The Worker Thread

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Vrede too
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Re: The Worker Thread

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O Really wrote:
Sun Jun 18, 2017 12:11 pm
I support the "persuader rule" but I don't think overall it's all that important. The article says, "Rescinding the persuader rule is a huge blow to workers’ abilities to negotiate for better treatment on the job by joining a union, and a huge blow to the democratic values of transparency in elections in America’s workplaces." The article does note that companies have employed "union busting" consultants for many years, which they have. It doesn't really make any difference in a campaign whether the employer-side propaganda is actually created by the employer or created by a paid consultant. The unions - and thus most employees - are well aware they're being fed mostly bullshit anyway.

It would be a much better help for employees attempting unionization if they made it easier to hold elections and increased enforcement of anti-retaliation law and stiffened penalties for unfair labor practices. As if, in this Administration.
You don't think that transparency in who's actually doing the anti-union campaigning will affect many worker votes? Could be.
O Really wrote:
Sun Jun 18, 2017 12:20 pm
Vrede too wrote:
Sun Jun 18, 2017 11:12 am
... Celine McNicholas, Labor Counsel

Kind of a female O Really, but playing for the other team....
As a side note, our firm does represent employers, but overall we're not anti-union. A large part of our revenue is in contract negotiation and management of the union relationship. We do also do some union avoidance work, but I don't know of anybody who's run a campaign for years, not that I know everybody, but still. Main reason for that, of course, is that there aren't many campaigns run and the percent of unionized employees in the private sector is down to around 10% or - from nearly half back in the 50's. And part of the reason for that is that a lot of unions haven't kept up with the changing workforce and are selling the wrong service.
I didn't mean to imply that you or your firm are anti-union or anti-worker, sorry. Representing employers is all I meant by "other team."
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Vrede too wrote:
Sun Jun 18, 2017 12:38 pm

You don't think that transparency in who's actually doing the anti-union campaigning will affect many worker votes? Could be.

Dunno. I'm not sure how it would, or for that matter which way the votes might be affected. If I'm an employee who is soundly pro- or anti- union, it's not going to make any difference. If I'm on the fence and somebody says "unions are baaaaad" and I find out that the writer/speaker/presentation creator is some hotshot consultant from Philadelphia, am I more or less like to call bullshit? I'll still know that it's the employer's message, whether they thought it up or paid for it. Now if the consultant is pretending to be neutral or otherwise presenting a false front, then yeah, I might be fooled.

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Re: The Worker Thread

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Vrede too wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:55 pm
rstrong wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:10 pm
While still protecting people from trolls who rely on "fight back and win, and you'll only be bankrupted anyway."

That's not how it works here. With our contingency system, small potential damage claims are already weeded out since lawyers won't take the case.
That's exactly how it works in the US. Patent, copyright and ADA trolls usually ARE lawyers. It keeps their costs to a minimum while they sue people in bulk - demanding pay-outs just low enough that giving in to the extortion is cheaper than fighting and winning. Those lawsuits never, ever reach a judgment in court. They get dropped if the defendant fights back...after racking up major legal fees.

Sure, you get cases like Prenda Law or the lawyer who claimed copyright on the word "stealth" in virtually every context eventually getting shut down by the courts. But only after they get REALLY greedy and break laws, and only after they've successfully extorted a lot of people.

It's reached the point where lawsuits are now a form of investment for venture capitalists. Fund litigation for a cut of the money. Like Peter Thiel funding Shiva Ayyadurai. Ayyadurai claims to have invented email, and despite how thoroughly documented his lie is, he sues anyone who says otherwise for defamation. He already won $750,000 from Gawker - not on the case's merits but through Gawker being bankrupted by Thiel's other lawsuits. Now they're suing Techdirt and others.

One bit of good news: Cloudfare is fighting back against one patent troll. Not just trying to invalidate their patents, but going after the lawyers themselves. Saying that the patent troll "is really just a law firm, rather than a tech company." Apparently that's a bit of a no-no.

But the really unusual no-no was that they went after a larger company like Cloudfare. Usually they won't go after say (real example) a company making the networked fax machines. They go after all the company's customers. Folks who are less likely to be able to afford to fight back.

It's not just IP and defamation. I watched a story a decade back - on 20/20 or a similar show - about a woman who had sued virtually everyone on her street (kids playing in the front yard lowers property values; the same goes for noise from them playing unseen in the back yard) and every company (tripping over a doorway or display stand, etc.) in her town. Being a lawyer she has only minor costs, and she could always drop a case if someone decided to bankrupt themselves on principle.
Vrede too wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:55 pm
Under your Rx, people that suffered real harm but with iffy legal claims that can only be settled with a judge sorting out the complexities will forego suing out of fear despite the fact that they would have won.
With "bogus lawsuits to extract settlements from those who can't afford to fight back" being a standard business model, what you describe is the lesser of two evils.
Vrede too wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:55 pm
Here's one example - As we know, zero Canadian banks had to be bailed out as a consequence of the Shrubcession thanks to superior Canadian regulation. It's a guess, but I assume that also means that far fewer people were people were hurt by Canadian banker greed, negligence and criminality. Why should US victims have a higher hurdle to get redress from our banks that did all those things?
Regulation is the answer. Get rid of the "wild west", anarcho-capitalism playing field. Anti-SLAPP laws are VERY successful, letting defendants obtain a ruling on whether the action against them is even valid, BEFORE bankrupting themselves with legal fees. And sometimes recover some of those fees.

Alas, only some states have anti-SLAPP laws. The trolls often have some choice regarding which state to litigate in.

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Re: The Worker Thread

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rstrong wrote:
Sun Jun 18, 2017 10:37 pm
Vrede too wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:55 pm
Under your Rx, people that suffered real harm but with iffy legal claims that can only be settled with a judge sorting out the complexities will forego suing out of fear despite the fact that they would have won.
With "bogus lawsuits to extract settlements from those who can't afford to fight back" being a standard business model, what you describe is the lesser of two evils.

How have you calculated that?
Vrede too wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:55 pm
Here's one example - As we know, zero Canadian banks had to be bailed out as a consequence of the Shrubcession thanks to superior Canadian regulation. It's a guess, but I assume that also means that far fewer people were people were hurt by Canadian banker greed, negligence and criminality. Why should US victims have a higher hurdle to get redress from our banks that did all those things?
Regulation is the answer....
That's what I've said from the beginning. Without it, you've chosen to make the poor and vulnerable even more vulnerable. Don't put the cart before the horse.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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The Economic Policy Institute
Minimum Wage Tracker


The federal minimum wage has not been raised since 2009. In the absence of action at the national level, many states and localities have raised their own minimum wages. Explore the map to see how these rapidly changing laws differ across the country, and read EPI’s recent research explaining the benefits of raising the minimum wage and eliminating the subminimum wage for tipped workers. As of July 3, 2017
NC, TN and SC, but not FL, are at the bottom of the pack. :roll:
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Florida put in a minimum wage indexed to the CPI year ago (2005) It was pre-Scott and before the Republican coup. I'm quite sure it would never get through now. But to his credit, it was during Mini-Bush's term. Still, it's only $8.10 now - not much better than Fed min.

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Re: The Worker Thread

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Not nearly enough, but an extra $1700 or so per year probably means a lot to those folks. C'mon, it's rare that I find reason to give FL any credit at all. :D
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Always be yourself! Unless you can be a goat, then always be a goat.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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rstrong wrote:
Sun Jun 18, 2017 10:37 pm
Vrede too wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:55 pm
rstrong wrote:
Mon May 29, 2017 12:10 pm
While still protecting people from trolls who rely on "fight back and win, and you'll only be bankrupted anyway."

That's not how it works here. With our contingency system, small potential damage claims are already weeded out since lawyers won't take the case.
That's exactly how it works in the US. Patent, copyright and ADA trolls usually ARE lawyers. It keeps their costs to a minimum while they sue people in bulk - demanding pay-outs just low enough that giving in to the extortion is cheaper than fighting and winning. Those lawsuits never, ever reach a judgment in court. They get dropped if the defendant fights back...after racking up major legal fees.
Oh, hey. One such troll just lost in court. Sort of.
Shipping & Transit asserted its patents against businesses that simply sent email to customers with a tracking number. In other cases, it has sued municipal transport agencies and logistics companies.
They've sued more than 490 companies over the years. Keeping the settlement fee under $50,000, so that it wouldn't be worth fighting in court. (You could win, but it'll still cost you more to get that win.) If anyone decided to fight, Shipping & Transit would get the case dismissed and simply walk away. AFTER the victim racked up heavy legal bills.
...so it is unsurprising that the vast majority of accused infringers choose to settle early rather than expend the resources required to show a court that the Patents-in-Suit fail under § 101. When the few challenges do occur, however, they are promptly met with voluntary dismissals with prejudice, as in this case.
But this time was finally different. The judge noted that their patents would never stand up to a legal challenge. And that they were legal trolling with cut & run tactics. So he made them pay the victim's legal fees.

So.... victory?

Well, because they dismissed the case yet again, the validity of their patent still didn't make it to court. So they can keep on suing new victims by the hundreds.

Win some (1), lose some (490+).

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Re: The Worker Thread

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I'll bet that someone with IT skills could mess with Shipping & Transit . . . if you know anyone like that. :evil:

Sounds like we need a law that targets regular abusers.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Vrede too wrote:
Wed Jul 12, 2017 7:42 pm
I'll bet that someone with IT skills could mess with Shipping & Transit . . . if you know anyone like that. :evil:
They may not have anything to mess with. Patent trolls tend not to do or invent anything. They exist only to rack up out-of-court settlements.
Vrede too wrote:
Wed Jul 12, 2017 7:42 pm
Sounds like we need a law that targets regular abusers.
You'd have to ask the legal community for that. You know, the community that makes money both on the trolling and defending against the trolling.

'It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.'
- Upton Sinclair


As for the government, as the article notes, "...we've seen in countless troll operations, lawsuits that are challenged often result in plaintiffs dismissing suits in hopes of avoiding paying the winning parties' legal fees. (The government does this as well in asset forfeiture cases.)"

Good luck with that.

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Re: The Worker Thread

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So, if their electronic devices implode, they've got nothing. ;)

I guess it depends on how many businesses are victims or are worried about being victims for there to be any hope for change.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Ivanka Trump clothes are made by women in sweatshops. Macy's should drop them.

Tell Macy's:

Stop promoting the Trump White House and remove Ivanka Trump clothing from your stores.
Always be yourself! Unless you can be a goat, then always be a goat.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Another year of congressional inaction has further eroded the federal minimum wage

... at its high point in 1968, the federal minimum wage was equal to $9.90 in today’s dollars. That means that workers at the minimum wage today ($7.25) are paid roughly 27 percent less than their counterparts almost 50 years ago.

... if the minimum wage had been raised since 1968 at the same growth rate as average wages of typical U.S. workers, it would be $11.62 today....

Prior to 1968, the federal minimum wage was raised at roughly the same pace as growth in labor productivity—i.e., the rate at which the average worker can produce income from each hour of work. This makes sense—if the economy as a whole can produce more income per hour of work, it means there’s capacity for wages across the distribution to grow at a similar rate. Had the minimum wage risen at the same pace as productivity after 1968, it would be over $19 per hour ($19.33, see graph) today....
Instead, almost all of that wealth - $2.65, $4.37 or $12.08 per hour - has been redistributed to the fat cats.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Always be yourself! Unless you can be a goat, then always be a goat.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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I don't know for sure who is right and wrong here, but this is another case where the plaintiffs and their lawyer were ordered to pay the costs for those they sued:

Parents of Kendrick Johnson ordered to pay attorney fees in gym mat death lawsuit

I'm fine with that if the plaintiffs' actions were egregious, just not making it blanket policy.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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If the story had been "...FBI agent Rick Bell, father of Brian and Branden, along with Lowndes County’s school superintendent and a former sheriff, rolled Kendrick’s body in the gym mat and devised a plan to make his death look like an accident," considering where it occurred (Valdosta), it might have been believable, but with no evidence to support the claim and conflicting evidence on cause of death from the investigation, it's pretty wild. When I saw the headline, I thought their lawsuit would be against the manufacturer of the mat for not having emergency unrolling devices or something, or maybe the school for storing it improperly and unsafely. Might have had a better chance with those than a community-wide conspiracy theory.

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Re: The Worker Thread

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Yeah, I have no real reason to doubt the LEOs and judge, though it is a pretty bizarre accident. I mostly posted about it because of our earlier discussion re frivolous lawsuits and the power judges already have to penalize the frivolous.
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Re: The Worker Thread

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Bizarre, yes, but bizarre accidents happen all the time. What would be even more bizarre would be a giant conspiracy involving a couple of kids, and FBI agent, a school superintendent and a sheriff, plus two more kids to "find" the victim. Even in Valdosta, even if the victim is a black kid, that's pretty unbelievable.

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Re: The Worker Thread

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You know more about the case, and Valdosta, GA ;) , than I do.

I've seen the results of lots of bizarre accidents. One of my favorites was the guy who gave himself a really good cut needing sutures while opening a brand new first aid kit. I told him that he really should leave healthcare to the professionals. :D
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