Evelyn Reynolds

More stories

  • 113 Shares109 Views

    in Economy

    Supreme Court Backs Employer in Suit Over Strike Losses

    The justices ruled that federal labor law did not block state courts from ruling on a case regarding damage caused when workers walked off the job.The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that federal labor law did not protect a union from potential liability for damage that arose during a strike, and that a state court should resolve questions of liability.The majority found that if accusations by an employer are true, actions during a strike by a local Teamsters union were not even arguably protected by federal law because the union took “affirmative steps to endanger” the employer’s property “rather than reasonable precautions to mitigate that risk.” It asked the state court to decide the merits of the accusations.The opinion, written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, was joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Brett M. Kavanaugh.Three conservative justices backed more sweeping concurring opinions. A single justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented.Some legal experts had said a union setback in the case would discourage workers from striking by making the union potentially liable for losses that an employer incurred during a work stoppage.“It will definitely lead to more expensive-to-resolve lawsuits against labor unions,” said Charlotte Garden, a law professor at the University of Minnesota who was an author of a brief in support of the union. Professor Garden did note, however, that the decision was less far-reaching in discouraging strike activity than it could have been.Others have argued that the ruling was necessary to prevent workers from intentionally harming an employer’s property, an act not protected by federal labor law, and that such restrictions do not jeopardize the right to strike.“Damages from intentional destruction of property are not inherent to the act of striking,” said Michael O’Neill of the Landmark Legal Foundation, a conservative legal advocacy group that submitted a brief in the case. As a result, Mr. O’Neill said, the law does not shield workers or unions from liability for such damage.The case, Glacier Northwest v. International Brotherhood of Teamsters, No. 21-1449, involved unionized employees of a concrete mixing and pouring company who walked off the job during contract negotiations, leaving wet concrete in their trucks. The employer argued that it suffered substantial monetary losses because the abandoned concrete was unusable.The union argued that it had taken reasonable steps to avoid harming the employer’s property, as federal law requires, because workers kept their trucks running as they walked off the job. That allowed the company to dispose of the concrete without damage to the trucks. The union said the lost concrete amounted to the spoilage of a product, for which unions were not typically held liable.At issue were two key questions. The first was procedural: whether the case should be allowed to go forward in state court, as employers generally prefer. The alternative is that the state court — in this case, Washington — should step aside in favor of the National Labor Relations Board, the federal agency responsible for resolving labor disputes.The second question was about what economic damage is acceptable during a strike, and what amounts to vandalism — which federal labor law does not protect — of property or equipment.The two issues are linked because under legal precedent, the labor board is supposed to elbow aside state courts when the alleged actions during the strike are at least “arguably protected” by federal law.The Supreme Court ruled that the union’s actions, as alleged by the employer, were not arguably protected because the spoilage of the product was not merely an indirect result of the strike. Instead, the employer contended in a lawsuit, “the drivers prompted the creation of the perishable product” and then waited until the concrete was inside the trucks before walking off the job.“In so doing, they not only destroyed the concrete but also put Glacier’s trucks in harm’s way,” the majority opinion said. It sent the case back to Washington State court to be litigated.Sean M. O’Brien, the president of the Teamsters, issued a defiant statement after the decision was announced. “The Teamsters will strike any employer, when necessary, no matter their size or the depth of their pockets,” he said.The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said the court “got it right” in ruling that federal law “does not pre-empt state tort claims against a union for intentional destruction of an employer’s property during a labor dispute.”In a concurring opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas agreed that the Washington State court should be allowed to take up the case. He wrote that in a future case, the Supreme Court should reconsider whether the National Labor Relations Board should have such wide latitude to take the first pass in such cases.Justice Jackson noted in her dissent that the labor board had issued its own complaint since the case was first filed in Washington State. In issuing its complaint, the labor board’s general counsel found that the strike activity was in fact protected. This by definition meant that the activity was “arguably protected,” Justice Jackson wrote, requiring the state court to stand down.The decision, which some experts said could cause unions to reconsider striking or take a more cautious approach when a perishable product could be harmed, followed a series of rulings that appeared to scale back the power of unions and workers.The court ruled in 2018 that companies could prohibit workers from collectively bringing legal actions against their employers, even though the National Labor Relations Act protects workers’ rights to engage in so-called concerted activities.In the same year, the court ruled that public-sector unions could no longer require nonmembers to pay fees that help fund bargaining and other activities that unions do on their behalf.In 2021, the court deemed unconstitutional a California regulation that gave unions access to agricultural employers’ property for recruitment.In interviews, union leaders said that the ruling on Thursday would further tilt an already uneven playing field toward employers, and that it was often not a strike itself but the threat of a strike that helped unions win concessions.“Without the threat of a strike, you have little leverage in negotiations,” said Stuart Appelbaum, the president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which has organized successful strikes.Mr. O’Neill’s group, the Landmark Legal Foundation, argued that a ruling against the employer could have jeopardized the labor peace that the National Labor Relations Act was enacted to assure, “placing workers and the public at risk” by essentially blessing acts of vandalism and sabotage.Unions and workers often deliberately plan strikes to exploit employers’ vulnerability — for example, Amazon workers walked out during the holiday season — and rely on an element of surprise to maximize the economic harm they inflict, and therefore the leverage the union gains.In the near term, unions that are contemplating strikes or already striking, such as unions representing Hollywood writers or United Parcel Service employees whose contract expires this summer, may have to take greater precautions to insulate themselves from legal liability.Such precautions will typically weaken the impact of strikes, said Ms. Garden, the University of Minnesota professor. “You could get unions prophylactically adopting less effective tactics — things like giving advance warning about strike, which gives the employer a lot more time to hire replacement workers,” she said.Other unions may simply decide not to strike at all out of fear of heightened legal exposure, she said.Further out, unions and their political allies may seek to enact legislation that explicitly exempts workers from liability for certain types of economic damage that arise during a strike.“There will be efforts in blue states to make the best of it, to do something protective,” said Sharon Block, a former Biden and Obama administration official who is a professor of practice at Harvard Law School.But even these laws could wind up being challenged before the Supreme Court, experts said.Adam Liptak More

  • 150 Shares179 Views

    in Economy

    Here’s what to watch out for in Friday’s jobs report for May

    Economists surveyed by Dow Jones expect job growth in May of 190,000, a slowdown from the 253,000 jobs added in April and the smallest gain since December 2020.
    The jobs count has beaten consensus estimates 13 of 16 times since January 2022.
    Wages are expected to increase 0.3% for the month and 4.4% from a year ago, a level that officials have said is not consistent with a return to 2% inflation.

    Construction workers on a job site on May 05, 2023 in Miami, Florida.
    Joe Raedle | Getty Images

    Watching the monthly jobs reports this year has been something of a waiting exercise, with economists and market participants looking for a downturn that never seems to arrive.
    That scenario is likely to recur Friday when the Labor Department releases its nonfarm payrolls count for May. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones expect job growth of 190,000, a slowdown from the 253,000 jobs added in April, below the 2023 monthly average of 284,500 and the lowest monthly gain since December 2020.

    But judging by the way these reports have been going, the risk is probably to the upside in a jobs market that has been nothing if not resilient. The jobs count has beaten consensus estimates 13 of 16 times since January 2022.
    “The labor market still looks tight. Job openings are very high, unemployment is at a 50-plus-year low. We’re expecting further job gains… actually a bit above consensus,” said Joseph LaVorgna, chief economist at SMBC Nikko Securities America. “I would tell people to focus on whatever the trend is.”
    For how much the headline numbers have been defying the market outlook, LaVorgna sees some underlying weakness.

    Total job openings edged higher in April to 10.1 million, but the pivotal leisure and hospitality industry actually registered a nearly 6% decline, according to Labor Department data released Wednesday. That could be bad news for a sector that has generated more than 900,000 jobs over the past year.
    Also, the April nonfarm payrolls report showed that job growth estimates for the prior two months were cut by 149,000, indicating that the picture from earlier this year hadn’t been quite as robust as initially indicated.

    “Right now, we’re getting close to an inflection point,” said LaVorgna, who was chief economist for the National Economic Council under former President Donald Trump. “I don’t think it’s going to happen in May, but given the amount of tightening in the economy that the Fed has engineered and given that lending standards have gotten more restrictive, the labor market should weaken. History tells us when it happens, it happens fast.”

    Defying the Fed

    The tight labor market and the pressure that has put on wages and inflation has bedeviled the Federal Reserve. The central bank has raised interest rates 10 times since March 22, only to see inflation stay well above the Fed’s 2% target.
    Policymakers, though, have signaled that they may be willing to skip hiking again when they meet later in June, as they look to see how all the policy tightening has impacted conditions.
    “A decision to hold our policy rate constant at a coming meeting should not be interpreted to mean that we have reached the peak rate for this cycle,” Fed Governor Philip Jefferson said in a speech Wednesday. “Indeed, skipping a rate hike at a coming meeting would allow the [rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee] to see more data before making decisions about the extent of additional policy firming.”
    One area policymakers will be focused on is average hourly earnings.
    Wages are expected to increase 0.3% for the month and 4.4% from a year ago, a level that officials have said is not consistent with a return to 2% inflation. However, May could bring some good news in that regard.

    A ‘fully staffed’ jobs market?

    Data from Homebase indicates wages for small- and medium-sized businesses declined 0.2% in May, the first monthly decline since 2021. That came even with a 0.64% increase in employees working and a 1.16% gain in hours worked.
    Payrolls processing firm ADP reported Wednesday that wages for workers who stayed at their jobs increased 6.5% in May, still high but a deceleration from previous months. ADP also said private payrolls expanded by a higher-than-expected 278,000 in May.
    A Fed report Wednesday noted that wages grew “modestly” which was in line with the rest of the observations the “Beige Book” had about the jobs economy.
    “Overall, the labor market continued to be strong, with contacts reporting difficulty finding workers across a wide range of skill levels and industries,” the report said, noting that some employers said “they were fully staffed, and some reported they were pausing hiring or reducing headcounts due to weaker actual or prospective demand or to greater uncertainty about the economic outlook.”
    The unemployment rate in May was expected to nudge higher to 3.5%, which would still be near the lowest level since 1969. More

  • 163 Shares169 Views

    in Economy

    Private payrolls rose by 278,000 in May, well ahead of expectations, ADP says

    Private sector employment increased by a seasonally adjusted 278,000 for the month, ahead of the Dow Jones estimate for 180,000, ADP reported.
    The ADP report noted that the distribution of job grains was “fragmented” as increases were concentrated in just a few industries.
    Salary growth is still strong showing signs of decelerating, the payroll processing firm said.

    The U.S. labor market posted another month of surprising strength in May as companies added jobs at a pace well above expectations, according to a report Thursday from payroll processing firm ADP.
    Private sector employment increased by a seasonally adjusted 278,000 for the month, ahead of the Dow Jones estimate for 180,000 and a bit lower than the downwardly revised 291,000 in April. May’s increase took the payroll growth so far in 2023 to 1.09 million.

    The ADP report noted that the distribution of job grains was “fragmented” for the month, as increases were concentrated in leisure and hospitality, which added 208,000 positions, and natural resources and mining, which saw a gain of 94,000.
    Construction added 64,000 jobs, but multiple other categories saw declines.
    For instance, manufacturing saw a drop of 48,000, financial activities lost 35,000 and education and health services was off by 29,000. Trade, transportation and utilities posted an increase of 32,000 while the other services category added 12,000.
    From a size perspective, companies with 500 or more workers lost 106,000 jobs. Small firms, with fewer than 50 workers, added 235,000 positions.
    One area of note for ADP was a slowdown in the pace of wage gains, with annual pay up a still-robust 6.5% in May but down from the 6.7% increase in April. Those switching jobs reported an annual increase of 12.1%, off a percentage point from the month before.

    “This is the second month we’ve seen a full percentage point decline in pay growth for job changers,” ADP chief economist Nela Richardson said. “Pay growth is slowing substantially, and wage-driven inflation may be less of a concern for the economy despite robust hiring.”
    The ADP count comes a day ahead of the Labor Department’s more closely watched nonfarm payrolls report, which is expected to show job growth of 190,000 in May following a gain of 253,000 in April.
    ADP’s report serves as a precursor to the government’s tally, though the two sometimes can differ considerably. The Labor Department said private payrolls rose by 230,000 in April.
    The payroll gains have come despite the Federal Reserve’s efforts to tackle inflation and slow the labor market through a series of interest rate increases. Central bank officials have said in recent days that they may be in favor of skipping another hike in June as they weigh the impact of policy tightening that began in March 2022.
    A separate report Thursday showed that initial filings for unemployment benefits were little changed last week.
    Jobless claims totaled 232,000 for the week ending May 27, up 2,000 from the previous week and slightly below the Dow Jones estimate for 235,000. Continuing claims edged higher as well to 1.795 million. More

  • 138 Shares139 Views

    in Economy

    House Set to Vote on Debt Ceiling Bill Amid Republican Resistance

    A bipartisan coalition was set to push through the compromise struck by Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Biden, even as lawmakers in both parties signaled their displeasure with the plan.The House on Wednesday was poised to push through legislation negotiated by President Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy to suspend the debt ceiling and set federal spending limits, as a bipartisan coalition lined up to cast a critical vote to pull the nation back from the brink of economic catastrophe.The bill would defer the federal debt limit for two years — allowing the government to borrow unlimited sums as necessary to pay its obligations — while imposing two years of spending caps and a string of policy changes that Republicans demanded in exchange for allowing the country to avoid a disastrous default. The vote, expected Wednesday night, was coming days before the nation was projected to exhaust its borrowing power, and after a marathon set of talks between White House negotiators and top House Republicans.With both far-right and hard-left lawmakers in revolt over the deal, congressional leaders cobbled together a coalition of Republicans and Democrats willing to drag the bill over the finish line, throwing their support behind the compromise in an effort to break the fiscal stalemate that has gripped Washington for weeks.It nearly collapsed on its way to the House floor, when hard-right Republicans sought to block its consideration, and in a suspenseful scene, Democrats waited several minutes before swooping in to supply their votes for a procedural measure that allowed the plan to move ahead.Representative Dan Bishop of North Carolina, along with other hard-right House Freedom Caucus members, tried to block the procedure to advance the debt deal to a vote on Wednesday.Haiyun Jiang for The New York TimesThe deal would suspend the $31.4 trillion borrowing limit until January 2025. It would cut federal spending by $1.5 trillion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office, by effectively freezing some funding that had been projected to increase next year and then limiting spending to 1 percent growth in 2025, which is considered a cut because it would be at a lower level than inflation. The legislation would also impose stricter work requirements for food stamps, claw back some funding for I.R.S. enforcement and unspent coronavirus relief money, speed the permitting of new energy projects and officially end Mr. Biden’s student loan repayment freeze.The compromise was structured with the aim of enticing votes from both parties, allowing Republicans to say that they succeeded in reducing some federal spending — even as funding for the military and veterans’ programs would continue to grow — while allowing Democrats to say they spared most domestic programs from significant cuts.Ahead of the series of votes on Wednesday, Mr. McCarthy urged his members to support the bill, framing it as a “small step putting us on the right track,” and promoting the spending cuts and work requirements Republicans won in the deal.“Everybody has a right to their own opinion,” he said. “But on history, I’d want to be here with this bill today.”In the Senate, both Democratic and Republican leaders said they would quickly take up the legislation and push to get the package to Mr. Biden as swiftly as possible, with Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, warning that lawmakers would need to approve the bill without changes to meet the June 5 deadline when the Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen has said the government would default without action by Congress.“I cannot stress enough that we have no margin for error,” Mr. Schumer said. “Either we proceed quickly and send this bipartisan agreement to the president’s desk or the federal government will default for the first time ever.”Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, warned that lawmakers would need to approve the bill without changes to meet a June 5 deadline to avert a default.Haiyun Jiang for The New York TimesPassage of the deal would be a major victory for Mr. McCarthy, a California Republican who faced a massive challenge in shepherding a debt-ceiling increase through a narrowly divided chamber populated by Republicans who have long refused to raise the borrowing limit. Few had expected that Mr. McCarthy would be able to unite his fractious conference around any such measure, much less one negotiated with Mr. Biden, without prompting an attempt by his right flank to oust him.As of Wednesday, no such effort had materialized, thought there still may be political consequences ahead for Mr. McCarthy. Representative Dan Bishop, Republican of North Carolina and a member of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus, has publicly said that he considered the debt and spending deal grounds for removing Mr. McCarthy from his post. Another member of the group, Representative Ken Buck, Republican of Colorado, told CNN that its members would have “discussions about whether” to try to oust him.“I’m not suggesting the votes are there to remove the speaker, but the speaker promised that we would operate at 2022 appropriations levels when he got the support to be speaker,” Mr. Buck said. “He’s now changed that to 2023 levels plus one percent. That’s a major change for a lot of people.”Under the rules House Republicans adopted at the beginning of the year that helped Mr. McCarthy become speaker, any single lawmaker could call for a snap vote to depose him, a move that would require a majority of the House.Hard-right lawmakers were nonetheless furious over the compromise, savaging the bill and Mr. McCarthy’s handling of the negotiations as a betrayal.“No one sent us here to borrow an additional $4 trillion to get absolutely nothing in return,” said Representative Chip Roy, Republican of Texas, who promised “a reckoning about what just occurred.”In a dramatic display of their displeasure, 29 conservative Republicans took the unusual step of breaking ranks on a procedural vote to take up the legislation, normally a formality that passes entirely along party lines.In a dramatic tableau on the House floor, as the Republican defections piled up, imperiling the deal, Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the minority leader, finally raised a green voting card in the air, signaling to fellow Democrats that it was time go ahead and bail Republicans out. A stream of centrist and veteran lawmakers — 52 in all — crowded into the well of the House and voted “yes,” rescuing the deal from collapse.After a pause on the floor when Republicans came up short on votes, Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the New York Democrat and minority leader, gave the assent to a group of Democrats to help move toward a vote on the deal.Kenny Holston/The New York TimesMr. Jeffries had gathered Democrats in the Capitol on Wednesday morning, along with top White House officials who had helped broker the deal, and urged them to back the compromise. He argued that Mr. Biden had successfully fended off the worst of Republicans’ demands, and reiterated that allowing the nation to default was not an option.“I made clear that I’m going to support legislation that is on the floor today,” Mr. Jeffries told reporters at a news conference after the meeting. “And I support it without hesitation or reservation or trepidation.”But progressive Democratics bristled at the package, and said they could not support new work requirements for safety net programs or incentivize Republicans from weaponizing the debt ceiling as a political cudgel.“Republicans need to own this vote,” said Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, who took particular aim at changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and a measure to expedite production of a gas pipeline. “This was their deal, this was their negotiations. They’re the ones trying to come in and cut SNAP, cut environmental protections, trying to ram through an oil pipeline through a community that does not want it.”“Republicans need to own this vote,” said Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, one of a group of Democrats displeased with Republican provisions in the bill.Kenny Holston/The New York Times“This has been a hostage situation,” Representative Greg Casar, Democrat of Texas, said. “We’re going to get out of the hostage situation. I appreciate the president negotiating down the ransom payment for the hostage. But I think it’s appropriate for progressives to say we never want to be in this situation again.”Adding to progressive discontent are provisions in the deal that claw back some unspent money from a previous pandemic relief bill, and reduce by $10 billion — to $70 billion from $80 billion — new enforcement funding for the I.R.S. to crack down on tax cheats. Other measures in the bill include a provision meant to speed the permitting of certain energy projects and a provision meant to force the president to find budget savings to offset the costs of a unilateral action, like forgiving student loans — though administration officials could circumvent that requirement.The deal also includes measures meant to avert a government shutdown later this year.Carl Hulse More

  • 100 Shares159 Views

    in Economy

    Job Openings Rose in April, Defying Cooling Trend

    After three consecutive months of declines, job openings jumped in April, reaching 10.1 million, the Labor Department reported on Wednesday.The surge signals that job opportunities are withstanding the economic pressures that have led many to believe that the American economy may soon enter a recession.At the same time, the report — known as JOLTS, or the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey — showed that the labor market was far less feverish than it was a year earlier.The quits rate — viewed as an indicator of how confident workers are in leaving a job and finding employment elsewhere — was 3 percent, seasonally adjusted, in April 2022. Since then, it has retreated to 2.4 percent, just above its prepandemic peak. And the hiring rate was unchanged from March, which was the lowest since December 2020.Layoffs, however, decreased again, showing that employers are hesitant to let go of employees brought on board during this recovery.A bagel shop in Brooklyn advertised that it had positions to fill.Earl Wilson/The New York TimesThe data complicates the interest-rate outlook.The jump in openings may put pressure on the Federal Reserve to take interest rates even higher.The statistical relationship between high job vacancies, as calculated by the government, and low unemployment has been frequently cited by the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome H. Powell, as a key sign of the labor market’s being “unsustainably hot” and “clearly out of balance, with demand for workers substantially exceeding the supply of available workers.”But even as some economists remain unsatisfied with the progress on subduing prices, others worry that reliance on job openings as a core measure of labor market balance may lead the Fed to keep the cost of borrowing for businesses and households too high for too long, prompting a harsher downturn than necessary.“The quits rate is nearly back to prepandemic levels, the hires rate has already reverted to prepandemic pace,” Skanda Amarnath, the executive director of Employ America, a nonprofit that supports tight labor markets, wrote in a note. “JOLTS data should not drastically color this broader assessment of labor market tightness but will matter at the margins for the Fed’s own perception of labor market heat.”Some question how much weight to give the report.After peaking at a record of around 12 million in March 2022, job openings as measured by the government have fallen overall. For the past year, a mix of strong hiring for positions that were already listed and a decline in business sentiment has led to a pullback in newly created listings. But the April uptick is at least a pause in recent trends.Some economists think the JOLTS report should be taken with a grain of salt. Gregory Daco, the chief economist at EY-Parthenon, said the bump in listings could reflect summer hiring in the rebounding service sector, though he added, “I’d want to see June before assuming that summer hiring is stronger than last year.”The report is based on a survey of about 21,000 nonfarm business and government establishments. The economic research team at Goldman Sachs has made the case that since the response rate to the JOLTS report has fallen sharply since the start of the pandemic, “these findings argue for currently treating JOLTS less like the ‘true’ level of job openings.”The May jobs report will be the next gauge.The May employment report, to be released by the Labor Department on Friday, will fill out the labor market picture before Fed policymakers meet on June 13 and 14.Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expect the data to show the addition of 195,000 jobs on a seasonally adjusted basis, down from 253,000 in the initial report for April. Unemployment, which was 3.4 percent in April — matching the lowest level since 1969 — is expected to rise to 3.5 percent, and the month-over-month increase in wages is expected to ease. More

  • 100 Shares109 Views

    in Economy

    Debt Ceiling Deal Would Reinstate Student Loan Payments

    The legislation would prevent President Biden from issuing another last-minute extension on the payments beyond the end of the summer.Follow for live updates as the House prepares for a vote on the debt limit deal.For millions of Americans with federal student loan debt, the payment holiday is about to end.Legislation to raise the debt ceiling and cut spending includes a provision that would require borrowers to begin repaying their loans again by the end of the summer after a yearslong pause imposed during the coronavirus pandemic.President Biden had already warned that the pause would end around the same time, but the legislation, if it passes in the coming days, would prevent him from issuing another last-minute extension, as he has already done several times.The end of the pause will affect millions of Americans who have taken out federal student loans to pay for college. Across the United States, 45 million people owe $1.6 trillion for such loans — more than Americans owe for any kind of consumer debt other than mortgages.The economic impact of the pandemic has faded since President Donald J. Trump first paused student loan payments in March 2020. Many Americans lost their jobs at the outset of the public health crisis, undercutting their ability to repay their loans on time. The number of jobs in the United States now exceeds prepandemic levels.Promoting the debt ceiling legislation over the weekend, Speaker Kevin McCarthy said on “Fox News Sunday” that it would end the pause on student loan payments “within 60 days of this being signed.”In fact, the legislation would follow the same timeline that the Biden administration had previously outlined, ending the pause on payments on Aug. 30 at the latest.A spokesman for Mr. McCarthy did not respond to an email seeking comment.Even with the pause ending, some borrowers may still see some relief if the Supreme Court allows Mr. Biden to move forward with a plan to forgive up to $20,000 in debt for some people with outstanding balances.Mr. Biden’s plan would cancel $10,000 of federal student loan debt for those who make under $125,000 a year. People who received Pell grants for low-income families could qualify for an additional $10,000 in debt cancellation.But the plan was challenged in court as an illegal use of executive authority, and during oral arguments in February, several justices appeared skeptical of the program. A ruling from the court could come at any time but is expected next month.White House officials have said repeatedly that they are confident in the legality of the president’s plan. But the debate about the plan, and the broader issue of student loans, has been fierce in Congress.Republicans have vowed to block the president’s plan if the courts do not. But they have so far failed to make good on that promise, despite repeated attempts.Last month, House Republicans passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling that would have blocked the student debt cancellation plan and ended the temporary pause on payments. That bill was shelved after negotiations began with the White House on the debt ceiling and spending cuts.Last week, the House passed a resolution that would use the Congressional Review Act to overturn the president’s debt cancellation plan. But the Senate has not taken up the measure, and Mr. Biden has said he would veto it.Instead, the compromise debt ceiling legislation now under consideration by lawmakers only requires ending the pause on payments — a move that the president had already said he would make. It would not block the debt cancellation plan.In addition, White House officials said the legislation would not deny the Biden administration the ability to pause student loan payments during a future emergency, as Republicans had sought to do.A spokesman for the White House said the president was pleased that Republicans had failed to block his debt cancellation plan in the debt ceiling legislation.“House Republicans weren’t able to take away a single penny of relief for the 40 million eligible borrowers, most of whom make less than $75,000 a year,” the spokesman, Abdullah Hasan, said. “The administration announced back in November that the current student loan payment pause would end this summer — this agreement makes no changes to that plan.” More

  • 75 Shares149 Views

    in Economy

    ‘We Have Fish, That’s Our Currency’

    Just before midnight, David O’Neill navigated his trawler into the harbor in Union Hall, a small port in southwestern Ireland, the wake from the vessel sending tiny waves slapping against the pier.The crew swiftly unloaded their catch, using a crane to lift ice-packed crates of haddock and hake from the hold of the Aquila under bright spotlights.Less than an hour later, the Aquila would depart for its final trip. Two days later, the crew stripped the vessel’s contents — chains, buoys, ropes, steel cables, and hooks — and ejected them onto the pier, on their way to a shipyard to be scrapped.“This is coming with me,” Mr. O’Neill said as he unscrewed the Aquila’s wooden steering wheel. “It reminds you of all you’ve been through on this boat.”Crew members removing the nets from the Aquila after the ship’s last voyage.“This is coming with me,” said David O’Neill, the skipper of the Aquila, as he unscrewed the vessel’s wooden steering wheel. “It reminds you of all you’ve been through on this boat.”The Aquila is one of dozens of Irish boats being scrapped as part of a voluntary government decommissioning plan introduced after Britain withdrew from the European Union, and transferred 25 percent of Europe’s fishing rights in British waters. That significantly limited Irish vessels in the numbers of fish they are allowed to catch — an anticipated annual loss of 43 million euros ($46 million), making Ireland one of the European nations most affected.Although fishing is a small industry in Ireland, in some coastal communities, it has been the backbone of the economy, even as it has been whittled down over the years. But beyond economics, fishing has been an essential way of life for generations. Locals fear the Brexit quotas and subsequent retiring of boats will be the final death knell. More

  • 100 Shares149 Views

    in Economy

    Remote Work Gives Amazon Workers a Common Cause

    At Amazon, warehouse workers have shown support for corporate colleagues, noting they have nothing to gain if office workers lose flexibility that the pandemic proved possible.Eric Deshawn Lerma felt waves of anxiety when he sat down to tally the new costs in his routine since Amazon’s return to the office this spring. There’s parking. There’s fuel. There’s lunch. They add up to at least $200 extra a month, all to support a policy whose justification he can’t fully understand — after three years in which he and his teammates have been doing their jobs from home.Still, when Mr. Lerma heard that some of his colleagues were organizing a walkout to protest the return-to-office policy, which asks employees to come in at least three days a week, he initially wavered on whether to participate. After all, he realizes that thousands of Amazon workers have no flexibility to work from home. Their jobs require them to go into warehouses to do physically taxing labor each day.“It really provided me with a sense of internal conflict about working from home being a luxury or a right,” said Mr. Lerma, 27, who is an executive assistant in Seattle and joined the company, where he feels he has grown personally and professionally, in 2022. “There are different rights and amenities afforded to my role.”He ultimately decided, though, that he would probably join virtually. “While warehouse workers have much harsher working conditions than I do,” he said, “I should still be able to reserve the right to protect my autonomy as an employee.”Thousands of corporate employees, across industries, who remain adamant that they do not want to return to the office are now confronting a tension: How do their demands compare with those of the millions of workers whose jobs have never permitted them the ease of remote work? And can a corporate employee’s advocacy be of use to workers, including those trying to unionize, outside the corporate sphere?This tension follows a pandemic that exacerbated the divide between white-collar workers who could do their jobs from the safety of their homes and workers who often could not and were exposed to higher Covid risks.Simultaneously, workers in both the corporate and noncorporate realms have re-evaluated their working conditions, quit their jobs in waves and called for higher wages, amid a tight labor market at one point called a “workers economy.” The unemployment rate this spring has remained low, at 3.4 percent, with wages rising.Most Amazon workers have been working at company facilities throughout the pandemic.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesAt Amazon, hundreds of corporate employees plan to walk off the job on Wednesday, for one hour during lunchtime, in protest of the company’s return-to-office rule, among other issues including layoffs and the company’s impact on the climate. Weeks earlier, employees voiced their frustrations with the R.T.O. policy in a Remote Advocacy channel, with over 30,000 members, on the Slack workplace messaging system.The company has more than 350,000 corporate and tech employees globally. More than 800 in Seattle and 1,600 globally have pledged to participate in the walkout. Some employees, particularly working parents, pin some of their frustration to the financial toll of returning to the office, especially the cost and pressures of child care.The vast majority of Amazon’s more than one million workers, including those who formed a union at a Staten Island warehouse, have been working in person throughout the pandemic.Apple, where employees issued open letters protesting in-person work, and at the Gap have encountered a similar dynamic. At Starbucks, more than 70 named employees, along with others who remained anonymous, released a petition this year urging the company to permit them to keep working remotely. Members of the union representing Starbucks baristas have been supportive of these corporate workers, even though most of the company’s roughly 250,000 U.S. employees, including those across more than 300 unionized stores, cannot work from home.Indeed, many workers in warehouses and stores have been quick to show support for their corporate colleagues, noting that they have nothing to gain from seeing office workers lose out on the flexibility that the pandemic proved was possible.“The work that we’re doing is in two separate fields,” said Anna Ortega, 23, who is active in Inland Empire Amazon Workers United, a group of warehouse workers, and has been working at an Amazon facility in San Bernardino, Calif., for almost two years. “It’s just showing us that Amazon has a problem with workers and listening to us.”Ms. Ortega spends her days lifting 50-pound packages — a task she could never do from home. But she said she supported the Amazon workers who were asking for the flexibility to keep working remotely.“If your employees are happy and are able to work productively from home, I think they would be able to bring better results,” Ms. Ortega said.An Amazon spokesman, Brad Glasser, said that the company respected “employees’ rights to express their opinions and peacefully assemble,” but that it had felt “good energy” since more employees returned to the office.Members of a union representing Starbucks store staff have offered support to corporate employees who petitioned in favor of remote work.Audra Melton for The New York TimesAt Starbucks, members of the union representing store workers have corresponded with corporate employees on Discord and other platforms, offering their support. And when corporate employees released their petition, they asked the company both to reverse its return-to-office policy and to allow free and fair union elections across stores.Jake Sklarew, 34, a software engineer at Starbucks who signed the petition, was frustrated by the return-to-office policy because during the pandemic he had bought a home in an affordable area, 30 miles from the office, thinking he’d be able to keep working remotely. Earlier in his career, when he worked in restaurants, he commuted as much as three hours a day, and he sees his current calls for fairer company policies as connected to the struggles of baristas demanding workplace respect.“The people that are working in stores, when you talk to them, they’re not asking for other people to have to work in person,” he said, adding that it wouldn’t make sense for Starbucks to end remote work for some just because not everyone can do it. “It feels to me like kind of an eye-for-an-eye situation: You’re not helping anyone — you’re just hurting everyone.”Starbucks has suggested that its policy, which requires its 3,750 corporate workers to come in three days a week, contains an element of equity for its employees, or “partners,” because “many partners didn’t have the privilege of working remotely.” But some union members have rejected this logic.To Sarah Pappin, 32, a Starbucks shift supervisor in Seattle, what corporate employees are asking for is directly related to what store employees are demanding, such as increased Covid safety protections.“Even jobs that you might think of as dream jobs can be exploited,” she said. “I think there is a growing understanding that we’re all workers.”But that sense of solidarity doesn’t erase the guilt that some office workers feel as they ask to hold on to the freedom of a workday in their living room. Many office workers have realized, too, all the advantages they have even in their organizing efforts.“We’re so much closer to leadership,” Mr. Lerma said. “I have access to a work-issued laptop that has provided me with the complete address book of everyone within Amazon. I have access to Slack, which can give me any contact I want. A warehouse employee doesn’t have that luxury.” More