Campaign News

Después de que miles de electores acudieron en masa a Washington DC para detener a los republicanos en su intento de derogar la ley de atención médica, pensamos que habíamos ganado cuando los republicanos del Congreso pusieron fin a la propuesta Cassidy-Graham.

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YOUTH ‘LOBBY DAY’ LOOKS TO DISCIPLINE GUIDELINES: More than 100 young activists are expected to gather in front of the Education Department today and call on Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to maintain Obama-era guidelines aimed at addressing racial bias in school discipline policies. DeVos is chairing a White House school safety commission that’s considering whether to rescind the guidelines over concerns that they burden school districts and potentially keep violent students in the classroom. The activists are also expected to visit the offices of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), urging them to sign a pledge and “prohibit federal funding for any school policing or criminalization of schools and invest in restorative justice, and mental health supports and resources for schools, students, and families,” according to a release. The “youth-led lobby day” is being organized by left-leaning groups including the Center for Popular Democracy, Make the Road New York and the Urban Youth Collaborative.

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Top progressive groups — including MoveOn and the Daily Kos — are taking on the Democratic establishment’s “undemocratic” superdelegate system in a fight that threatens to disrupt the party’s national convention next week in Philadelphia.

A coalition of 14 left-wing organizations announced Thursday that 50 members of the DNC Rules Committee have co-sponsored an amendment filed shortly before midnight Thursday to end the practice of awarding superdelegate status to top officials, lawmakers and other insiders.

The proposal threatens to force the party’s hand on an issue that has dogged Democrats throughout the primary season, driven by supporters of Sen. Bernard Sanders, Hillary Clinton’s chief rival for the presidential nomination.

Leading the fight is Rhode Island state Rep. Aaron Regunberg, a member of the DNC Rules Committee, who said Thursday that the campaign to reform the system is “catching fire.”

“Superdelegates disempower voters, they are less diverse than our overall delegates, and they are wildly unpopular,” Mr. Regunberg said in a statement. “The time has come to end the archaic and undemocratic superdelegate system once and for all — and that starts Saturday in Philadelphia.”

The skirmish has the potential to sully the image of party unity that Democrats hope to convey in contrast to the infighting that has characterized the Republican National Convention, which wrapped up Thursday night.

 The Democrats will gather Monday through Thursday at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia.

Mrs. Clinton’s commanding lead with superdelegates was a sore point throughout the primary race with Sanders voters, who accused the Democratic establishment of using superdelegates to tip the scales for the former secretary of state.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, has defended the system, which was instituted in 1982 to serve as a moderating influence on the presidential nominating process after disastrous defeats in 1972 and 1980.

The congresswoman from Florida has argued that the 712 superdelegates, who make up about 15 percent of total delegates, are free to change their minds about candidates and that the setup improves the convention’s racial balance.

The Congressional Black Caucus is staunchly opposed to abolishing the system, arguing in a letter last month to party leaders that the practice allows elected officials to avoid the “burdensome necessity of competing against constituents” for slots.

Even so, critics of superdelegates insist that the preference system benefits white men. A Pew Research Center study released May 5 found that 58 percent of this year’s Democratic superdelegates are men and 62 percent are white, while only 20 percent are black and 11 percent are Hispanic.

“We have always been the party of the hard-working, the voiceless, and the downtrodden; but by upholding the special privileges of superdelegates, we are betraying the people we fight for to service an unjust, archaic, and anti-democratic institution,” Maine state Rep. Diane Russell said in a statement.

Despite their egalitarian image, Democrats have far more superdelegates than do Republicans. The Republican Party’s 168 superdelegates, about 7 percent of the total, are bound to vote in accordance with the majority of delegates in their states.

The Associated Press estimates that 602 superdelegates have thrown their support behind Mrs. Clinton, compared with 48 for Mr. Sanders. Mrs. Clinton also has 2,205 pledged delegates for a total of 2,807, more than the 2,383 needed to secure the presidential nomination.

Organizers said the proposed amendment has won support from backers of both Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Sanders. Other leading Democrats who have expressed support for reform include House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.

One reason: The measure is not retroactive, meaning it will not affect the outcome of this year’s contest.

The 50 members co-sponsoring the amendment represent more than 25 percent of the 187-member committee, a critical threshold under the rules.

If at least 25 percent of those members follow up by voting Saturday in favor of the amendment, the panel will be required to issue a “minority report” and bring the issue to the convention floor, organizers said.

A letter to the Democratic National Committee posted this week on the EndSuperdelegates.com website gathered nearly 125,000 signatures in less than 48 hours in support of reform.

“The superdelegate system is unrepresentative, contradicts the purported values of the party and its members, and reduces the party’s moral authority,” said the letter.

The 14 groups involved in the campaign are Courage Campaign, Credo, Daily Kos, Demand Progress, Democracy for America, the Center for Popular Democracy, MoveOn, National Nurses United, NDN, The Other 98%, Presente.org, Progressive Change Campaign Committee, Progressive Democrats of America, and Social Security Works.

By VALERIE RICHARDSON 

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Al Jazeera - December 3, 2013, by E. Tammy Kim - Adjacent to its lofty, glass-faced midtown headquarters, Bank of America operates a humble retail location for individuals and small businesses. The branch serves many customers who work in the Bank of America Tower —secretaries and tech support, analysts and executives. One such patron, a former investment banker raised by struggling immigrants but schooled in the Ivy League, recalled the disconnect between his sky-high office and the retail branch. “I wondered if they feel inferior,” he said of the bank tellers, who likely earned a fifth of his salary.

While employed by the same entity, retail bank workers are worlds apart from those in corporate or high finance. Yet for giant universal banks like Bank of America and Citibank, comprising retail, commercial and investment banking divisions — a model made possible by the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999 — the branch locations are a critical point of contact with ordinary Americans. And according to a new advocacy campaign, the underpaid workers in these branches may be the key to a more accountable banking system.

Today, kicking off a week of protests against big banks, the New Day New York Coalition will release a report documenting historic levels of inequality in Wall Street’s hometown. The paper reveals that the top 1 percent of income earners take home 40 percent of New York’s total income and that the city’s financial sector was responsible for approximately 45 percent of job losses (affecting some 26,000 workers) in the first half of this year. While bank CEOs receive astronomical compensation — JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon made $21 million in 2012 — 39 percent of bank tellers in New York State had to rely on public assistance to stay afloat.

Low pay, professional veneer

Ryan Filson, a 38-year-old assistant branch manager in New York, started out as a bank teller when he was 18. “The money I made back then is the same that they’re paying tellers now to start: $10! And the workload is so different. Tellers have a harder job today than I ever saw,” he said, referring to time-intensive verification practices for checks and deposits.

In 2010 the national median salary for tellers was $24,100, or just over $11 per hour. But tellers and other retail staff are often required to purchase suits and look the part of professional workers. They also face pressure to meet stringent quotas for referrals and sales of checking and savings accounts, credit cards, loans and mortgages while cultivating relationships with their customers.

“The three women (tellers) I work with all receive public assistance,” Filson said. (He asked that his real name not be used.) “I was shocked. (The head teller) shows up for work on time, she has a great personality, she works hard. (With welfare), you have the image of someone lazy collecting a check, so for me, that was eye opening.”

On the corporate side, back-office personnel are paid meager hourly wages, are routinely outsourced and subcontracted and are segregated from analysts and investment bankers in the same company. Large banks often treat support departments as a drain on resources rather than a crucial part of the business.

According to subcontracted back-office workers at a prominent New York bank, clerical, security and technology staff are paid $12 per hour, though their predecessors — direct employees of the corporation before a massive restructuring — were paid $16 to $20 per hour. In the third quarter of this year, the same bank reported earnings of nearly $1 billion. (Those interviewed asked that neither they nor their employer be identified.)

The money I made back then is the same that they’re paying tellers now to start: $10! 

Bank workers also cite job security and whistle-blower protections as pressing concerns. Twice in the recent past, Filson was subject to what he sees as retaliation for reporting suspicious transactions under the Bank Secrecy Act, a law meant to combat money laundering. The first time, his superiors transferred him to a different branch; the second time, his complaint was circulated widely.

“It made me think that during the mortgage crisis, there were probably people who saw things that didn’t seem quite right,” Filson said. “But even if they complained, it probably wouldn’t have gone anywhere.”

Representatives of Wells Fargo and Bank of America would not respond to specific questions, and JPMorgan Chase and the American Bankers Association were unavailable for comment. But Bank of America spokeswoman Tara A. Burke told Al Jazeera in an email, “We work with each employee to support their career development and offer competitive compensation and benefits for employees. We also value their feedback and opinions and routinely create opportunities for ongoing dialogue.” Burke would neither confirm nor deny that entry-level tellers are paid $10 per hour, a rate advertised in the Wall Street Oasis Company Database. 

A trade union for bankers?

In countries such as South Africa, Australia and Argentina, employees of banks and insurance companies have pursued better pay and conditions through trade unions. The idea has floated around U.S. activist circles in recent years as well and may now be gaining real traction.

The Brazilian union CUT (Unified Workers’ Central) has provided seed money for organizing efforts in New York City, Miami and Orlando, home to Banco do Brasil branches and call centers. (Brazilian unions have also supported American automotive workers.) CUT president Vagner Freitas explained this transnational strategy at a union convention in September, saying, “We don’t have the bank workers in the U.S. organized, so we can’t organize workers around the world. A lot of them are in the U.S., and they have a great role to play.”

The Committee for Better Banks, which includes the Communication Workers of America union and the nonprofit Alliance for a Greater New York, has started reaching out to bank employees in the New York City area. By organizing a critical mass of retail and back-office workers, the campaign hopes to improve sector conditions and put people’s faces behind calls for accountability.

A finance-workers’ union could force employers to pay higher wages, empower tellers to refuse to sell high-interest credit cards and protect accountants who blow the whistle on creative bookkeeping — without fear of retaliation. The collective-bargaining process, moreover, would require banks to open their books to the union.

More than 500,000 employees in financial services worldwide have lost their jobs since 2008.

“We want to create a (banking) system that’s sustainable in the long term. We need to have an actor that can make an intervention in society, and trade unions are an important actor to do that,” said Marcio Monzane, a former bank teller who now heads UNI Finance, a Brussels-based international union with 237 finance- and insurance-sector affiliates representing 3 million workers. UNI estimates that more than 500,000 employees in financial services worldwide have lost their jobs since 2008.

Despite the apparent message of recent settlements in the U.S. — $13 billion to be paid by JPMorgan Chase and $404 million by Bank of America — the big banks have, by and large, denied legal responsibility for the ongoing financial crisis. And a recent report on the finance sector by the Economist Intelligence Unit found that executives continue to prioritize profits and “career progression” over reputation and “adherence to ethical standards.” 

Organizers behind the New York City effort are sober about the challenges ahead. “We want the campaign to develop further before commenting,” a representative of the Communication Workers of America wrote in an email.

Retail workers, investment bankers, hedge-fund analysts and Wall Street activists interviewed for this story were skeptical about the viability and direct impact of a finance union on industry practices. But many acknowledged the campaign’s political potential — its ability to rally the American public behind low-wage bank workers, as with janitors, security guards and now fast-food and Walmart employees.

Part of the difficulty in holding Wall Street accountable, experts say, is the scale and complexity of the global financial machine. By keeping the focus on low-wage bank workers, organizers aim to cut this machine down to size.

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