As Federal Reserve Selects New Top Officials, Coalition Calls for Public Input
New York Times - November 10, 2014, by Binyamin Appelbaum - A coalition of community...
New York Times - November 10, 2014, by Binyamin Appelbaum - A coalition of community groups and labor unions wants the Federal Reserve to change the way some Fed officials are appointed, criticizing the existing process as secretive, undemocratic and dominated by banks and other large corporations.
In letters sent to Fed officials last week, the coalition called for the central bank to let the public participate in choosing new presidents for the regional reserve banks in Philadelphia and Dallas. The current heads of both banks plan to step down in the first half of 2015.
The Fed’s chairwoman, Janet L. Yellen, has agreed to meet on Friday with about three dozen representatives of the groups to hear their concerns.
“The Federal Reserve has huge influence over the number of people who have jobs, over our wages, over the number of hours that we get to work, and yet we don’t have discussion and engagement over what Fed policy should be,” said Ady Barkan, a lawyer with the Center for Popular Democracy, a Brooklyn-based advocacy group that is orchestrating the campaigns. “More people’s voices need to be heard.”
A spokeswoman for Ms. Yellen confirmed the meeting but declined to comment on the issues raised by the groups.
The Philadelphia Fed said in an email that the institution “is conducting a broad search for its next president and will consider a diverse group of candidates from inside and outside the Federal Reserve System.”
James Hoard, a spokesman for the Dallas Fed, said the bank’s board would meet on Thursday to discuss the search process.
The campaign is part of a broader increase in political pressure on the Fed, which is engaged in a long-running campaign to stimulate the economy that some liberals regard as insufficient and some conservatives see as both ineffective and dangerous. Mr. Barkan led a picket line in support of the Fed’s efforts in August outside the annual monetary policy conference at Jackson Hole, Wyo.
House Republicans, meanwhile, have passed legislation that seeks to reduce the Fed’s flexibility in responding to economic downturns, arguing that such efforts are destabilizing.
The Fed acts like a monolith, but it has a complicated skeleton. Most power rests with a board of governors in Washington, who are nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate. But operations are conducted through 12 regional banks, each of which selects its own president. And those presidents rotate among themselves five of the 12 seats on the Federal Open Market Committee, which sets monetary policy.
The two presidents who have said they plan to step down are, by coincidence, among the most outspoken internal critics of the Fed’s campaign to stimulate the economy. Charles I. Plosser, president of the Philadelphia Fed since 2006, plans to retire at the end of March. Richard W. Fisher, president of the Dallas Fed since 2005, is required to step down by the end of April, though he has not set a date.
Their replacements will be selected by the board of each reserve bank. Each board has nine members, including three bankers, but under the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, only the nonbank members can participate in the process. The banks in each reserve district, however, still elect three of those six nonbank members. The other three, including the chairman and vice chairman, are appointed by the Fed board in Washington.
By law, the boards are supposed to represent a diverse set of viewpoints, including “labor and consumers.” But the 72 nonbank board members are predominantly corporate executives. Just eight are leaders of community groups; two more are leaders of labor groups.
Corporate executives exclusively make up the boards of the St. Louis and Richmond regional banks. The Dallas Fed’s board includes the presidents of the Houston Endowment — a charitable organization — and the University of Houston. The Philadelphia Fed has five executives and the president of the University of Delaware.
“I look at that list and it doesn’t strike me that most of those folks are representing the public,” Kati Sipp, director of Pennsylvania Working Families, a nonprofit advocacy group that is one of the signatories of the recent letter, said of the Philadelphia Fed’s board. “We believe it is important for the people who are making economic policy to hear from the regular folks on the ground who are being affected by those decisions.”
The two dozen signatories also include the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO, New Jersey Communities United and W. Wilson Goode Jr., a Philadelphia city councilman. The letter asks for the Fed to disclose basic information about the selection process, including the timetable, criteria and, eventually, names of candidates. It also seeks search committee seats and opportunities to question the candidates publicly.
The selection process is secretive, but control has increasingly shifted from the regional banks to the board of governors. Beginning under the leadership of Alan Greenspan, a former Fed chairman, the central bank has sought presidents who can contribute to making monetary policy. The board provides informal guidance during the winnowing process, and candidates travel to Washington to meet with the governors.
As a result of that trend, 10 of the 12 sitting presidents are former Fed staffers, economists or both. Mr. Fisher, a former investor, is one exception. The other is Dennis P. Lockhart, a former banker who leads the Atlanta Fed — and is the next president who will reach retirement age.
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JPMorgan Chase Is Funding and Profiting From Private Immigration Prisons
JPMorgan Chase Is Funding and Profiting From Private Immigration Prisons
One of America's largest banks, JPMorgan Chase, is quietly financing the immigration detention centers that have detained an average of 26,240 people per day through July 2017, according to a new ...
One of America's largest banks, JPMorgan Chase, is quietly financing the immigration detention centers that have detained an average of 26,240 people per day through July 2017, according to a new report by the Center for Popular Democracy and Make the Road New York. Through over $100 million loans, lines of credit and bonds, Wall Street has been financially propping up CoreCivic and GeoCorp, America's two largest private immigration detention centers.
Read the full article here.
Jeff Flake Explains Why He Called for a Delay on the Kavanaugh Vote
Jeff Flake Explains Why He Called for a Delay on the Kavanaugh Vote
As for Ana Maria Archila and Maria Gallagher, the women who confronted him in the elevator, Flake said their intervention was “poignant,” but that he believed “some of their concern was how...
As for Ana Maria Archila and Maria Gallagher, the women who confronted him in the elevator, Flake said their intervention was “poignant,” but that he believed “some of their concern was how Kavanaugh would rule on the court. They may have been there prior to the allegations against him because of his position on some issues.”
Read the full article here.
Protesters On Hunger Strike For 17 Days Ask Education Department To Help
Two Chicago protesters who have been fasting for 17 days over the future of a local high school traveled to Washington D.C. this week to take their fight to the national stage.
...
Two Chicago protesters who have been fasting for 17 days over the future of a local high school traveled to Washington D.C. this week to take their fight to the national stage.
The protesters, joined by civil rights leaders and the presidents of the nation's two largest teachers unions, held a press conference on Wednesday and delivered a letter to Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, asking him to take action so city officials will make a decision about Chicago's Dyett High School, which closed in June due to low enrollment rates and test scores.
Twelve protesters have been participating in a hunger strike since Aug. 17 in an attempt to convince the Chicago Board of Education to reopen the school as an open-enrollment public school with a focus on science, which they say will best serve the needs of the community. The board is weighing various plans to reopen the school, but protesters say this process has been slow and inconsistent, and worry that the board will ultimately allow the school to remain closed.
Since the start of the hunger strike, four protesters have had to receive medical attention, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. Last week, a group of medical professionals asked Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel to intervene, calling the situation "a health emergency."
Only two of the protesters made the trip to Washington. The letter they delivered to Duncan on Wednesday asks him to "act swiftly to avert the further harm." An excerpt from the letter states:
"One of the challenges facing African American parents and students in Chicago is the lack of response and accountability from elected and appointed officials. Affluent neighborhoods receive selective enrollment and well-resourced schools. However, communities comprised of predominantly low-income and working families have to contend with under-resourced schools and privatization models that undermine the integrity of the community. We compel you to act on behalf of the residents of Bronzeville who have been rendered voiceless in this process."
At Wednesday's press conference, protesters Jitu Brown and April Stogner were joined by American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, National Education Association President Lily Eskelsen García, Advancement Project Co-Director Judith Browne Dianis, Schott Foundation President John Jackson, Coalition for Community Schools Director Martin Blank, and members of the Alliance for Educational Justice and the Center for Popular Democracy.
"Sometimes you have to put your own health on the line to get the attention of the world," said García.
The protesters want the Board of Education to choose their proposal for the school's future, which would reopen the school as the Dyett Global Leadership and Green Technology High School.
"We’re going to do whatever is necessary to keep this school and have an open enrollment school in our community,” said Stogner, a protester who has three grandchildren. “I’m hungry. But I’m not really hungry for food -- I’m hungry for justice. I’m hungry for justice for my grandbabies, for all the kids in my community."
“We live in a city where we are not valued as black and brown people,” she added.
Earlier this week, protesters met with Emanuel and officials from Chicago Public Schools to discuss the strike, but the meeting did not lead to any resolution.
"The mayor appreciates there are strong feelings about Dyett, and he understands there is a desire for a quick resolution about its future, however what's most important is the right decision," said a statement from the mayor's office. "CPS is engaged in a thorough review of Dyett, and while they are closer to a decision, they continue to weigh all the factors at play in an effort to achieve the best outcome possible -- one that will ensure a strong Bronzeville and a strong future for our children."
A spokesperson for Duncan said Department of Education leaders plan to meet with the protesters to hear their concerns.
“We respect the efforts of this group and worked to accommodate their plans to hold a press conference outside our building," said Department of Education press secretary Dorie Nolt in a statement. "Senior leaders at the Department will meet with representatives of the group today to hear more about their concerns. While this is squarely a local issue, we always welcome the opportunity to engage with concerned students, parents, educators and community members.”
Source: Huffington Post
More Cities Should Do What States and Federal Government Aren't on Minimum Wage
Early this month, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a guaranteed $15 minimum wage for all city government employees by the end of 2018. This is a big win for over 50,000 workers across...
Early this month, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a guaranteed $15 minimum wage for all city government employees by the end of 2018. This is a big win for over 50,000 workers across the city struggling to provide for their families, including those directly on the payroll and tens of thousands working at non-profits that contract with the city.
Unlike in Seattle and Los Angeles, where city officials are empowered to raise the minimum wage for the entire workforce in their cities, Mayor de Blasio is unable to unilaterally raise wages for all New York City workers. That power lies with Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the state legislature. The governor's efforts to lift the minimum wage to $15 are being hampered by a Republican-controlled state Senate.
De Blasio's decision to raise wages for city employees is a crucial independent step towards a more equitable city - and should be seen as an inspiration for cities around the nation. It also reflects the power and momentum of a groundbreaking worker-led countrywide movement demanding higher wages.
Even as state and federal administrations drag their feet on the inevitable question of a decent minimum wage for working families in the United States, de Blasio's gutsy move shows cities can and should take matters into their own hands.
The mayor's minimum wage raise closely follows his announcement last month giving six weeks paid parental leave, and up to 12 weeks when combined with existing leave, to the city's 20,000 non-unionized employees. The mayor has now moved to negotiate the same benefits with municipal unions. Again, New York City private sector workers must look to Albany or Washington, D.C. to move on paid family leave for all.
Mayor de Blasio's recent actions support his goal of lifting 800,000 New Yorkers out of poverty over ten years. More than 20 percent of the city's population lives in poverty, a huge swath of a city commonly associated with extraordinary wealth.
The last couple of years have seen unparalleled momentum from workers themselves - from New York City to Los Angeles and Chicago - calling for livable wages, resulting in minimum wage raises for fast food workers and other groups.
Workers are not waiting patiently on government officials – they are organizing in an unprecedented way. Progressive mayors like de Blasio are responding with sound policy, while less responsive officials are being put on notice. Cities like Los Angeles, New York City, and Chicago are paving the way, showing that it is possible to act independently of state and federal governments.
In addition, laws raising the minimum wage to more than the pitiful federal standard of $7.25 an hour have passed in a number of states. There are now campaigns to raise the floor and standards for workers being led in 14 states and four cities. This momentum is building into a crescendo that will have deep implications for the 2016 presidential election.
Nearly half of our country's workers earn less than $15 an hour and 43 million are forced to work or place their jobs at risk when sick or faced with a critical care-giving need. Now is the time for cities to listen to their workers and override state and federal passivity to allow millions of hard-working Americans to provide for their families.
*** JoEllen Chernow is minimum wage and paid sick days campaign director at Center for Popular Democracy. On Twitter @popdemoc.
Source: Gotham Gazette
Industry Attacks on ‘Scaffold Law’ Put Construction Workers on Shaky Ground
In These Times - March 12, 2014, by Michelle Chen - New York City’s tens of thousands of construction workers face a precarious landscape at work. Teetering at the edge of rooftops, sidestepping...
In These Times - March 12, 2014, by Michelle Chen - New York City’s tens of thousands of construction workers face a precarious landscape at work. Teetering at the edge of rooftops, sidestepping mammoth cranes and noisy bulldozers, and navigating through half-collapsed walls and chemical-laden debris, they’re surrounded by hazards day in and day out. Yet many workers remain silent about unsafe conditions. For them, the risk of retaliation outweighs the risk to life and limb.
Given these hazards, one might assume that demanding employers take responsibility for worker safety is about as basic a precautionary measure as a hard hat. Yet, construction industry lobbyists are working hard to gut the Scaffold Law, a keystone piece of occupational safety legislation that has for more than a century added an extra layer of accountability for firms that fail to protect workers from harm. Complaining that the law cuts into their bottom line, opponents have in recent months pushed for reform legislation in Albany that could prove disastrous for the workers most at risk: non-union Asian and Latino workers doing small-scale and informal building jobs already off the regulatory radar of the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
The Scaffold Law, a state law on the books since 1885, states that worksites above the ground “shall be constructed, placed and operated as to give proper protection to a person so employed.” The law holds owners and contractors liable for injuries that result as a violation of those standards, and allows employees to sue for damages if they can demonstrate that such a violation occurred and caused the injury in question. Advocates say that the law thereby promotes safety standards such as provision of appropriate training and protective equipment, as well as checks to ensure that worksites are structurally sound.
Opponents say New York’s law is a frivolous measure unique to a notoriously litigious city. But in reality, lawmakers passed the Scaffold Law in response to alarming reports of injuries and deaths caused by unsafe conditions at building sites, including faulty scaffolds. And in fact, other states have passed similar safety laws over the years.
Illinois’ occupational safety record worsened after the state repealed the law in 1995. According to one analysis by a trial lawyers' group, “In 2004, the incidence rate of falls from scaffolding/staging in the construction industry in Illinois was more than triple the national rate.”
The firms and business groups, including the Associated Builders and Contractors, American Insurance Association and, in a nod to diversity, Association of Minority Enterprises NY, mobilizing against the law blame it for excessive litigation and insurance costs, saying that it puts undue emphasis on the employer rather than the “personal responsibility” of the worker. They say the law should be rewritten to allow for consideration of “comparative negligence,” to take into account workers’ alleged carelessness. Proposed changes to the law would explicitly direct juries to consider the degree to which the worker caused the accident. The idea is to create more legal wriggle room to limit the company's legal and financial liability toward victims.
Critics point out that under the current law, the courts are already tasked with adjudicating these factors in civil suits when determining whether the employer is legally at fault for a safety failure, since the law addresses only proven violations of safety codes. But more importantly, critics argue that the concept of “comparative” responsibility is absurd in light of the outsized power imbalance between construction workers and bosses.
Of course, the Scaffold Law provides just a thin layer of protection against an endemically oppressive labor market.
But the Center for Popular Democracy (CPD), a New York City-based advocacy group, argues that the Scaffold Law helps “protect workers from dangers at work that lead to disparate outcomes based on race, ethnicity, or language.”
Occupational hazards, as well as labor abuse, are rife across the construction industry, particularly for more casual, unregulated work, such as the day laborer jobs that proliferated in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy and the small-scale contractor projects on private suburban homes. Falls from heights made up over one-third of construction worker deaths in 2012, and construction workers suffer injuries that are more frequent and severe than workers in many other private-sector industries, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. According to an analysis by CPD, in New York City between 2003 and 2011, a stunning 74 percent of fatal construction-site falls investigated by OSHA involved Latino or immigrant workers, exceeding their representation in the general population and the construction workforce. Most occurred on smaller, non-union worksites, where undocumented labor is typically concentrated.
Other research from advocacy groups and occupational-safety authorities suggests Latino immigrant workers are deterred from speaking out about unsafe conditions, in part due to limited English ability or fear of exposing their immigration status. That compounds the oppression of economic precarity and discrimination; it’s hard to feel empowered to challenge your working conditions when you’re “off the books.”
CPD’s analysis highlights the perilous tightrope these workers traverse each day. In one case narrative in the report, two men were working at a height of 16 feet, and “They were moving and adjusting the scaffold when employee #1 fell. Employee #1 was not tied off to his lifeline. Employee #1 was pronounced dead at the hospital.”
Those who survive such workplace accidents may never fully heal. In an interview with WNYC last year, Pedro Corchado recalled an accident while working on a ladder in the Bronx in 2008. “The ladder collapsed on me,” he said. “I fell about 11 feet or so to the concrete floor. I suffered neck and lower back injuries that will be with me the rest of my life.”
Under the proposed reform, these workers might come under scrutiny for being “negligent”—Why did he get on a shaky ladder in the first place? Why wasn’t his lifeline securely tied? Advocates counter that question’s about the employer’s negligence—Who was charged with overseeing the worksite? Did inadequate equipment or poor management place workers in harm’s way?— ultimately hold more weight.
“The fact of the matter is, you could be doing everything right,” CPD Director of Strategic Research Connie Raza tells Working in These Times. “If you don't have the right equipment, you're not going to be able to keep yourself safe in every circumstance that comes up. And it is the owners' and the contractors' responsibility to make as safe a workplace as possible, but certainly as safe a workplace as legally required."
As for the business case against the law's cost, it is true that some of this uniquely litigious city’s largest civil settlements in recent years came from suits involving construction-related scaffold and ladder injuries.
But this is offset by the permissiveness of the federal regulatory environment. According to the AFL-CIO, the average penalty assessed for a “serious” violation of an OSHA standard, such as failing to provide appropriate mechanical safeguards or protective gear—in New York in 2012 was $2,164. (Criminal prosecutions are virtually unheard of, and the agency's inspection and enforcement capacity is severely hampered by chronic understaffing).
While the contractors at the top of the construction industry complain of lawsuits and insurance costs, Razza says the suggested reforms “would shift responsibility away from owners and contractors who control the work site, to workers who don't, and who are often really in a relationship where they feel threatened if they come forward with complaints ... The construction and insurance industries are trying to push back and save money, and the reason that the law is so important is that it saves lives."
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Taxing the rich: how Seattle leads a ‘go-local’ trend in liberal politics
Taxing the rich: how Seattle leads a ‘go-local’ trend in liberal politics
Seattle is trying to tackle income inequality one local move at a time – and becoming a case study in how cities are testing liberal policies that lack traction at the state or federal level....
Seattle is trying to tackle income inequality one local move at a time – and becoming a case study in how cities are testing liberal policies that lack traction at the state or federal level.
Read the full article here.
No sanctuary cities in Florida? That’s not as settled as Andrew Gillum claims
No sanctuary cities in Florida? That’s not as settled as Andrew Gillum claims
It’s difficult to speak in absolutes when discussing sanctuary cities, because as Gillum said, there is no formal definition. The term can be used to make either negative or positive arguments...
It’s difficult to speak in absolutes when discussing sanctuary cities, because as Gillum said, there is no formal definition. The term can be used to make either negative or positive arguments about local policies, said Francesca Menes, Florida state coordinator for Local Progress, a national network of local elected officials working on social issues, including immigration protection.
Read the full article here.
Fed moves to quell charges of opacity, lack of diversity
The Federal Reserve has rolled out a series of announcements, online forums and meetings with Americans this year in response to outspoken civic groups and many Democrats, including Hillary...
The Federal Reserve has rolled out a series of announcements, online forums and meetings with Americans this year in response to outspoken civic groups and many Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, calling for a more transparent and inclusive U.S. central bank.
The latest critique came this week when Fed Up, a labor-affiliated coalition pushing for reforms, said it was "disappointing" that Nicole Taylor, a black woman and dean of community engagement and diversity at Stanford University whose term as director at the San Francisco Fed soon expires, would be succeeded on the board by Sanford Michelman, a white man who is co-founder of law firm Michelman & Robinson LLP.
"It's definitely a step back in terms of what I'd like to see on our board. We're working actively to build representation of women and minorities," John Williams, president of the San Francisco Fed, said on Wednesday in response to reporters' questions, noting the decision was made by private banks in his district.
After years of resisting more overt political efforts to curb its independence, the Fed this year has appeared willing to shine a light on its historically opaque process of choosing district Fed presidents, and also to show it is more sensitive to racial and gender diversity.
After the Philadelphia, Dallas and Minneapolis Fed banks last year all chose as presidents men with past ties to Goldman Sachs, the Atlanta Fed hosted a public webcast this month and said it seeks a "diverse set of candidates" for its new chief, raising hopes it would name the first black or Latino Fed president in the central bank's 103-year history.
"It's not just because we want to go and say we're diverse," Loretta Mester, Cleveland Fed president, said at a meeting with workers a day after her bank launched online applications for the public to recommend directors and advisers. "It's about getting different view points that are very helpful to us in ... thinking about the economy and understanding the trends."
The regional Fed presidents have rotating votes on policy, except for the head of the New York Fed who has a permanent voting role. Unlike Fed governors who are selected by the White House and approved by the Senate, the presidents are chosen by their district directors, half of whom are themselves picked by private local banks that technically own the Fed banks.
Critics say the dizzying structure leaves the Fed beholden to bankers who do not represent the public, and they point out that 11 of 12 district presidents are white while 10 are men.
By Jonathan Spicer and Dion Rabouin
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A Push to Give Steadier Shifts to Part-Timers
New York Times - July 15, 2014, by Steve Greenhouse - As more workers find their lives...
New York Times - July 15, 2014, by Steve Greenhouse - As more workers find their lives upended and their paychecks reduced by ever-changing, on-call schedules, government officials are trying to put limits on the harshest of those scheduling practices.
The actions reflect a growing national movement — fueled by women’s and labor groups — to curb practices that affect millions of families, like assigning just one or two days of work a week or requiring employees to work unpredictable hours that wreak havoc with everyday routines like college and child care.
The recent, rapid spread of on-call employment to retail and other sectors has prompted proposals that would require companies to pay employees extra for on-call work and to give two weeks’ notice of a work schedule.
Vermont and San Francisco have adopted laws giving workers the right to request flexible or predictable schedules to make it easier to take care of children or aging parents. Scott M. Stringer, the New York City comptroller, is pressing the City Council to take up such legislation. And last month, President Obama ordered federal agencies to give the “right to request” to two million federal workers.
The new laws and proposals generally require an employer to discuss a new employee’s situation and to consider scheduling requests, but they do not require companies to accommodate individual schedules. Many businesses have opposed these measures, arguing that they represent improper government intrusion into private operations.
In a referendum last year, voters in SeaTac, Wash. — the community near Seattle that also passed the nation’s highest minimum wage, $15 an hour for some workers — approved a measure that bars employers from hiring additional part-time workers if any of their existing part-timers want more hours. The move was a response to complaints from workers that they were not scheduled for enough hours to support their families. Some San Francisco lawmakers are seeking to enact a similar regulation.
Representative George Miller of California, the senior Democrat on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, plans to introduce legislation this summer that would require companies to pay their employees for an extra hour if they were summoned to work with less than 24 hours’ notice. He is also proposing a guarantee of four hours’ pay on days when employees are sent home after just a few hours — something that happens in many restaurants and retailers when customer traffic is slow.
That happened to Mary Coleman. After an hourlong bus commute, she arrived at her job at a Popeyes in Milwaukee only to have her boss order her to go home without clocking in — even though she was scheduled to work. She was not paid for the day.
“It’s becoming more and more common to put employees in a very uncertain and tenuous position with respect to their schedules, and that ricochets if workers have families or other commitments,” Mr. Miller said. “The employer community always says it abhors uncertainty and unpredictability, but they are creating an employment situation that has huge uncertainty and unpredictability for millions of Americans.”
While Mr. Miller acknowledges that his bill is unlikely to be enacted anytime soon — partly because of opposition from business (and a Republican-controlled House), he said the bill would bring attention to what he called often callous scheduling practices. His bill, similar to one in the Senate sponsored by Bob Casey, Democrat of Pennsylvania, has a “right to request” provision that would bar employers from denying requests from workers with caregiving or school-related conflicts unless they had a “bona fide” business reason.
Corporate groups protest that such measures undercut efficiency and profits. “The hyper-regulation of the workplace by government isn’t conducive to a positive business climate,” said Scott DeFife, an executive vice president of the National Restaurant Association. “The more complications that government creates for operating a business, the less likely we’ll see a positive business environment that’s good for the economy and increasing jobs.”
Mr. DeFife pointed out that the daily ebb and flow of customers necessitated flexibility in scheduling.
David French, a senior vice president of the National Retail Federation, said many people chose careers in retail because of the flexible work hours.
“These proposals may sound reasonable, but if you unpack them, they could be very harmful,” Mr. French said. “Where employers and employees now work together to solve scheduling problems, you’ll have a very bureaucratic environment where rigid rules would be introduced.”
While many of these workers are not unionized, the labor movement has often battled against part-time work and ever-changing schedules. But as unions have grown weaker, employers have felt freer to employ part-timers and use more volatile scheduling. Unions still push for workers to get more hours — and those pressures are one reason Macy’s and Walmart have adopted programs letting employees claim additional, available shifts by going onto their employers’ websites.
In a climate where many retailers, restaurants and other businesses are still struggling after the recession, economists point to the increased uncertainty faced by employees. About 27.4 million Americans work part time. The number of those part-timers who would prefer to work full time has nearly doubled since 2007, to 7.5 million. According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, 47 percent of part-time hourly workers ages 26 to 32 receive a week or less of advance notice for their schedule.
In a study of the data, two University of Chicago professors found that employers dictated the work schedules for about half of young adults, without their input. For part-time workers, schedules on average fluctuated from 17 to 28 hours a week.
“Frontline managers face pressure to keep costs down, but they really don’t have much control over wages or benefits,” said Susan J. Lambert, a University of Chicago professor who interpreted the data. “What they have control over is employee hours.”
Ms. Lambert said flexible, not rigid or unpredictable, hours would become as important an issue as paid family leave. “The issue of scheduling is going to be the next big effort on improving labor standards,” she said. “To reduce unpredictability is important to keep women engaged in the labor force.”
David Chiu, president of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, has created a business-labor group that is trying to find the middle ground.
“We’ve learned that predictability in hours is important not just to help workers juggle their lives, but for economic security — to help workers take a second job to live in expensive cities like San Francisco or New York,” Mr. Chiu said. “We’re confident that we can move forward with policies that work for workers as well as business’s bottom line.”
Sharlene Santos says her part-time schedule at a Zara clothing store in Manhattan — ranging from 16 to 24 hours a week — is not enough. “Making $220 a week, that’s not enough to live on — it’s not realistic,” she said.
After Ms. Santos and four other Zara workers recently wrote to the company, protesting that they were given too few hours and received just two days’ notice for their schedule, the company promised to start giving them two weeks’ advance notice.
Fatimah Muhammad said that at the Joe Fresh clothing store where she works in Manhattan, some weeks she was scheduled to work just one day but was on call for four days — meaning she had to call the store each morning to see whether it needed her to work that day.
“I felt kind of stuck. I couldn’t make plans,” said Ms. Muhammad, who said she was now assigned 25 hours a week.
A national campaign — the Fair Workweek Initiative — is pushing for legislation to restrict these practices in places including Milwaukee, New York and Santa Clara, Calif. The effort includes the National Women’s Law Center, the United Food and Commercial Workers union and the Retail Action Project, a New York workers’ group.
“Too many workers are working either too many or too few hours in an economy that expects us to be available 24/7,” said Carrie Gleason, director of the Fair Workweek Initiative and an organizer at the Center for Popular Democracy, a national advocacy group. “It’s gotten to the point where workers, especially women workers, are saying, ‘We need a voice in how much and when we work.' ”
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