[Sticky] NLOC Draft Program of Struggle

To join or create an affiliated Gig Worker Committee, members must agree to the NLOC Draft Program attached below. Read and learn more at newlaborpress.org. The following is an excerpt:

Immediate Program of Struggle:

• For a minimum living wage.
• Against speed-ups, mass lay offs, and other attacks on the workers justified using technological breakthroughs. Technology should serve the workers who use it.
• Against the rise in cost of living, and the stagnation or reduction of real wages.
• Against document checks and harassment/discrimination based on immigration status.
• Workers shall be compensated for time spent dealing with the immigration bureaucracy and should be provided with free legal/language services.
• For freedom of organization for all workers, including their press, and including the right of distributions of literature and assembly at job sites.
• For health insurance with full coverage, including dental and vision and without high premiums or monthly costs.
• For sufficient and paid maternity and paternity leave. For the direct provision of childcare or childcare benefits.
• For a single socialized benefit fund; against the private insurance racket.
• For the simplification of wage scales and elimination of arbitrary and divisive job classifications.
• For a reduction of the working day/week with no loss in pay, in accordance with increases in the productive forces or the transfer of unemployed persons into productive labor.
• For earlier retirement for blue-collar jobs, and increased retirement/pension pay for all job classes.
• For the abolition of all No-Strike Clauses and the full right to strike without limits.
• For the abolition of all Managerial Rights clauses.
• For workplace committees elected by the workers that determine shop conditions and policies.
• Against all state intervention in the settlement of disputes and against arbitration.
• Against all workplace harassment, discrimination, and abuse of power by bosses and supervisors, in particular abuses against nationally oppressed workers, immigrant workers, women workers, and LGBT workers.
• For severance and/or re-training in the event of any layoff or dismissal.
• Against arbitrary part-time classifications
• Against all forms of unpaid labor
• Against imperialism and the militarization of society and the economy
• For the constant defense of the interests, dreams, and goals of the working class and toiling masses.
• For accommodations for workers with physical or mental impairments and illnesses.

Suggested Minimum Collective Bargaining Agreement Demands:

• $30/hr starting wage
• Hourly guarantee of 25/week for part time employees and 40/week for full time employees
• Employee insurance plan should have a premium covered 100% by the employers
• Establishment of a joint committee composed of half employee representatives, half corporate representatives for resolving grievances involving management
• Anything past 8 hours in one day is paid at overtime rate, hours worked between midnight and 8am are also paid at overtime rate
• Hazard pay for extreme weather, including extreme winds, snowfall, rainfall, exposure to temperatures above 85ºF or below freezing
• Minimum of two consecutive days off per week
• Minimum turnaround time of 12 hours between shifts
• Anti-harassment, workplace surveillance/micromanagement and anti-discrimination provisions
• Include contract language that weakens or outright eliminates no-strike clauses and managerial rights clauses, especially concerning the pace of work.