Guest Post — The PLOS Union 

PLOS staff are unionizing. How its leadership responds is a test of its vision for inclusive publishing.

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It’s Pat

Wednesday briefing: Inside the marking boycott that has thrown university students’ futures into the air

In today’s newsletter: A stalemate between lecturers and universities has left thousands of exams and dissertations ungraded – what’s the dispute about, and how might it end?

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Good morning. Finishing the last exam of your degree course should be one of the happiest moments of a student’s career. The stress of finals is over, the hard work has paid off. Graduation beckons and, beyond that, the next exciting stage of life.

But for tens of thousands this summer, the reality is proving very different. A marking boycott by the union representing many UK university lecturers means that tests are being left ungraded and dissertations unassessed.

Net zero | The government’s plans to hit net zero have been criticised in a report by its own advisers that warns targets are being missed on nearly every front. Lord Deben, outgoing chair of the CCC, said the UK had “lost the leadership” on climate action shown at Cop26 in 2021 and done “a number of things” that were “utterly unacceptable”.

Julian Sands | A body that was discovered in the wilderness near Mount Baldy in California on Saturday has been confirmed to be that of the missing British actor Julian Sands. San Bernardino county sheriff’s department had been coordinating a search for the actor who was reported missing on 13 January.

Health | Senior doctors in England have voted to go on strike over pay for the first time in nearly 50 years. Hospital consultants will strike for two days on 20 July, which will bring major disruption to services that have already had to reschedule 651,000 appointments since a wave of NHS strikes began last December.

Covid | Matt Hancock has said he is “profoundly sorry” for his part in mistakes that meant the UK was not properly prepared for Covid. He told the Covid public inquiry that he had not properly challenged assurances that sufficient planning was in place.

UK economy | The UK’s largest mobile and broadband companies have been accused of fuelling “greedflation” after pushing through the biggest round of price hikes for more than 30 years. Six companies controlling most of the telecoms market all charged a 3.9% supplement on top of their annual inflation-linked increases this year, meaning millions of customers have faced mid-contract price increases of up to 17.3%.

Marking boycott may delay degrees of more than 1,000 Durham students

University says about 20% of final-year students will face delays if industrial action continues

More than 1,000 final year students at Durham University could be left without a degree this summer because of the marking boycott disrupting universities across the UK.

Durham, one of 145 universities affected by the industrial action over pay and working conditions called by the University and College Union (UCU), said about 20% of its 5,300 final year students would “at the moment, face delays in receiving all their marks and final classifications”.

Third of UK final-year students face grades delay due to marking boycott

Small number could attend graduation but later be told they have failed as pay dispute affects assessments at 145 universities

Tens of thousands of university students are being left in limbo without their final degree results this summer, including some who could attend graduation ceremonies only to be told later that they have failed.

About a third of the UK’s 500,000 final-year undergraduates are thought to have been affected by the marking and assessment boycott at 145 universities, part of the pay dispute between the University and College Union (UCU) and employers that has strained relations between staff, students and management.

Busting the “Paid What You’re Worth” Myth You’ve probably heard...

Busting the “Paid What You’re Worth” Myth 

You’ve probably heard that everyone is “paid what they’re worth.” Don’t buy it.

According to this mythology, workers at the bottom are “unskilled” and don’t deserve more than what they currently earn.

Minimum wage workers at McDonald’s are paid what they are worth in the so-called “free market.” If they were worth more, they’d earn more.

By the same logic, the CEO of McDonald’s is worth his multi-million dollar compensation package.

The notion that people are paid what they’re “worth” is by now so deeply ingrained in the public consciousness that many who earn very little assume it’s their own fault that they don’t earn more. That they simply lack the skills they need to be paid more.

But there’s no such thing as unskilled workers. Only underpaid workers. Their productivity — that is the value of what they produce — has been growing for decades. The problem is that their wages haven’t kept pace with their productivity.

The “paid what you’re worth” mythology also lures the unsuspecting into thinking nothing can be done to change what people are paid. It’s simply the way the market works.

Meanwhile, according to this same view, CEOs who rake in tens of millions and Wall Street traders who rake in hundreds of millions, are simply being paid what they’re “worth” because that’s what the market has dictated.

Rubbish. The “paid what you’re worth” fairytale ignores power and disregards policies that have made inequality skyrocket. Like the demise of antitrust enforcement, which has given big corporations the power to set prices, make record profits, and reward their CEOs unprecedented compensation. This fairytale ignores the attacks on labor unions that have reduced union membership from over a third of all private-sector workers in the 1950s to just 6 percent today. All of this resulting in a massive shift in power and wealth from workers to owners.

Those at the top justify their staggering wealth, and they’re “worth,” three ways:

The first is trickle-down economics. They claim that their wealth trickles down to everyone else as they invest it and create jobs. Just wait for it… But as we know, wealth at the top has soared for decades and nothing has trickled down.

The second is the “free market.” They talk about market forces beyond their control. But remember, markets are created by rules. These rules don’t exist in nature; they are human creations. The political power of the wealthy has let them change the rules for their own benefit — busting unions, monopolizing industries, and reaping big tax cuts.

The third is the idea that they’re superior human beings. Sure, they may be talented but this doesn’t justify the staggering amount of wealth they are now taking home. Nor does it justify the amount of wealth they will pass down to heirs. The biggest intergenerational transfer of wealth in history will occur over the next 25 years as the richest 1.5% of Americans hand down roughly some $36 trillion dollars to their children and grandchildren. That doesn’t make those heirs superior. It makes them lucky.

The reality is there’s no justification for today’s extraordinary concentration of wealth at the very top. Or for how little people are paid at the bottom.

The “paid what you’re worth” myth has proven to be a cruelly effective way to put the blame on workers for not getting ahead — while giving the rich and powerful cover to rig the game for their own benefit.

It is distorting our politics, rigging our markets, and granting unprecedented power to a handful of people while millions of Americans struggle to get by.

Don’t fall for it.

Split City

Michigan offers real hope — and a roadmap back to democracy and common sense

Staff at 150 UK universities begin three days of strikes

Industrial action going ahead despite hopes of breakthrough on pay, conditions and pensions last week

Universities in the UK have been hit by strike action once again, despite hopes of a breakthrough last week with an offer from employers on pay, working conditions and pensions.

Tens of thousands of staff at 150 universities pressed ahead with planned strikes on Monday in the first of three days of industrial action this week, with many branches claiming big turnouts on picket lines.

UK university staff make breakthrough in strike dispute with employers

Unions and UCEA declare agreement ‘on terms of reference for detailed negotiations’ on pay and conditions

University staff have made a breakthrough in their months-long dispute with employers during which lecturers have gone on strike, worked to rule and refused to cover for absent colleagues across the UK.

A group of five higher education trade unions and the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) announced agreement “on terms of reference for detailed negotiations covering a review of the UK higher education pay spine, workload, contract types and equality pay gaps”.

After a marking boycott, the university threatened to withhold our pay. That only made us angrier | Tanzil Chowdhury

The disdain shown to us by Queen Mary University of London inspired me to redouble my efforts on the picket lines. Staff and students have had enough

On 29 June 2022, all the staff at Queen Mary University of London, where I work, received an email from management. To our horror, they were threatening to withhold 100% of our pay for 21 days of both July and August, because we were participating in a marking boycott over pensions, pay, labour precarity, inequality and working conditions. Life in the higher education sector had been getting tougher ever since I started my career in 2017. But at that moment, I not only resolved to continue to strike, but redoubled my efforts to get as many colleagues as possible to join me on the picket lines. The condescension from my employers made me feel something stark and visceral.

I hadn’t always felt so jaded. I finished my PhD in law in 2016 and was ready to begin a life of service in education and research, working in the subject I cared passionately about. But several things quickly became clear. There was the increasing precarity of university labour: one-third of academics are on fixed-term contracts, 41% are on hourly paid contracts and there are still 29 institutions employing at least five academic staff on zero-hours contract. In 2021, it was reported that pay had been cut by 20% in real-terms over the past 12 years, while changes to the pension scheme mean that we’ve taken a 35% cut to our guaranteed retirement income despite contributing more. Meanwhile, university and college staff are doing the equivalent of two days’ unpaid work every week on average. It’s an environment that leaves me feeling, like many others, disillusioned and questioning my future.

Dr Tanzil Chowdhury is a lecturer at Queen Mary University of London.

Workers at trading card marketplace TCGplayer form eBay's first union

The workers at eBay-owned TCGplayer, a marketplace for trading card games such as Magic: The Gathering, have voted in favor of joining a union. eBay purchased the company in 2022 for a deal valued up to $295 million, but the website continues to operate independently. Now that all 272 non-supervisory workers at the company's authentication center in Syracuse, New York are represented by the Communications Workers of America, they've become the first group to form a union at eBay in the US. 

The organized workers, who are responsible for ensuring the accuracy and quality of all shipments in and out of the company, filed for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board back in January. They wanted to unionize in a bid to have a voice within the company, and they were also seeking pay raises to account for inflation, a fair and comprehensive sick leave and absence policy, as well as inclusive career advancement opportunities, fair and transparent hiring practices, and clearly defined job roles and expectations.

In the CWA's announcement of the union victory, it said TCGPlayer workers first tried to unionize in 2020. However, the company hired a union buster to "spread disinformation," and the workers ultimately withdrew their petition for a vote due to the pandemic. While they were successful this time around, their employer reportedly tried to get them to back down again. CWA filed an unfair labor practice charge against the company in January for illegally surveilling union activity. It filed more charges just last week, accusing the company of threatening workers for supporting unionization efforts and forcing them to attend anti-union meetings, as well. The unionized workers are still waiting for the NLRB's decision on those complaints.

Playing trading card game

Building Community and Trust During a Graduate Student Strike

Strikes by university staff called off after pay breakthrough

Move follows agreement from employers on lowest-paid workers and review of salary grades

Strikes by university staff over the next two weeks have been called off after a breakthrough in negotiations over pay, pensions and working conditions, unions have announced.

Five unions – Unison, UCU, GMB, Unite and EIS – issued a joint statement with the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) confirming three days of strikes will be suspended following talks at the conciliation service Acas, though discussions will continue.

University admin staff are burnt out too | Letter

It’s not just lecturers who are struggling with stress due to unrealistic workloads, says one reader

Re the University and College Union’s dispute (Work-life balance as important as pay, says university staff union, 10 February), there is always a focus on lecturers in articles about it. But the UCU is made up of more than lecturers. I am a burnt-out administrator, struggling to have my issues taken seriously by my university and by the country.

In the past year, I have been spread across three projects, all full-time roles in themselves, yet classified as only needing one or two days a week of work. All these were time-limited contracts. My contract is now permanent, but my job description is six pages long. It seems the universities now want blanket contracts so you’re on the hook for any work they want to dump on you. I have co-workers who are so snowed under with their workload that they’re afraid to strike lest they come back to an even larger mountain of work. I know many people in professional services jobs at the university who have been off sick with stress.

Work-life balance as important as pay, says university staff union

Six days into strike action, Jo Grady, UCU general secretary, demands end to ‘draining’ campus conditions

Striking university staff are determined to secure a deal that tackles burnout and makes their working lives more liveable, Jo Grady, general secretary of the University and Colleges Union (UCU) has insisted, ahead of talks at the independent Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas).

Speaking on the sixth day of coordinated strike action across the higher education sector, Grady told the Guardian that for the UCU and fellow higher education unions, the dispute has never been just about pay.

Ministers and unions dig in amid widespread strike action across UK

Little prospect of breakthrough as strikes hit schools, trains, universities and border posts

Unions and the government appear as far apart as ever after widespread strike action closed or partly closed more than half of schools across England and Wales.

Striking workers from participating unions held rallies in cities including Bristol, Brighton, Birmingham and London on Wednesday as teachers, university staff, rail workers and civil servants stopped work to demand better pay.

CWA files unfair labor practice charge against eBay's trading card subsidiary

The Communications Workers of America (CWA) has filed an unfair labor practice charge against eBay-owned TCGplayer on behalf of workers at the trading card marketplace. The organization says TCGplayer supervisors and managers, including founder and CEO Chedy Hampson, illegally surveilled union activity in recent weeks.

Workers at TCGplayer are trying to unionze and this week, a supermajority filed for a union representation election. If they're successful, they'll form TCG Union/CWA, which will be the first union within eBay.

The CWA claims that TCGplayer higher-ups have walked the floors of the company's authentication center in Syracuse, New York. It says the supervisors and managers were taking note of employees who wore clothing or badges that identified them as supporters of the union drive. "This conduct constitutes unlawful surveillance of union activity and further created an impression of surveillance designed to interfere with, restrain and coerce employees in the exercise of their rights guaranteed by Section 7 of the National Relations Labor Act," the CWA said in a statement.

The workers renewed their attempts to form a union after eBay bought TCGplayer late last year in a deal worth up to $295 million. They previously tried to organize in 2020, but withdrew their union election petition a few days before the vote. The CWA says that TCGplayer thwarted those efforts by bringing in a union-busting firm and running "an intense anti-union campaign where workers were regularly ordered to attend captive audience meetings and disparaged by management in company communications."

Engadget has contacted TCGplayer and eBay for comment.

Cards of the pokemon card collection of Jens Ishoey Prehn and his brother Per Ishoy Nielsen are displayed in Niva, eastern Denmark on November 25, 2022. - Jens Ishoey Prehn and his brother are included in the Guinness Book of Records for their pokemon collection. They have almost 35000 different pokemon cards. - Denmark OUT (Photo by Ida Marie Odgaard / Ritzau Scanpix / AFP) / Denmark OUT (Photo by IDA MARIE ODGAARD/Ritzau Scanpix/AFP via Getty Images)

The Republican Party’s Worst NightmareRepublicans have been...

The Republican Party’s Worst Nightmare

Republicans have been trying to crush unions for decades, but American workers are fighting back with a vengeance.

Many GOP leaders wink and nod while talking about “making America great again,” as if the country was more prosperous when they were in charge.

Rubbish.

Yes, there was a time when the American economy worked better for workers than it does now, but not because Republicans played any part in making it that way. And certainly not because of the bigotry, misogyny, and racism they’ve been peddling to pit workers against each other to distract them from how much wealth is being siphoned off to the top.

In fact, Republicans have been waging a relentless war against what had been one of the biggest drivers of prosperity for the working class — labor unions.

Now, it’s important to note that this prosperity wasn’t shared equally with women or people of color, but a big reason much of the workforce was better off decades ago than today is because of the power of labor unions to organize and fight for the rights and dignity of workers.

Republicans have fought labor unions tooth and nail. They’ve enacted deceptively named “right-to-work” laws, which are all about weakening unions rather than giving workers more rights. And they’ve voted against bills allowing workers to form unions with simple up or down majorities at the workplace.  

This is the great irony of the MAGA movement. And it would be funny if it weren’t so tragic. If Republicans really cared about American greatness, they would support unions — one of the major tools at our disposal to actually combat inequality and lift up the working class.

Fortunately — despite Republican efforts — labor unions are on the rise once more. And so are pro-labor Democratic politicians.

These Democrats won big in the 2022 midterms — especially in the rust belt. They captured the governorships of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Illinois, Minnesota, and also Michigan — where they flipped both chambers of the state legislature. The last time Democrats had full control of Michigan’s state government was in the 1980s.

And look at the impressive victory of John Fetterman — the new U.S. senator from Pennsylvania. He defeated a wealthy Republican snake oil salesman and flipped a senate seat, while running on an unabashedly pro-worker platform aiming to increase the federal minimum wage, end corporate price gouging, and make it easier for workers to organize unions at their workplaces.

It wasn’t just pro-worker politicians who won big during the midterms, but worker friendly ballot measures as well — almost universally opposed by Republicans.

Illinois voted to enshrine collective bargaining rights into its constitution, effectively banning right to work laws from ever being passed in the state.

Washington D.C. voted overwhelmingly to eliminate the subminimum wage for tipped workers.

Voters in Nebraska and Nevada chose to increase their state minimum wage.

Forced prison labor was outlawed in Vermont, Alabama, Tennessee, and Oregon.

Republicans, along with their rich and powerful patrons, have always feared that working people would recognize their collective power, both through unions and at the ballot box. So the wealthy are doing everything they can to hold working people down.

But the midterm elections and the resurgent worker power movement should give us hope that a more just and equitable United States will be built with union labor.

It’s not just about making America great — it’s about making America better. Not just a bigger economy but a fairer economy. Not just more wealth for the wealthy, but better and more secure lives for all.