The Animation Guild, IATSE Local 839, also known as The Animation Guild, or TAG is a professional guild and union of animation artists, writers and technicians. The full name of the organization is The Animation Guild and Affiliated Optical Electronic and Graphic Arts, Local 839 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts of the United States, its Territories and Canada, American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations/Canadian Labour Congress.
Joseph Kishore is an American Marxist and writer who has been active in the Trotskyist movement since 1999. He is the National Secretary of the Socialist Equality Party (SEP) and a writer for the World Socialist Web Site.
This chart shows historical information on the salaries that members of the United States Congress have been paid. The Government Ethics Reform Act of 1989 provides for an automatic increase in salary each year as a cost of living adjustment that reflects the employment cost index. Since 2010 Congress has annually voted not to accept the increase, keeping it at the same nominal amount since 2009. The Twenty-seventh Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in 1992, prohibits any law affecting compensation from taking effect until after the next election.
The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is a broad tent, democratic socialist political organization in the United States. After the Socialist Party of America (SPA) transformed into Social Democrats, USA, Michael Harrington formed the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC). The DSOC later merged with the New American Movement (NAM) to form the DSA. The organization is headquartered in New York City and has about 80,000 members. It leads organizing and protest campaigns, and has members in the House of Representatives, state legislatures, and other local offices.
Maya D. Wiley is an American lawyer, professor, and civil rights activist. She has served as president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights since May 2022. Wiley served as counsel to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio. She chaired the Civilian Complaint Review Board (CCRB) from 2016 to 2017. She was an MSNBC legal analyst from August 2018 to January 2021. Wiley ran in the 2021 New York City Democratic mayoral primary, placing third.
The 2018 United States House of Representatives elections in New York were held November 6, 2018 to elect a U.S. Representative from each of New York's 27 congressional districts. The elections coincided with the gubernatorial election, as well as an election to the United States Senate and various state and local elections.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, also known by her initials AOC, is an American left-wing politician and activist. She has served as the U.S. representative for New York's 14th congressional district since 2019, as a member of the Democratic Party.
Saikat Chakrabarti is a political advisor, left-wing activist, and software engineer. He was formerly chief of staff to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the U.S. representative from New York's 14th congressional district representing portions of The Bronx and Queens in New York City.
Rachel Lears is an American independent documentary filmmaker. She is the director of Knock Down the House (2019), a documentary film about four women running for Congress in the 2018 midterms, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The film premiered at Sundance Film Festival in January 2019 and was sold to Netflix for $10 million, releasing on May 1, 2019. Her other documentaries include The Hand That Feeds (2014), about undocumented immigrant workers in a labor dispute with owners at a Manhattan bakery café, and To the End (2022), about climate change.
The 2019 General Motors strike began September 15, 2019, with the walkout of 48,000 United Automobile Workers from some 50 plants in the United States. Demands by workers included increased job security, gateway for temporary workers to become permanent, better pay and retaining healthcare benefits.
Some warehouse workers of Amazon, the largest American e-commerce retailer with 750,000 employees, have organized for workplace improvements in light of the company's scrutinized labor practices and stance against unions. Worker actions have included work stoppages and have won concessions including increased pay, safety precautions, and time off. There are unionized Amazon workers in both the United States and Europe.
The 2018 New York's 14th congressional district election was held on Tuesday, November 6, 2018. The primaries for New York's federal elections were held earlier in the year on June 26. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defeated incumbent congressman Joe Crowley in the primary, and went on to defeat Republican opponent Anthony Pappas in the general election.
A tech union is a trade union for tech workers typically employed in high tech or information and communications technology sectors. Due to the evolving nature of technology and work, different government agencies have conflicting definitions for who is a tech worker. Most definitions include computer scientists, people working in IT, telecommunications, media and video gaming. Broader definitions include all workers required for a tech company to operate, including on-site service staff, contractors, and platform economy workers.
The Campaign to Organize Digital Employees or CODE-CWA is a project launched by the Communications Workers of America to unionize tech and video game workers in January 2020. It sprung out of conversations with Game Workers Unite (GWU) and employed at least two full time staff, including GWU co-founder Emma Kinema and veteran SEIU organizer Wes McEnany. In 2022, Jessica Gonzalez joined, a former Activision Blizzard QA tester.
The New York Times Guild is the union of New York Times editorial, media, and tech professional workers, represented by NewsGuild since 1940. As of March 2022, the Times Tech Guild, is the largest tech union with collective bargaining rights in the United States.
Jaz Brisack is an American barista. They're also known for leading unionizing efforts at Starbucks, namely at a Buffalo, New York store.
Microsoft recognizes 7 trade unions representing 1,750 workers in the United States at its video game subsidiaries Activision Blizzard and ZeniMax Media since 2022. There is an ongoing union petition at Bethesda Game Studios in Canada. Microsoft South Korea recognizes its union since 2017. German employees have elected Works Councils since 1998.
Dear White Staffers is an anonymous Instagram account that documents instances of alleged poor behavior by sitting members of the United States Congress, in their capacity as employers of congressional staff. The account was created in 2020, primarily to post memes about being a person of color in the disproportionately white environment of congressional staffing. Two years later, however, a single thread shifted the account's focus towards documenting poor treatment of congressional staffers in general, and significantly increased the popularity of the account overall.
The 2023 United Auto Workers strike was a labor strike involving automobile workers in the labor union United Auto Workers (UAW) and the three unionized automakers in the United States—Ford Motor Company, General Motors, and Stellantis. These three automakers' factories combined employ about 145,000 UAW members and produce about 50 percent of the vehicles manufactured annually in the US, accounting for 1.5 percent of US GDP. The strike began on September 15, 2023, when the union was unable to reach a deal with the three automakers. It was the first trilateral strike against the three automakers in the union's history.
The subscription music streaming service Spotify employs 7,500 employees globally as of December 2023. Spotify recognizes trade unions at its US podcasting subsidiaries Ringer and Spotify Studios since 2019. In Germany a Works Council exists since 2023. Swedish trade unions are unsuccessful in collective bargaining with Spotify since 2023.
