America. Joe Biden is about to deliver a hastily arranged address about the Inflation Reduction Act, the White House says.You can watch the president’s remarks here. More