Deacon’s Blog

Two cases, highlighted below, where individuals, institutions, and a whole diocese have fallen short of the Church’s teaching on Labor.

From IWJ: Healthcare workers in Michigan–and across the country–need our support!

In his recent Encyclical, Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict XVI repeatedly speaks of the “grave dangers for the rights of workers” that today imperil so many of our friends and neighbors who struggle daily to provide security for their families. It is imperative that people of faith stand with those workers hoping to secure wages and benefits consistent with their dignity as children of God.

Ascension Health is the nation’s largest Catholic and non-profit health system, comprised of 37 health systems or centers in 20 states, totaling over 570 hospitals, clinics, rehabilitation centers, labs, and other facilities. The employees of Genesys Health System, a member of Ascension Health, provide health care services in the Flint, Michigan area.

The management of Genesys is proposing severe wage, benefit, and pension cuts for several hundred of its employees. These healthcare workers are men and women committed to serving the health and welfare of the members of their communities.

On Friday, March 12, Genesys workers and their supporters traveled to the Ascension headquarters in St. Louis, Mo. to protest these wage and benefit cuts. Workers also gathered at Ascension centers in seven cities across the country – Washington, D.C., Buffalo, N.Y., Tucson, Ariz, Detroit, Flint, Mich. and Kansas City, Mo. – and held vigils before the management of Ascension and its subsidiary, Genesys Health System.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops reminds us that “among the elements of a just and fair workplace [in medical and health care centers] are: fair wages, adequate benefits, safe and decent working conditions…” (See A Fair and Just Workplace: Principles and Practices for Catholic Health Care.) These things are indispensible if we hope to assure quality care for patients and dignity for working people.

As has been seen in several Labor issues over the past few years, the message often does not translate into action. While the R.C. Church is not unique in pushing out Unions, or resisting employee efforts to unionize, it should hold itself to a higher standard, especially in light of Encyclicals exhorting fair treatment of workers going back to Leo XIII.

From the U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit via BNA: Ninth Circuit Nixes Seminarian’s Wage Claim, Says Exception Applies to Priest-in-Training

The First Amendment’s “ministerial exception” barred a Catholic seminarian from bringing his claim for unpaid overtime compensation against the Corporation of the Catholic Archbishop of Seattle under the Washington Minimum Wage Act, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled March 16 (Rosas v. Corp. of the Catholic Archbishop of Seattle, 9th Cir., No. 09-35003, 3/16/10 [pdf]).

Judge Robert R. Beezer wrote for the unanimous panel that the “ministerial exception helps to preserve the wall between church and state from even the mundane government intrusion presented here.” “The district court correctly determined that the ministerial exception bars [Cesar] Rosas’s claim and dismissed the case on the pleadings,” Beezer wrote.

In affirming the lower court, Beezer found that the interplay between the First Amendment’s Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses carves out an exception to otherwise applicable statutes if enforcing them would interfere with religious organizations’ employment decisions about their ministers.

Seminarian in Ministry Training Program

Rosas was a Mexican seminarian who was required to participate in a ministry training program at St. Mary Catholic Church in Marysville, Wash., located in Snohomish County, as part of the ordination process for the Catholic priesthood.

Rosas and another Mexican seminarian, Jesus Alcazar, worked under the supervision of St. Mary’s parish priest, Horatio Yanez, performing some pastoral duties and doing maintenance work for the church in 2002.

In February 2006 both Rosas and Alcazar filed a lawsuit against the Archdiocese alleging Yanez had sexually harassed Alcazar and that the Archdiocese fired them in violation of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act for complaining and reporting the conduct. The two men also claimed the Archdiocese had failed to pay them overtime compensation in violation of the Washington Minimum Wage Act.

Trial Court Dismisses Wage Claims

The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington dismissed Rosas’s harassment claim because he had not indicated that he had been sexually harassed but allowed Alcazar’s sexual harassment claim to proceed (4 DLR A-10, 1/8/07).

Alcazar subsequently settled his sexual harassment claim against the Archdiocese and was dismissed from the lawsuit.

The district court dismissed all other claims on the pleadings as barred by the First Amendment’s ministerial exception. “This exception prohibits a court from inquiring into the decisions of a religious organization concerning the hiring, firing, promotion, rate of pay, placement or any other employment related decision concerning ministers and other non-secular employees,” the trial court said.

Ministerial Exception Applies to State Law Claims

Rosas argued on appeal that the district court had erred in dismissing his state law claim without first determining if requiring the church to pay overtime wages actually burdened the church’s religious beliefs. Second, Rosas argued that requiring the church to pay overtime wages did not implicate a protected employment decision. Finally, he claimed that the district court erred in determining on the pleadings that he was a “minister” to whom the exception applied.

The appellate panel disagreed. Beezer first clarified that although the district court had relied on precedent involving only Title VII cases, the exception also applied to state law claims.

Beezer wrote that the ministerial exception encompassed “all tangible employment actions” and barred lawsuits seeking damages for lost or reduced pay.

“Our previous cases focus on Title VII, but our analysis in those cases compels the conclusion that the ministerial exception analysis applies to Washington’s Minimum Wage Act as well,” Beezer wrote. “Because the ministerial exception is constitutionally compelled, it applies as a matter of law across statutes, both state and federal, that would interfere with the church-minister relationship.”

Next, Beezer disposed of Rosas’s assertion that the trial court should have considered if the law “actually” burdened the church. “The [ministerial] exception was created because government interference with the church-minister relationship inherently burdens religion.”

Overtime Claim Triggers Exception

In addition, Beezer said that Rosas had misinterpreted Ninth Circuit precedent in arguing that the payment of overtime wages was not a protected employment decision that would trigger the exception.

Beezer said that Rosas admitted that his case involved the training and selection of the Catholic Church’s priests-issues the Ninth Circuit had expressly addressed in Bollard v. Cal. Province of the Soc’y of Jesus, 196 F. 3d 940, 81 FEP Cases 660 (9th Cir. 1999); (232 DLR AA-1, 12/3/99).

“This case thus quintessentially follows Bollard’s explanation,” Beezer wrote. “Rosas interprets our case law too narrowly. Bollard refers not only to the selection of ministers but more broadly to ‘employment decisions regarding … ministers,’ ”

Beezer wrote that the ministerial exception therefore encompassed “all tangible employment actions” and barred lawsuits seeking damages for lost or reduced pay.

Finally, Beezer rejected Rosas’s argument that the district court erred in ruling on the pleadings that the exception applied because Rosas claimed that his primary duties at the church primarily involved maintenance rather than ministerial duties…

Here is some text from Judge Beezer’s decision (emphasis mine and discussed below):

“The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach.” Everson v. Bd. of Educ., 330 U.S. 1, 18 (1947). The interplay between the First Amendment’s Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses creates an exception to an otherwise fully applicable statute if the statute would interfere with a religious organization’s employment decisions regarding its ministers. Bollard v. Cal. Province of the Soc’y of Jesus, 196 F.3d 940, 944, 946-47 (9th Cir. 1999). This “ministerial exception” helps to preserve the wall between church and state from even the mundane government intrusion presented here. In this case, plaintiff Cesar Rosas seeks pay for the overtime hours he worked as a seminarian in a Catholic church in Washington. The district court correctly determined that the ministerial exception bars Rosas’s claim and dismissed the case on the pleadings. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, 1 and we affirm.

…

Cesar Rosas and Jesus Alcazar were Catholic seminarians in Mexico. The Catholic Church required them to participate in a ministry training program at St. Mary Catholic Church in Marysville, Washington as their next step in becoming ordained priests. At St. Mary, Rosas and Alcazar allegedly suffered retaliation for claiming that Father Yanez¹ sexually harassed Alcazar, and they eventually sued Father Yanez and the Corporation of the Catholic Archbishop of Seattle (“defendants”) under Title VII. 2 In addition, Rosas and Alcazar sued under supplemental jurisdiction for violations of Washington’s Minimum Wage Act for failure to pay overtime wages. See Wash. Rev. Code § 49.46.130. The district court dismissed the overtime wage claims on the pleadings, see Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(c), and Rosas’s overtime wage claim is the only issue on appeal.

…

Because the judgment was on the pleadings, the pleadings alone must be sufficient to support the district court’s judgment. We thus base our decision on the very few allegations in Rosas’s complaint. Rosas alleges as follows:

1.3 … The Corporation of the Catholic Archbishop of Seattle hosted [Rosas] as [a] participant[ ] in a training/pastoral ministry program for the priesthood.
. . . .
2.2 Cesar Rosas entered the seminary to become a Catholic priest in 1995 in Mexico.
2.3 As part of [his] preparation for ordination into the priesthood, the Catholic Church required [Rosas] to engage in a ministerial placement outside [his] diocese, under the supervision of a pastor of the parish into which [he was] placed. The Archdiocese of Seattle sends seminarians to Mexico and has Mexican seminarians come to its parishes. [Rosas was] placed in St. Mary Parish in Marysville, Washington under the supervision of defendant Fr. Horatio Yanez.
. . . .
2.10 … [Rosas] was hired to do maintenance of the church and also assisted with Mass. He … worked many overtime hours he was not compensated for.

First, I think the Court erred in defining exactly what a minister is. Is a seminarian a minister of the R.C. Church? It could be argued that in the Roman Church, prior to Vatican II, most seminarians were ministers of the Church since they were likely tonsured and deemed clerics entitled to beneficences (the civil benefits then enjoyed by clerics)².

In this day and age a R.C. seminarian is no more a minister than your average lay person. They receive no beneficence from the Roman Church (health care, salary, stipend, room and board), nor are they entitled to carry out any ministry different than your average lay person (men and women both who may serve at the altar, distribute the Holy Eucharist – yuk, read the lessons, etc.). The average seminarian is just a student and a “civilian” with a vocational choice.

Next, seminaries are open to any lay person who may engage in a variety of ‘ministries’ or jobs in the Church. It is definitely no exclusive club and there is no real differentiation any longer. Any person may be in a training program related to their studies (an internship/externship) which makes the work these seminarians were doing no different from your average pew dweller. The Court, and likely the defendant’s lawyers, missed that point

Additionally, look at the work they were “hired” to do. The Archdiocese of Seattle took these university educated Mexicans, and in typically American fashion, made them maintenance men who also happened to serve as altar boys from time-to-time. It would only have been worse if the Archdiocese would have had them go out and pick crops. There is definitely something wrong here. If the ministerial teaching was to be about menial labor and humility, why not send them to a monastery?

Judge Beezer quoted the Fifth Circuit’s holding that if a person (1) is employed by a religious institution, (2) was chosen for the position based ‘largely on religious criteria,’ and (3) performs some religious duties … that person is a ‘minister’ for purposes of the ministerial exception,” What was missed was that the choice of these individuals for this service had very little to do with religious criteria and more to do with whether they had strong backs. Further, the religious duties portion of the test likely fails because the ministerial or religious portion of the training was so de minimis as to be almost non-existant.

So did the Court err in finding that these men were engaged in ministerial training? Absolutely! There was no ministerial training going on. These two young men were merely janitors, and the whole escapade a scam aimed at obtaining cheap labor. What happened here was wage theft, all disguised as “ministerial training;” another example of actions inconsistent with teaching.

As the Seattle Herald reported:

The two seminarians became disillusioned by the experience and have given up their quest to become priests…

“Both these young men had a lifelong dream of being priests,”… “It’s emotionally damaging when your lifelong dream and your spiritual vocation is shattered by the very people you entrusted that dream to.”

So much possibility wasted in a world plagued by a shortage of men willing to offer their lives for worship of God and service to His people. A sad case, and a case teetering on the edge of going the other way if all the facts had been established.

Christian Witness Education, immigration, Labor, Vocations

You can now pre-order Interfaith Worker Justice’s new book: A Worker Justice Reader: Essential Writings on Religion and Labor.

Next month Orbis Books is publishing A Worker Justice Reader: Essential Writings on Religion and Labor, an exciting anthology compiled by IWJ that will be a vital resource for seminaries, congregational study groups, social justice committees, labor unions, and beyond.

The book is organized into five parts:

1. Crisis for U.S. Workers
2. Religion-Labor History
3. What Our Religious Traditions Say about Work
4. Theology and the Ethics of Work
5. The Religion-Labor Movement Today

I will be picking up a copy. I wonder if the role of the PNCC in Labor history will be included, as well as the role played by organizations like the Polish National Alliance (An interesting history, the PNA is generally non-sectarian and was a close ally of the PNCC¹ in supporting Labor).

You can pre-order a copy online or by phone (call 800-258-5838 and use code WJR for FREE shipping) or through your local bookstore.

For suggestions on incorporating the Reader into your curriculum, contact Rev. April McGlothin-Eller, IWJ’s Student Programs Coordinator, at (773) 728-8400, ext. 21, or by E-mail.

PNCC, Poland - Polish - Polonia Announcements, Culture, Education, freedom, History, immigration, Labor

The title above from 1 John 3:18. From the Salt Lake Tribune: Churches help folks find jobs

Good works » For many worshippers, helping Utah’s unemployed is a spiritual mandate.

Larry Adakai was out of options.

He lost his welder job after taking too much time off to care for his ailing wife through numerous surgeries. The Navajo father had no savings and few places to turn.

That’s when the Rev. Steve Keplinger and the good folks at St. David’s Episcopal Church in Page, Ariz., part of the Utah diocese, stepped in.

They offered him handyman work around the church and prepared dinners for the family. They paid his union dues so he could be hired at a nearby site. They faxed his application to the new company, then gave him gas money to go there and take the necessary welder exams.

It took six months, but now Larry Adakai has the job, Mary Ann Adakai is fully recovered, and their 14-year-old son, Marcus, is feeling good about life.

Today’s economic realities are prompting more and more workers like the Adakais to turn to their religious communities for encouragement, advice, contacts, training, financial aid, spiritual solace and, frankly, jobs.

More than 90,000 Utahns are out of work, up nearly 20 percent from a year ago, as the state’s unemployment rate jumped to 6.8 percent in January. Executives, students, hairstylists, truck drivers, builders, Realtors, people in every profession and at every level face an unknown future, many for the first time.

“We used to place 300 people a month,” says Ballard Veater, manager of LDS Employment Services, who has worked for the church since 1978. “Now it’s half that many.”

When a person loses work, it’s like a death in the family where the one who died is you, Veater says. A job is at the core of who we are.

For many people of faith, helping the unemployed is more than a kindhearted gesture. It’s a spiritual mandate.

“When I was scared, they talked to me,” says Mary Ann Adakai of St. David’s leaders. “When I lost all hope, they helped me with prayers.” Indeed, such assistance is the centerpiece of Keplinger’s theology.

“Trying to help people get back on their feet is the most Christ-centered thing we can do,” he says. “It is more important than worship.”

…

Joining religious forces

Sunday was hardly a sabbath, an unemployed Presbyterian woman told Anne Gardner last fall, because of the stress of not knowing what Monday would bring.

That comment prompted Gardner, a business executive, to launch the Park City Career Network, with a handful of faith leaders.

Gardner, a Catholic, invited Ellen Silver, the director of Jewish Family Services; Bill Humbert, an executive recruiter and a member of St. Mary of the Assumption Catholic Parish; and Dale M. Matthews, a career coach and Greek Orthodox, to join her in a weekly workshop at Temple Har Shalom in Park City. Among other benefits, the effort helps job-hungry seekers define “The Brand Called You.”

The group offers people of all faiths free training similar to the LDS approach. It also provides monthly speakers, who might address such topics as debt negotiations, retirement planning and the emotional stress of job searching.

The typical job seekers are in their early to mid-40s, with either college or graduate education, working at a management level or above. They are not used to having to look for a job. The weekly meetings, begun last fall, attract about 15 people; 21 “graduates” have found jobs and another nine have started their own businesses through this effort.

“We encourage people to reach out in the community, to be active in the community, and make sure you continue your routines,” Gardner says. “We tell them to have faith in whatever their guiding principles are.”…

Christian Witness Charity, Ecumenism, interfaith, Labor

Two from Interfaith Worker Justice:

Extend Unemployment and COBRA Now!

Are you unemployed? Do you know someone who is? Urgent action is needed to make sure that Congress extends the lifeline for workers by extending unemployment and COBRA coverage before the end of the month. Your response will help someone put food on the table, keep their lights on and of course, enable them to live with some dignity during this harsh economic climate. Click Here to take action!

This isn’t an issue of slackers who sit around enjoying a check. There are too few jobs for too many unemployed workers, approx. 1 job for every 4 persons unemployed. Further, the skill sets of many unemployed workers will not transfer forward. They will need significant retraining to be prepared for the time when jobs once again become available. Also remember that unemployment assistance, which is temporary help for people who are ready, willing, and able to work, makes an immediate economic impact. Those dollars are spent, returning $1.67 to the economy for every dollar in assistance.

Principles on Jobs

It is time for people of faith to act and bring their moral vision to the national conversation on jobs.

Interfaith Worker Justice has stood with workers in times of economic prosperity and stands with them now in this time of economic crisis. Yet we are continually confronted by stories of workers who want to work but can’t find jobs, workers whose hours have been cut from full time to part time and workers who have been victimized by employers who will not pay them for the work they have done.

Our religious traditions teach us that work is a sacred act, that when we labor we are “God’s hands” on earth. Those who work and those who cannot work must be treated fairly. “Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms by injustice, who makes his neighbors work for nothing, and does not give them their wages.” (Jeremiah 22:13)

As people of faith, we call for an economy that provides a good job for everyone who wants and needs one. While it is good and right to pass measures that can put some people back to work, it is not enough. All jobs should be good jobs, paying living wages and benefits, allowing workers dignity and a voice at the workplace, ensuring worker’s health and safety, and guaranteeing their right to organize unions.

IWJ has developed a “Statement of Principles” on Jobs that I have signed. Please join me in signing that principle statement.

Christian Witness, Perspective, Political Labor

Save the Date for Interfaith Worker Justice’s Public Policy Training!
March 14th-16th – Chicago

Learn from experts on the IWJ national staff and local organizational leaders. The trainers bring extensive experience in interfaith organizing, worker and union campaigns, and organizational development.

This Training is designed for:

• Organizers with faith-based organizations or workers centers
• Board members, leaders, or volunteers of interfaith organizations
• Religious or community outreach staff of unions

Sessions covering…

• How you can be involved in moving federal, state, and local legislation?
• How to engage in multi-racial alliance building around policy issues?
• How to engage labor and religious leaders in your policy goals?
• The current status of Immigration, Jobs, and Wage Theft campaigns and legislation?

IWJ National Office
1020 W Bryn Mawr, 4th floor
Chicago, IL 60660

More information on registration and costs is available at the IWJ website.

Perspective, Political Education, immigration, Labor, Training

Forged Power is an ASU Art Museum Moving Targets Initiative featuring the work of Ferran Mendoza, Alvaro Sau and William Wylie. The exhibit will be at the Arizona State University Art Museum from February 20 – May 29, 2010.

Friday Conversations @11 series, Feb. 19
Spring Season Reception, Feb. 19 from 7-9pm

Ferran Mendoza & Alvaro Sau, Outdoors, High Definition Video, 2009
William Wylie, Carrara series, Cavatori, The Block, Dust, Friction, Digital Video, 2006

In the digital age, the way we engage with physical work has shifted drastically. Such shifts are not new and have occurred over the course of human history – from the invention of simple tools, to the industrial revolution, to our current digital society. But as technologies continue to advance, our control and power appear to diminish, not only in our work, but also of our bodies. The body’s relationship to work continues to be less physical. We use mechanical arms to lift both heavy and light objects into place, and vacuums now roam floors on their own. A document that once took the entire use of one’s arm to handwrite can now be created with light touches of computer keys. With voice activation and eye-tracking technologies entering the mainstream consumer market, the hand may soon be removed altogether from the process of work.

Spanish artists Ferran Mendoza and Alvaro Sau traveled the Basque-French border region. The artists refer to it as “this kind of frontier land which we call the outdoors,” a territory of Europe where the “most archaic ways of living coexist with the omnipresent industrial world.” Using their cameras, Mendoza and Sau captured, in high definition video, the residents of this seemingly isolated region in their daily routines and surroundings. The result of their journey is the video OUTDOORS (2008), a 56-minute work that delivers a composition of portraits. These portraits provide fleeting glimpses of individuals who take pride in their independence, work and knowhow. Their knowledge of their tools, their environment and how their bodies interact with each is clear and poetic; they perform their tasks as if every specific activity or action has been choreographed.

In the historic quarries of Carrara, Italy, the cavatori (stonecutters) have worked for centuries excavating large slabs of white marble from the earth. Through a fellowship exchange, artist William Wylie was provided the opportunity to spend time observing the everyday operations and interactions of the men who work in these famous quarries, the very quarries used by artists from Michelangelo to Louise Bourgeois. What at first appears to be a focus on machinery is soon realized to be a study of human activity and control. While trucks and machinery within these digital videos appear to struggle and battle to complete tasks, the cavatori work with their hands – making precision measurements and chiseling slight grooves. The artist captures in his Carrara series, Cavatori, The Block, Dust, and Friction (2006), the gestural engagements of the hand and body as the stonecutters work together, using signals and whistles, to coordinate their movements within the noise and chaos of the industrial site. Together these four videos demonstrate that the actions of work can be perceived as beautiful in and of themselves.

The individuals captured in these videos control their own actions by working with their hands and bodies. They do more than just push a button; they exert human energy and create an effect through the power of their own body. Retaining the capability of doing work or accomplishing tasks with the use of the physical body, their forged power is a reaffirmation of human capability.

William Wylie will be in attendance at ASU Art Museum to present a free lecture on a yet to be determined date. He will also meet with students and classes while in Tempe.

Curated by John D. Spiak, Curator, ASU Art Museum.

The exhibition and programs are generously supported by Helme Prinzen Endowment, ASU Art Museum Advisory Board, ASU School of Art and the Department of Photography, and Northlight Gallery at ASU.

Arizona State University Art Museum
Mill Avenue @ 10th Street
Tempe, AZ 85287-2911

Art Announcements, Arts, Culture, Labor, Life

M. Patricia Smith’s nomination as Solicitor of the Department of Labor has moved forward with a cloture vote today along party lines. There should be an up-or-down vote on the nomination tomorrow or the day after. See SENATUS for details on the vote.

Senator Enzi, the leading Republican on the Senate HELP Committee, had been blocking the nomination, for no good, valid, or honest reason. As both Republicans and Democrats have done in recent years, he has abused the whole practice of filibuster (I’ll write more on that later).

To respond to his ignorant criticism would take volumes. Frankly, he is scandalous in his use of innuendo and distorted facts to paint those he doesn’t like as incompetent managers and liars (an example of his blathering at the Washington Examiner). I would hate to be his child and have made a mistake. Of course his blather is par for the course in Washington (a pox on both houses). If someone won’t bow to your personal agenda, destroy them by whatever means possible.

Sen. Harkin, no flaming liberal, provided the facts that refute Sen. Enzi line by line during his pre-cloture vote statements. The Congressional Record should have his factual testimony in-full by tomorrow. I encourage you to check it out.

So to my title above, ‘What does Sen. Enzi really want?’ I believe he wants the following:

• That workers not be educated as to their rights under the law.
• That low wage workers have no recourse when their wages are stolen.
• That any person or organization providing assistance only do so according to an approved script and to approved eligible individuals.
• That employers who skirt the rules, especially those who hire low wage and immigrant workers presuming that they can abuse them, be free to establish a system of indentured servitude.
• That disreputable, race-to-the-bottom, employers be free to re-establish the company store and a chit and voucher program.
• That rights are only for those in Sen. Enzi’s social and economic demographic.
• That the law is only a set of suggestions and optional guidelines, especially laws that protect the lower classes.
• That truth be subservient to agenda.
• That the United States be known as the land of permanent masters and servants.
• That the Republican Party abjure its tie to the abolition of slavery.

Amy Traub, writing at Huffington, gives a great narrative on the things Ms. Smith has done and works to prevent in New York in New York’s Hidden Crime Wave

And we thought crime in New York City was low. According to the NYPD just 418 robberies were reported in New York last week, along with 695 incidents of grand larceny. Not bad for a city of more than 8 million people. But the rosy numbers overlook a devastating series of thefts that never make it into the police statistics: last week the city may have experienced just 375 burglaries but it also saw an estimated 317,263 cases of employer wage theft from their own low wage workers. More than $18.4 million were stolen from wages in that week alone. And because the wage violations are systematic and ongoing, the crimes recur every week throughout the year.

The shocking new wage theft data come from research [pdf] unveiled this morning by the National Employment Law Project. After a rigorous study involving thousands of front-line workers in New York’s low wage industries, researchers documented the prevalence of New York City’s workplace violations for the first time.

The study reveals a crime wage centered on the city’s most vulnerable workers. More than one in five workers in the city’s low-wage industries was paid less than the minimum wage. More than three in four were denied the overtime pay they were legally owed. When workers tried to stand up for themselves (for example, by filing a complaint with a government agency or attempting to organize a union) they faced a high risk of illegal employer retaliation: being fired, getting their hours cut, or having the boss threaten to call immigration authorities. Not surprisingly, many workers decided to remain silent, even as they continued to work in dangerous conditions or saw their earnings stolen.

Imagine the destructive impact on New York’s families and communities. Although the average worker in the city’s low-wage industries earns just $20,644 a year, they lost an average 15 percent of that to wage theft. That amounts to an average $3,016 annually stolen from some of the lowest-income working families in the city…

Are you ready for your employer to arbitrarily cut your salary by 15%? That 15% cut isn’t for any good economic reason, and certainly no legal reason. It is just so you can continue to work the same hours at less pay, and he can take it home to buy himself a better bottle of scotch. Maybe he’ll share that scotch with Sen. Enzi. Wonder if he hypocritically likes it neat.

Funny that my son was recently studying indentured servitude. I can’t wait till my son learns about human trafficking. I will be able to point to Sen. Enzi (if he’s still there) as a proponent of the very things that aid in its continuance.

Perspective, Political Education, Ethnicity, freedom, History, immigration, Labor

On some older news in my inbox:

The irony

From Reuters: Republicans urge Obama to roll back “Buy American”

Republicans urged President Barack Obama on Thursday to roll back “Buy American” provisions of this year’s economic stimulus package that they said were delaying public works projects and costing American jobs.

“Clearly these provisions are creating problems for our domestic companies and employees that must be addressed,” Representative Wally Herger said at a “roundtable” Republicans organized to hear industry concerns about the measure.

Representative Kevin Brady urged the White House to exempt state, county and city governments from the Buy American requirement “so that we can get those dollars working, create these jobs, get these projects in place and move this economy.”

…

The Buy American provision included in the $787 billion economic stimulus act requires all public works projects funded by the bill use only U.S.-made goods.

As a result, many local jurisdictions receiving Recovery Act funds are faced with ensuring that their projects comply with the Buy American mandate.

That’s not as simple as it sounds because many products contain components from around the world.

…

Groups calling for changes in the Buy American provisions include the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Emergency Committee for American Trade, which together represents most of the biggest U.S. companies.

They said they feared other countries would retaliate by passing their own “buy domestic” provisions, as Canadian cities are threatening to do because their firms are being shut out of U.S. stimulus projects.

So, don’t do anything to stimulate and create manufacturing jobs in the U.S., and ensure those jobs keep getting shipped off-shore, while at the same time you decry the immigrant for “stealing” the last McDonald’s job left in the U.S.. Complete hypocrites.

On Ukrainian history:

From The Day: Mazepa: Architect of European Ukraine?

…Peter I’s Russia found its ideal dimension in Imperium, a “great form” with its inertial imperative of constantly developing supranational schemes aimed at compressing all conquered space into a single ideological whole.

Victorious as it was, Peter I’s Russia built its society out of “subjects” and “serfs.” Defeated as it was, Mazepa’s Ukraine was potential society of citizens.

Mazepa’s Ukraine had thus taken a resolute and decisive step in the direction of Europe at a time of anti-absolutist revolutions. Peter I’s Russia realized itself in an imperial structure whose messianic concept was generally anti-European.

It was a bolt of lightning that split the family tree of Old Rus’. Since then the confrontation between Ukraine and Russia has been systemic and conceptual. The gist of this confrontation is that Ukraine was not an obedient territorial unit open for colonization. Ukraine was Europe’s last bulwark retaining a political tradition that was absolutely unacceptable for Russian absolutism and thus very dangerous for centralized governance. It was a republican tradition. Rooted in the philosophic legacy of European culture, this tradition became the basis of the Ukrainian idea, i.e., a republican and consequently national idea, which has since been in opposition to the Russian Idea as an imperial and consequently immanently supranational one…

It is a complex article which attempts to draw the currents of the Reformation, Humanism, Orthodoxy, Polish-Ukrainian history, and the Khmelnytsky revolt into one large bundle giving rise to Mazepa’s movement. I’m really not sure how the Reformation and humanism play out here. I would ascribe the influence of Cossack independence and self-determination as well as the philosophies already existent in the Polish-Lithuanian, (later Ruthenian) Commonwealth. Those philosophies were already well settled, and well known in the Ukraine, when the rest of Europe met the Reformation and the advent of humanism as a philosophy.

Learning about your new neighbors:

From the Times: Polska! Year comes to London

Slap-bang in the centre of Warsaw there’s a striking neo-Gothic skyscraper called the Palace of Culture. Poles are forever debating whether to demolish it — it was a gift from Stalin, whose memory is not lovingly tended in these parts. But they could equally well celebrate it. Within its imposing walls it hosts three theatres, a cinema, bars and museums. What other capital city’s most prominent edifice is an arts centre? “Theatre is the national sport,” says Piotr Gruszczynski, a critic and dramaturge at the high-flying Nowy Theatre. “Poles still believe that theatre can change the world.”

Britons can now enjoy the fruits of this devotion in the form of Polska! Year, a 12-month arts festival that cashes in on the wave of immigration that has left Brits eager to know more about our new neighbours. Poland, we’re being told, is no slumbering ex-Soviet satellite, but Europe’s sixth-biggest country and a star in the international arts firmament.

…“Poland needs to kill its idols,” says Katarzyna Szustow, one of a triumvirate now running the Dramatyczny Theatre, based in the Palace of Culture. Here they like their drama more political. In the 19th century, Szustow says, when Poland was partitioned between Germany, Russia and Habsburg Austria, “it was to the theatre that you went to hear Polish spoken. Then, under the Soviets, theatre was the focal point of dissent. Post-1989 theatre was suddenly meaningless — the real ‘theatre’ was happening in the public sphere.”

…

The remaining taboos in Polish theatre include homosexuality and Poland’s relationship with its Jewish population. The former is broached by Szustow’s new regime, which programmes live art about gender and the body; the latter by a new play at the National Theatre in London, Our Class by Tadeusz Slobodzianek. His play, which confronts the country’s complicity in Second World War atrocities, hasn’t been staged in Poland — Slobodzianek is loath to apply for state funding because of the controversy it would generate. All theatres are state-funded and highly bureaucratic, which means plenty of activity, but a lack of flexibility.

The only other taboo is laughter. “Making comedy in Polish theatre means you are not an artist,” Gruszczynski says. He’s exaggerating – perhaps for comic effect. But for Britons striving to reduce our own theatre to a branch of the leisure industry Polish drama takes some getting used to. And yet, the sense of a thriving, passionate scene, and of a younger generation exploiting the public role theatre has retained from the Soviet years is exhilarating. If Polska! Year can communicate that excitement, its shows will be well worth seeing.

A fitting tribute:

Dr. Jerzy J. Maciuszko – Ambassador of Polish Culture and one of the most dedicated members of the Kosciuszko Foundation by Olga Teresa Sarbinowska

Those of us who were raised in Communist Poland have much in common. We are direct, act with a characteristic ease, and we tend to pay little attention to manners. The Polish post-war generations stand in direct contrast to the Polish pre-war intelligentsia. To many of us the pre-war intelligentsia is an abstract notion often associated with rigid etiquette and snobbism. When at the end of the eighties I arrived in Cleveland, the first representative of Polonia who reached out to me was Doctor Jerzy Maciuszko, a charming, courteous man full of gentleness, humbleness, politeness, and inherent high culture.

A Warsavian by birth, Jerzy Maciuszko, is a 1936 graduate of the Department of English Language at the University of Warsaw. He began his American career in 1951 as a lecturer of Polish Literature at Alliance College in Pennsylvania. Soon thereafter, he moved to Cleveland where he enrolled in the doctoral program in library sciences at Case Western Reserve University and worked in the department of foreign literature at the Cleveland Public Library. Upon defending his Ph.D. dissertation, Maciuszko was promoted to director of the prestigious John G. White Department at The Cleveland Public Library and continued his academic career teaching Polish literature at Case Western Reserve University.

In 1969, Dr. Maciuszko accepted the position of Chairman of the Slavic Studies Department at Alliance College in Pennsylvania. It should be noted that Alliance College was established by the Polish National Alliance. An informational brochure published by the College at the beginning of the seventies explained that “Slavic studies” at most American universities amounted to “Russian studies” while at Alliance College the emphasis was on “Polish studies.” …

Unfortunately in 1974 Dr. Maciuszko left Alliance College and returned to Cleveland where he accepted the directorship of Baldwin-Wallace College’s Ritter Library. Soon after his departure, Alliance College, together with the Center for Polish Studies, closed down. The magnificent Alliance College campus was sold out and the entire complex was turned into a women’s prison.

Accepting a position as the library director at Baldwin-Wallace College, Professor Maciuszko seemingly departed from his involvement in the Polish cause. However, this was not the case. He plunged into the life of Polonia like a missionary driven by an inner fire. He wrote, published, became active in many Polonia organizations, and quickly established himself as a foundation of cultural and intellectual life for the Polish-American community in Cleveland… Furthermore, as an active member, he was involved with the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences in New York, Polish-American veteran organizations in Cleveland, the Association of Polish Writers Abroad, and the Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, and others.

…

As a writer, Dr. Maciuszko dedicated his works primarily to Poland and Polonia. Since 1957, he has been publishing reviews of Polish literature in the quarterly World Literature Today. Reviews by him also appeared regularly in The Polish Review and other leading literary journals. In addition, as a prolific writer Dr. Maciuszko has authored numerous forewords and commentaries to various editions of classical literature. …

This prominent Cleveland Pole also wrote a chapter entitled “Polish Letters in America” for the book Poles in America, Frank Mocha, editor (Worzalla Publishing Company, 1978), as well as a chapter entitled “Polish-American Literature” for the book Ethnic Perspectives in American Literature, Di Petro, editor (Modern Languages Association of America, 1983). Numerous encyclopedic entries on Polish writers and poets authored by him appeared in Encyclopedia of World Literature in the 20th Century (Unger Publishing Company, 1975). The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History, John Grabowski, Editor (Indiana University Press, 1987) included an entry by Dr. Maciuszko. He was also a founding member of Choice, the official journal of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL). Choice was first issued in 1964, and since then Dr. Maciuszko has been a regular contributor, writing primarily reviews of Polish literature. He also has served as Chairman of the Slavic Division within ACRL organization.

In 1969 Dr. Maciuszko published The Polish Short Story in English; A Guide and Critical Bibliography (Wayne State University Press). This compendium consisted of summaries of Polish short stories published in English. The work was published within the Millennium Series of the Kosciuszko Foundation. Professor of Polish Studies at Columbia University, Dr. Anna Frajlich, called the book “a monumental work indispensable to all American teachers and students of Polish literature.”

A most puzzling fact is that a significant literary achievement of Dr. Maciuszko’s, to this day, remains completely unknown. To solve this mystery we must travel back in time to the beginning of World War II. In August of 1939, twenty-six-year-old Maciuszko was a member of one of the first military units to stand up to the Nazi war machine. Unfortunately, on September 4th, he was taken prisoner of war, and for the next five and a half years he remained in the German POW camps.

In 1943, the international Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) headquartered in Geneva announced a literary contest among all prisoners held in German POW camps. At night, by candlelight, after an exhaustive work day, while his comrades slept, Maciuszko wrote a short story which he entitled Koncert F-Moll (Concerto in F-minor). He was thrilled to find out later that it had been selected as a winner.

…

In 1974, an American professor wrote in a letter of recommendation that Dr. Maciuszko “still maintains his old-world dignity.” Never giving in to the pressures of the American culture, he has remained faithful to the ideals of his upbringing. Having known Dr. Maciuszko and his wife, Dr. Kathleen Maciuszko, throughout the years, I rediscovered the charm and splendor of Polish pre-war intelligentsia, this culture of mine that at first appeared very distant and incomprehensible, the culture that has been almost lost and forgotten. Today, I greatly value this engaging courtesy coupled with refined dignity and tremendous kindness. In today’s world of aggression, courtesy and kindness are invaluable assets. I salute Dr. Maciuszko for being able, against all odds, to preserve the most precious qualities of the Polish culture and pass them on to the next generations.

Zeal:

From Pew: The “Zeal of the Convert”: Is It the Real Deal?

A common perception about individuals who switch religions is that they are very fervent about their new faith. A new analysis by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life provides quantitative support for this piece of conventional wisdom often referred to as the “zeal of the convert.” The analysis finds that people who have switched faiths (or joined a faith after being raised unaffiliated with a religion) are indeed slightly more religious than those who have remained in their childhood faith, as measured by the importance of religion in their lives, frequency with which they attend religious services and other measures of religious commitment. However, the analysis also finds that the differences in religious commitment between converts and nonconverts are generally very small and are more apparent among some religious groups than others.

One of the most striking findings of the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, conducted by the Pew Forum in 2007, was the large number of people who have left their childhood faith. According to the survey, roughly half of all Americans say they have left the faith in which they were raised to adopt another faith or no faith at all, or if they were not raised in a religion, they have since joined one.

The new analysis finds that, overall, people who have switched religions consistently exhibit higher levels of religious commitment than those who still belong to their childhood faith, but the differences are relatively modest…

After joining the PNCC I went through strong convertitis. Affects others more strongly than others I suppose.

In Bridge news:

From the NY Times: Polish Wroclaw Team Blitzes, Winning Universities Title

The first European Universities Championship was played in Opatija, Croatia, from Oct. 4 through last Saturday. The 22 teams from 11 countries (Poland sent 7 teams) played a 10-board round robin.

With one round to go, Paris led Wroclaw-1 by 2 victory points. Paris played against Krakow (lying 15th), and Wroclaw-1 faced Munich (13th).

The final match started well for Paris. On Board 21 the Krakow East-West pair misdefended to let three no-trump through, giving Paris 13 international match points. And on the next deal this same Krakow pair missed three no-trump that was made at the other three tables in these matches, giving Paris another 10 imps.

…

On the penultimate board Wroclaw-1 gained 5 imps and Paris 7. So Paris needed a big swing on the final deal, but it was a dull three no-trump where the only fight was for an overtrick.

Paris had prevailed in its last match by 18 imps, which gave the team 20 victory points, but Wroclaw-1 had won a 38 to 0 blitz, gaining 25 victory points and the gold medals by 3 victory points.

The winning team comprised Zatorski, Nowosadzki, Wojciech Gawel and Piotr Wiankowski.

Bridge is hugely popular in Poland.

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On the National Day of Action to Stop Wage Theft:

• Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ) raised $7,383 toward its efforts to stop wage theft;
• In Memphis, the Workers Interfaith Network released the results of a survey it conducted of local low-wage workers, 68 percent of whom reported not being paid for all the hours they’d worked;
• In Chicago, four Polish workers each owed over $10,000 by a contractor¹, together with religious leaders and organizers with the Arise Chicago Worker Center, announced a lawsuit for back wages at one of the contractor’s current work sites;
• A rally and press conference were held at the Wisconsin State Capitol in Madison, workers and members of the clergy joined with the Workers’ Rights Center to demand both state and federal government measures to combat wage theft;
• IWJ, along with key allies (NDLON, NELP, AFL-CIO, Change to Win, SEIU), met with Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis and other top Department of Labor officials about increasing enforcement and outreach efforts in the department’s Wage and Hour Division and OSHA; and
• In New York, the Department of Labor announced the results of a sweep of restaurants in the tony Park Slope neighborhood in Brooklyn.

From The Brooklyn Paper: Slopers in guilt trap as restaurants shortchange deliverymen

First, Park Slope residents had to feel bad about eating non-organic food and having a high carbon footprint. Now, they even have to confront their liberal guilt when ordering in.

Last week, the state Labor Department claimed that 25 Slope restaurants underpaid their mostly immigrant workers as little as $2.75 per hour – a charge that has left Park Slope reeling, as customers struggle to reconcile their political sympathies with their appetites.

Much-loved stalwarts such as Aunt Suzie’s, and Taqueria, plus others including Bogota, Sette, Coco Roco, Olive Vine, Uncle Moe’s and Bagel World were caught in the dragnet, which included fines and negotiated settlements that stemmed from more than $910,000 in allegedly underpaid wages.

“Wage theft happens not only in dimly lit factories or grim depressed neighborhoods,” state Labor Commissioner Patricia Smith said in a statement. “Even our very nicest neighborhoods sometimes have sweatshops on their main streets.”

…

Still, all of the workers who spoke with The Brooklyn Paper bore no ill will toward their employers – in fact, they were grateful for the money.

“The boss looks for ways to help people, actually. Here we are fine,” one employee who wished to remain anonymous said in Spanish.

A typical response from undocumented workers. They are afraid to cry foul because the boss will immediately turn them over to Immigration. The workers live in fear and are thankful for the work. Their employers know the situations and purposefully exploit these folks. Its happened over and over, from Polish immigrants forced to visit the company stores of West Virginia and Pennsylvania to the well off neighborhoods in the cities and suburbs of today.

The workers weren’t upset, but in Park Slope, where buying a Fair Trade heirloom tomato that costs $2.50 is a badge of honor, many were shocked to find that they were benefitting from a system propped up on cheap labor.

“In this community, this happens?” said Sheri Saltzberg, a 35-year resident of the neighborhood. “It makes me question how those restaurants treat their staff.”

Others were disappointed that their favorite restaurants had been accused of such abuses.

“I was sad because those were places I had gone to,” said David Chorlian, a member of the Park Slope Food Co-Op. “One of them was Miriam’s and another was Aunt Susie’s. I was stupidly surprised that this happened.”

David, Wait till you see the two business owners responses at the end. They don’t give a **** for your sentiment or your country.

Most of the fines were the result of excessive workweeks at salaries below the minimum wage. But roughly half of the underpaid wages were allegedly at two restaurants: Coco Roco and Olive Vine.

The eateries were cited for underpaying their workers a whopping $587,000. In one example, food deliverymen were paid a meager $210 for a 70-hour workweek. The two restaurants’ abuses were so excessive, in fact, that the Labor Department expanded its search to two other locations of both eateries, a spokesperson said.

…

Still, owners who did agree to talk bristled at the notion that they were abusing their workers.

Martin Medina, the owner of Rachel’s on Fifth Avenue between Seventh and Eight streets, insisted he treated his workers fairly and that they did not work excessive hours. Instead, he likened Labor Department inspectors to “meter maids” who bully small business owners and never leave without levying a fine.

“They say I’m not paying overtime or giving lunch breaks, it’s a total lie!” said a fuming Medina. “If I was treating my workers bad, why would they stay with me?”

Because at a minimum they are your indentured servants and live in fear of what you will do if they speak up. Why don’t you point your indignation at the fact that you broke the law.

Indeed, some restaurants ended up on the list for seemingly minor infractions.

Melissa Murphy, owner of Sweet Melissa Patisserie said that her bakery cafe underpaid its workers by just $382 over two years. She attributed the mistake to clerical error.

Minor or not, even tiny amounts of money are a big deal to immigrant workers.

“A lot of people with low skill levels don’t have a lot of job options,” said Terri Gerstein, a deputy commissioner with the Department of Labor. “They’ll stay in a bad situation for fear of complaining or retaliation from the government.”

Exactly.

Some Slope residents are talking boycott, including, of course, workers at the Food Co-op.
“People are actively minded here,” Danielle Leon, who was shopping at the co-op said. “They [might] boycott these restaurants.”

But most owners seem more concerned with their profit margins than their tarnished reputations. Irene LoRe, the owner of Aunt Suzie’s, which allegedly underpaid its workers $10,196, even testified against a bill requiring paid sick days for workers.

…

In the end, it’s unlikely that boycott talk will take hold, added renowned restaurateur Alan Harding, best known for the now-closed Patois and the still humming Pacifico. Despite all the righteous chatter, customers are just like the restaurant owners – always trying to save a buck, he said.

“There is this ‘Oh woe is the deliveryman’ idea, but God forbid the turkey burger goes up $2 to reflect the required worker’s insurance and fair wage,” Harding said.

And it’s not as though cheap, hard-working labor is just going to disappear. As such, Medina said he would fight the fines to the bitter end.

“The immigrants I love,” he said. “It’s the Americans I hate.”

Now for the irony… Mr. Medina who owns Rachel’s Taqueria is the son of immigrants, from Mexico. He’s livin’ the American dream by pushing down on immigrants (his own people – I looove you, but be my slave) and cursing the people of the country that’s given him every opportunity. Mr. Medina, return to Mexico and push your taco stand around Mexico City. We’ll see how far you get. The Mexican meter maids will put you away for a long time…

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Our ancestors came here, the golden shores of America, their grandchildren and great-grandchildren are heading out. From USA Today: More U.S. job hunters look for work in other countries

Here’s one way to deal with the brutal U.S. job market: Leave the country.

With the nation’s unemployment rate at a 26-year-high of 10.2%, more Americans are hunting for, and landing, work overseas, according to staffing companies and executive search firms.

Jeff Joerres, CEO of Manpower, the No. 1 U.S. staffing company, says about 500 clients are seeking jobs abroad, up from a few dozen six months ago.

“It suddenly looks like there may be better opportunities outside the U.S.,” Joerres says. “It is a phenomenon we haven’t had before.”

While the number of globe-trotting job candidates is still relatively small, the trend reverses a longtime pattern of far more foreign workers seeking jobs in the U.S., Joerres says.

Fifty-four percent of executives said they’d be likely or highly likely to accept a foreign post, according to a survey of 114 executives Friday by talent management company Korn/Ferry. Just 37% of those surveyed in 2005 said they’d go abroad.

The hottest international job markets include India, China, Brazil, Dubai and Singapore, recruiters say. International companies are largely seeking candidates in engineering, computer technology, manufacturing, investment banking and consulting.

…

Steve Watson, chairman of executive search firm Stanton Chase International, says he recently sought a CEO for a Dubai manufacturer, and “three or four people quickly raised their hands. I do not think we would have had that two years ago.”

After completing his junior year at Georgia Institute of Technology, Charles Wang, an industrial engineering major, worked as a project manager for United Parcel Service in Dubai from July 2008 until last May. His task: develop a delivery system for the Arab state’s first-ever network of streets and addresses. After graduating next month, he plans to return to Dubai for a permanent job.

It’s “because of … my inability to find good jobs in the U.S.,” says Wang, 22, adding he’ll stay in Dubai until the U.S. job market is “back to normal.”

At MIT’s Sloan School of Management, 24% of 2009 graduates got jobs overseas, up from 19% last year. It’s “tied to the (U.S.) economy,” says career development head Jackie Wilbur.

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