I am blessed with a fantastic mom, a model of love and family. Growing up, my sister and I were lucky to have a mom who was able and chose to stay at home. While I didn’t truly appreciate all my mom did and sacrificed for us until I became an adult, I always knew she loved us unconditionally and her family meant everything to her.

Fast forward to today. I’m a single mom of a beautiful 11-year-old daughter. The basic desires of a mother have not changed.  We moms want the best for our families, and we will always sacrifice for the benefit of our children.  Unfortunately, today's economic realities mean that many mothers—including myself—must now work outside the home.

Over the years, I’ve have been truly fortunate to have held jobs that always included paid sick days.However, there have been instances in the past where an employer made me feel guilty for using a sick day to care for my sick daughter or ailing parent. Worse still, I’ve watched as friends struggle with the realities sending a sick child to school or leaving them home alone because if they don’t work, they don’t get paid (or worse yet, are fearful of losing their job). 

As a society we must realize that mothers should not have to make the choice between caring for family or ourselves and losing pay or a even our jobs.  In the spirit of Mother’s Day, please support the campaign for paid sick days and share your concerns with our elected officials. Check out our work on Paid Sick Days, and join us in working on this core employment standard.

Allison Zidek is Interfaith Worker Justice's bookkeeper and a single mother of a daughter who occasionally visits IWJ's national office and lifts the spirits of all on staff. Allison is involved in Girl Scouts and her PTA.

The nation’s middle class has been shrinking over the past three decades because of “misguided policies” in Washington making it harder to remain in or to enter the middle class, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) said on the monthly Faith Advocates for Jobs call May 10.

Harkin, who chairs the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, introduced the Rebuild America Act—a comprehensive bill that creates jobs and rebuild the economy. The bill would modernize the nation’s infrastructure creating millions of new jobs, expand manufacturing, provide more job training for workers and strengthen economic security for working people.

The bill also would raise the minimum wage, require paid sick days and expand overtime pay coverage, three of the top priorities for FAJ and IWJ.

Jen Kern, minimum wage coordinator for the National Employment Law Project (NELP) said raising the minimum wage is critical to reviving the economy because low-wage workers would spend the increase. The economy needs an increase in consumer spending, she said.

Kern said 18 states and D.C. have raised the minimum wage above the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour and seven states have eliminated the paltry $2.13 minimum wage for tip workers (like waiters and parking lot attendants). NELP is organizing the latest research, media coverage and campaign news on action to raise the minimum wage.

Both Harkin and Kern urged those concerned about creating good jobs to make their voices heard, especially in an election year. Responding to a caller’s question, Harkin urged people of faith to attend congressional town hall meetings and make sure their representatives know that people are watching to see what they do to create jobs. He called on the faith community to include issues on jobs in congregations’ newsletters and group discussions.

 “Let’s link our arms together and make our society more fair and more just for all,” Harkin said. 

Check out a fact sheet on the Rebuild America Act.

Last weekend, IWJ national staff and six affiliated worker centers joined more than 1,500 labor advocates at Labor Notes’ annual conference. 

Labor Notes produces a monthly magazine and holds a conference each year filled with rank-and-file members, local union leaders and labor activists who gather to talk about the labor movement.  Arise Chicago Worker Center director Adam Kader was on the planning committee for the conference. 

IWJ staff visited workshops and and met with allies in the worker movement. Three affiliated worker centers led workshops including Arise Chicago, Centro de Trabajadores Unidos en la Lucha and New Labor.

New Labor was recognized for their work with temporary warehouse workers in New Jersey. They were honored with the “Troublemakers Award” along with three other groups from across the country working with warehouse workers.

Learn more about New Labor’s work with warehouse workers.

The Madison Worker’s Rights Center served as workshop interpreters. Members of the worker center also interpreters with the Interpreters Co-op of Madison.

Cincinnati Interfaith Worker Justice Center and Portland Worker's Center in Portland, Maine also attended the conference.

Conferences like Labor Notes provide time and space for the IWJ affiliated network to meet and discuss in person critical issues to their work at the local level and through a national lens. The workshops offer insight and guidance to current campaigns and strategies.

Visit our worker center network site for more information on the campaigns IWJ affiliates are working on in their communities, and get in touch with them to join us as we build this movement.

Yesterday, I joined hundreds of others in protest and we marched to the Federal Plaza from Union Park in Chicago for May Day.  With chants, music, signs, noisemakers and raindrops, we let our presence be known.  The birthplace of May Day was honored with several folks representing various community organizations, labor unions in solidarity with Occupy Chicago.

May Day commemorates the anniversary of May 1, 1886, when the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions, the predecessor of the American Federation of Labor, began a movement for the eight-hour day. Chicago with its strong labor movement had the nation's largest demonstration on Saturday, May 1, 1886, when reportedly 80,000 workers marched up Michigan Avenue arm-in-arm carrying their union banners, according Illinois Labor History Society.

However, on May 4th in continued demonstration, a bomb was thrown into the crowd, killing four civilians, seven policemen and wounding many. This event later became known as the Haymarket Massacre.

As we marched past where this horrific incident occurred we were greeted with military helicopters and cops on foot, on horses and on bikes as we took the streets of the West Loop to the Loop.  Standing for ones’ rights can be dangerous, but the workplace should not be a dangerous place to be.  I was honored to be amongst those who continue to fight for labor rights.

The action was a great reminder that we need to work at advancing the rights of working people, and that together as allies and advocates we can call for change. Support the work of IWJ today.

Toma Lynn Smith is IWJ's new Individual Outreach Coordinator and part of the development team. Toma participated in Chicago's May Day events with Arise Chicago, an IWJ affiliate, and other community organizations. 

Today, IWJ Worker Center Network affiliates are participating in a variety of actions for International Worker Day. These events will address important issues in local communities, like our friends in Ithaca, N.Y. working to raise the minimum wage there, or our friends in Los Angeles seeking legalization of undocumented immigrants in Los Angeles.

What began as the struggle for an eight hour work day in the U.S. in the 1880s in Chicago, May Day has grown to symbolize a day to celebrate solidarity across ethnic, racial, religious and gender boundaries all around the world. In 2006 hundreds of thousands of immigrants took the streets to demand legalization and their place within the fold of the American mainstream. Today the 99 percent movement in cities across this country are leading mass marches and rallies with labor unions, immigrant advocacy groups, faith communities and worker centers to demand a more fair economy.

Find out more about what IWJ affiliated worker centers are doing for May Day.

Joe Hopkins is IWJ's Worker Center Network Assistant and a US-2 missionary with the United Methodist Church.

A reflection on Wednesday's action at General Electric's shareholders meeting in Detroit by IWJ's Executive Director Kim Bobo.

I was prepared to get arrested yesterday, but those in leadership decided we would peacefully disrupt (and not do civil disobedience at) General Electric’s shareholders meeting in Detroit. And so we did.

We waited for almost three hours for the meeting to begin. We met at a staging area at 7 a.m. Organizers reminded and updated us going inside on "the plan.” I rode over to the Renaissance Center in the clergy van. Once parked, we joined hands and prayed in the parking lot before going inside. Two Detroit pastors were the designated speakers (preachers) for the inside group. The rest of us in our van were to surround the two pastors to delay their escorts out of the meeting.

We arrived at the meeting check in spot by 8:30 a.m., but they wouldn’t let us go through security until 9:00 a.m. I’m used to security guards — I go through O’Hare airport almost weekly, but this was ridiculous. There were guards and GE staffers everywhere. They confiscated cameras and cellphones, searched our bags, marched us through metal detectors and wanded us all over.

We were finally allowed into the actual meeting room around 9:30 a.m., and the entire front section was already filled up. Somewhere, there was another entrance regular folks weren’t told about.

What a symbol for life. Regular folks have to struggle through all this stuff and meanwhile those in power go through another door and get the front seats!

When the meeting officially opened, one of the pastors, with a serious preacher voice, started scolding the company about paying its fair share. After he was led out, another pastor stood up and began his sermonette. Once he was hauled away, we all chanted, "pay your fair share," and marched out. We were out the door in less than ten minutes.

Outside, there were nearly  1500 protestors and a ridiculous number of guards, police and mounted police. We marched around the building chanting. 

Did it matter? In the short-term, absolutely. Immediately after we left, GE’s treasurer defended its tax payment policies and pledged itself in favor of tax reform. There is awesome media coverage about corporations paying their fair share. In the long-term, the event will matter if we continue to use is to insist on programs, jobs, investments and tax policies that serve the 99 percent.

In the U.S., the rate of fatal work injuries has not decreased for the last three years, even though employers are required by law to provide a workplace free of known hazards. This week, we remember all those workers killed or injured in the workplace. 

 We will remember fallen workers like:

• Two 14-year-old girls were electrocuted in a field by a pivot irrigator in Tampico, Ill.
• Two brothers, 16 and 22, died from exposure to fumes in a confined space while working at a compost center in Lamont, Calif.
• In Illinois, two teenage boys, 14 and 19, suffocated when trapped 30 feet deep in corn; the teens were “walking down the corn” to make it flow while the machine was running.
• In Oklahoma, two 17-year-olds suffered leg amputations after they became caught in an inadequately guarded grain conveyor while cleaning out a grain storage structure.

This week, we will do as Mary Harris “Mother” Jones said, “pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living.”

Construction, transportation, warehousing, agriculture, forestry are some of the most dangerous industries. Most of the occupational fatalities are preventable due to:

• An employer’s negligence to establish effective controls
• Lack of proper training on how to perform the job
• Safe use of tools and equipment, and on health and safety; long working hours
• Employment of teenagers under 18 to perform hazardous jobs.

Interfaith Worker Justice offers OSHA funded workplace health and safety trainings during the year. Workers from around the country can know their workplace rights and train their coworkers.

The path to safer workplaces includes new regulations, stricter enforcement of existing regulations, and employers and employees training among other actions. 

Saturday, April 28, is International Workers Memorial Day, and unions, worker justice organizations, activists, religious groups and worker centers are organizing and participating in actions to continue the fight for safe workplaces. Join IWJ affiliates and allies this week!

Maria E. Gutierrez is Interfaith Worker Justice’s national Health and Safety Coordinator. She coordinates and leads IWJ’s OSHA funded workplace safety trainings. Contact Maria for information regarding IWJ's next health and safety training.

On Tuesday, Tax Day, I joined organizers and worker-members from Arise Chicago and hundreds of folks from Chicago at an action telling some of the biggest corporations it's time they pay their taxes, and demanding a fair tax system that works for everyone—not just the country's richest few.

Throughout the month, “Citizen Tax Enforcers” delivered over-sized tax bills to Bank of America, Boeing, Exelon, CME Group, General Electric, BMO Harris Bank and Sears. On Tuesday, I joined one of four delegations and went to BMO Harris to send a clear message that their tax dodging is immoral and unjust.  Corporations like BMO Harris Bank receive billions in state and federal tax breaks each year, while struggling Americans keep finding ways to pay their fair share.

“Some people we saw just walked into the post office and paid their taxes, and now they are going to say corporations did you pay your taxes like we did?” Shelly Ruzicka of Arise Chicago told a reporter on Tuesday.

The delegations then gathered outside the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and hundreds of Chicagoans demanded CME group and other big corporations pay their taxes, and their executives be held accountable.

Organizations across the country held similar actions.

Arise Chicago plans to send a group to General Electric’s shareholder meeting in Detroit on April 25. IWJ’s Kim Bobo plans to attend the meeting and deliver a letter from people of faith calling on GE pay their fair share of taxes.

You can sign the letter now! 

The Apostle Paul, in II Timothy 4:7 says, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.”   Rev. Addie Wyatt, who died in Chicago on March 28, 2012, left her mark on Chicago and the nation.

Born in Mississippi, Rev. Wyatt’s family moved to Chicago during the Great Depression.  As a teenager in 1941, she applied for a typing job in a meat-packing factory.  After being told that Black people need not apply for the office jobs, she went to work on the factory floor, where she earned more than she would have as a typist due to the union contract between Armour and United Packinghouse Workers. Rev. Wyatt jumped right into activism with the union and eventually became the President of her local in the 1950's.

At the same time that she was leading her union, she and her husband, Rev. Claude Wyatt, started the Vernon Park Church of God, initially operating out of a garage. In the 1960's, she became a prominent civil rights leader, actively supporting Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and helping him connect with the labor movement. 

In 1976, Rev. Wyatt became the first female international vice president in the history of her union, which eventually became the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW).  She was a founder of the Coalition of Labor Union Women and served on several national and state commissions on women and labor.    

I didn’t meet Rev. Wyatt until the early 1990's. Even though she had officially retired from the union in 1984, she was still active in labor struggles.  I don’t even remember how I first heard of her, but I immediately wanted to meet her. I was beginning to try to build ties between the religious community and the labor community and here was a woman who epitomized the connection between faith and work.  She was gracious and generous with her time and wisdom, helping me, a complete novice in the partnership work.  When we started Interfaith Worker Justice in 1996, Rev. Wyatt agreed to serve as an advisor to the organization.

Rev. Wyatt was truly a woman of God who used her gifts and talents to bring good news to the poor.  She stood for justice at work, in the church and in the community.  In 2005, when she was 81 years old, she gave a talk in which she declared, “although I’m hopping, I’m not stopping.”

As I think of her life and legacy, here are seven things she taught us:
 
1) When God calls, you must respond.   Rev. Wyatt had a sense of her own calling by God, but she truly believed that we all are called.   And when we are called, we have a choice whether or not to respond.  
 
2) Focus on what you can do, not what you can’t.   Rev. Wyatt did not waste time and energy focusing on what people might say she couldn’t do.  She focused entirely on what needed to be done and what she could do.  In the process, she broke down racial and gender barriers.
 
3) Standing for justice can be done kindly.   Rev. Wyatt fought against injustice, but she was always kind, gracious and poised.  She cared for people and her love for them showed through in how she dealt with them.  She showed love and kindness to those in power as well as those in struggle.   As a woman in leadership operating in both the religious and labor worlds, sectors often dominated by men, she demonstrated how to operate effectively and powerfully and yet distinctly in her own style.
 
4) Unions and religious organizations are key partners.  Rev. Wyatt talked about how people need the union in the workplace to achieve justice and fairness, but the church (and I’d say synagogue and mosque as well) to achieve wholeness and fulfillment in life.  She recognized the power and importance of both institutions working together.
 
5) Poetry and music can teach us lessons.   Rev. Wyatt was known for her singing and her use of poetic language.   She often quoted great poets or songs in her sermons and presentations.  She recognized the ability of poetry and music to reach to us in ways that traditional words cannot.
 
6) Strong family relationships enable powerful community work.  Rev. Wyatt and her husband Claude were married for 70 years.  They worked together and ministered together.  They had a beautiful home to which they regularly invited people.
 
7) Give generously of your time, especially to young people.  Rev. Wyatt gave willingly of her time, especially when asked to train or talk with young people.  Until her health prevented her, Rev. Wyatt would regularly meet with our seminary interns and talk about how her career had unfolded and offer advice for connecting faith and labor.
 
In recent years, Rev. Wyatt was appalled to see what was happening to workers and unions.  Unfortunately, she is no longer with us.  She fought the good fight, finished the race, and kept the faith.  Now it is our turn.  We must learn her lessons and jump into the fight. 

Indeed, we face a fight – a good fight – for the core values of justice and dignity in the workplace.  Let us remember Rev. Wyatt by following her path to justice.
 
 

Easter is the climax of the Church calendar in which Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus from the grave. Amid the traditional trappings of Easter egg hunts and potted lilies, it is easy for the faithful to forget the radical implications of this affirmation. To believe that on "the third day he rose from the dead" demands that the followers of Jesus trust that the power of his resurrection can transform our economic relations.

One must remember the political context of his death. He was executed by the Roman Empire as a public demonstration of torture because he claimed to be an alternative 'Lord' to the Caesar. They had reason to be afraid because of his message and his methods. He preached about economic equality and the redistribution of wealth. And he put his preaching into practice when he staged an act of civil disobedience in the Temple attacking the money changers. This set in motion the plot to kill him.

His resurrection is a triumph over the political and economic forces which crucified him. To be sure, there is more to the Easter message than just economic liberation, but it can never be truncated to spiritual renewal or eternal life. The resurrection is the power of God to overcome all the forces of death and to give hope for every dimension of our lives.

This Easter, Christians celebrate the victory of Christ over the forces of injustice and oppression. The power to confront evil and to sustain one's commitment to the struggle for workers' rights comes from the Spirit of the Risen Carpenter. The hymn 'The Strive Is O'er, the Battle Done' says, 'The powers of death have done their worst, but Christ their legions hath dispersed; let shouts of holy joy outburst: Alleluia!' When we work for justice in the workplace we are shouting holy joy for the Messiah who has dispersed the powers of oppression.

The Rev. Darren Cushman Wood is the Senior Minister of Speedway United Methodist Church and President of IWJ's Board of Directors.