#postal service union

[lovethroughdelusions]

SUPPORT USPS

Some of you may have heard this already, but rural carriers in the USPS just got fucked over. (note: i myself am not a usps employee, but my partner is)

USPS and the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association (NRLCA) have disagreed on how to price the volume of work for the rural routes. City (walking) routes get paid hourly, but rural routes get paid salaried. After disagreeing, the matter went to arbitration and the arbitor chose a complicated algorithm for determining the pay by volume, and it goes into effect this week. People are losing thousands of $ a year. Most between 5%-30% of their wage just.. gone. My partner only lost $4000 off their wage, but someone he works with lost $10,000 off their yearly income. A person on reddit is saying they lost $18,000.

The USPS always gets the short end of the stick, but this is going to throw things into chaos. USPS workers are unable to strike, so they don't have much ability to fight back. (though some have been talking about illegal strikes...) They can file a grievance within their union, but it's a gamble on if it will work.

How you can help: please make a fuss about this. Contact your local reps. Share this on social media. Tell your friends.

Thank you. ❤️❤️

Sources:

r/USPS

Route Changes Survey by ruralinfo.net

official NRLCA site

USPS and Striking

[nando161mando]

New tentative agreement for mail carriers is a disgrace

I'm a mail carrier for the USPS. Today, after more than 600 days of negotiations and more than 500 days of being out of contract, our union president announced our tentative agreement. [It's a fucking disgrace.](https://www.nalc.org/news/nalc-updates/body/Summary-of-2023-Tentative-Agreement.pdf?fbclid=PAZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAabg3eRkti_wgqVJecFjuxu5-a0Fy2CJ6CBPfmFK0JiXkNHWbglLO1r9TFI_aem_vEwSMOQsiZCwuodW7-s7FA)

To summarize:

* Our raises for 2023, 2024, and 2025 are 1.3% for each year

* The two-tier system that was put in place in 2013 by federal arbitration is being "eliminated" by...... everyone being moved to the shittier tier

* Our non-career workforce, a position called City Carrier Assistant who have worse pay, worse benefits, and fewer workplace protections, are being re-entrenched as a fundamental part of the service.

All this for a few hundred dollars in (prorated) COLAs.

There's going to be a movement for a No vote on the TA so that we can go to federal arbitration and get something better than this wet piece of toilet paper, please look out for ways to support mail carriers!

[bakingmoomins]

correos de mexico slays so hard

[melyzard]

If they are that crucial,why can't they have air conditioning? If they are so darn essential, why can't they work full time and afford rent? If they are absolutely key to a functioning society, why are they treated like absolute shit?

[lifearoundtheworld]

License Plates Around the World

Austria - Province of Burgenland

[dixiedrudge]

The 2024 Election is Being Rigged: How You Can Help Stop It

After serious issues about election integrity, voter fraud and mainstream media deception in 2020, we can be certain that 2024 is turning out to be much of the same. View Source: Americans can be rightfully concerned about the significant changes in election practices, including universal mail-in voting, widespread ballot harvesting, counting integrity, and a concerted effort by Democrats to…

[worldpostday]

Delivering more than the mail: How Posts can deliver economic inclusion worldwide.

According to Visa, one of the world’s biggest financial services corporations, digital equity and inclusion rely on three key assets: access, trusted convenience, and knowledge. A key partner in the UPU’s Financial Inclusion Technical Assistance Facility (FITAF) project, Visa believes that the Post can advance each of these pillars, paving the way towards more equitable and prosperous communities.

Learn more on Delivering more than the mail: How Posts can deliver economic inclusion worldwide.

[liteblueinsider]

Stand with USPS Employees: A Vital Call for Support

In recent times, rural carriers at the United States Postal Service (USPS) have faced challenging circumstances, something that urgently calls for public awareness and action. My connection to this issue is more than just observational, as my partner is among the affected USPS employees.

The issue at hand stems from a dispute between USPS and the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association (NRLCA) over the compensation model for rural postal routes. While urban carriers are paid hourly, rural carriers are salaried, a structure that has recently undergone significant changes. Following an arbitration decision, a complex algorithm was introduced to determine rural carriers' pay based on work volume, leading to drastic reductions in annual salaries.

The impact of this new compensation system is substantial, with many rural carriers seeing a decrease in their earnings by 5% to 30%. Personal stories, including my partner's $4,000 salary cut and reports of others losing up to $18,000 annually, illustrate the severity of the situation.

This recent development is another example of the challenges USPS workers face, compounded by their inability to strike, which limits their means of protest. While union grievances are an option, the effectiveness of such actions remains uncertain.

How can you help?

Amplify the Issue: Share this information on social media and other platforms to increase awareness. Visibility is key in advocacy.

Political Advocacy: Contact your local and national representatives to express your concerns. Political pressure can be a catalyst for change.

Start Conversations: Discuss this issue within your community. Public discourse can lead to a broader understanding and support for USPS workers.

Your support can make a significant difference in the lives of rural USPS carriers. By standing together, we can push for equitable treatment and fair compensation for these essential workers.

For more detailed insights into USPS employees' challenges, I recommend visiting resources like LiteBlueInsider, a dedicated platform providing valuable information and perspectives. Additionally, for official information about the USPS, you can refer to its USPS

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Canada’s postal worker strike is nearing the end of its second week with no sign of movement from Canada Post after negotiations broke down earlier this week. While 55,000 members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers have been on the picket lines since November 15 fighting to protect their pensions, improve working conditions and push for higher wages that keep pace with inflation, media coverage of the strike has tended to focus on anti-worker narratives rather than the reasons postal workers went on strike. Now, even as the union says the employer is moving to lay off striking workers, common headlines centre around the impact of service disruptions on the general public —a similar talking point being used by Canada Post.

Article posted November 29, 2024.

Continue reading

Tagging: @newsfromstolenland

[racefortheironthrone]

Nobody is making anyone go into scriptwriting. No one is born in a Netflix company town where their dad takes them into the script mines at age 12. Fuck writers who want to get paid more than once for the same job. They should only get residuals AFTER all the people who do REAL WORK, like construction, grips, costume, makeup & animators etc. Most of them are much better at their jobs than writers especially for streaming services, and they are what screenwriters can lean on & novelists can't.

People need to realize that the unions for white collar people like WGA or SIEU or NEA (public sector unions are why cops who kill the people they were supposed to serve & protect remain employed get pensions) is not the AFL-CIO or any other historical union fighting for the lives of the people who built the country's industry and made it run, any more than the NRA are the Minutemen of 1775 New England.

First, go fuck yourself, you fucking scab. No, seriously - you don't come to my blog and spout off about what workers deserve unions and decent pay and what ones don't, like it's your fucking decision. The intellectual labor that writers perform is just as real as any other work done on a film set - "all who labor by hand or brain" is the inherent logic of industrial unionism for a reason.

Second, writers aren't asking to get paid more than once: residuals are deferred pay, you absolute moron. In Hollywood, whether it's writers or actors or voice talent or whatever, you get a small fraction up front - it's usually an ok check, depending on the union's day rates and so forth, but you can't make a living off stitching these together - and then most of your pay comes from monthly royalty checks that provide you with the income you need to live off when you're between jobs.

The problem is that, historically in Hollywood, residuals have been structured with a very long "tail" - the payments start out relatively low and then get more generous over time as the show has more seasons and (presumably) goes into syndication. This doesn't work with streaming's new business model, where increasingly shows are getting 2-3 seasons max and streaming services have become increasingly quick to not just cancel shows but yank them off their servers in order to avoid paying residuals.

So what WGA writers are fighting for is a system that ensures writers (but also actors and other creative workers, because the unions pattern bargain) get a fair share of the show's revenue, even if the show is only given 2-3 seasons.

Third, the U.S labor movement would not exist today if it wasn't for white collar workers and public sector workers. About half of the U.S labor movement - 7 million workers - is public sector, and those workers are overwhelmingly women of color, mostly working as either teachers or postal workers. Likewise, about half the U.S labor movement is made up of white collar workers, and we're graduate students and adjuncts and lab researchers, teachers and social workers, administrators and IT departments.

I'm both public sector and white collar, and I'm a member of an NEA union. I'm an adjunct professor who earns $6,000 a course and it's my job to get working adults with jobs and families who've never gone to college or who've been out of higher ed for a decade to graduate with a bachelor's or a master's. If you don't think that's real work, you're free to research and write all the lectures and powerpoints, deliver those in an entertaining and educational fashion, answer a flood of questions from students who need help navigating academia, and then grade all the midterms and finals and research papers.

[seadeepspaceontheside]

I have seen little to no support for the strike from fellow Canadians about the current Canadian Postal workers who are out there protesting for better work conditions. Canadian Postal workers =/= Canada post. Currently workers are striking for pay that has been stagnated as well as benefits being halted. Some of the things I want to debunk with all anti-worker talk about the strike. 1) "Our tax dollars pay for them! They should just go back to work! They are losing money!" False! They aren't GOVERNMENT JOBS they are a CROWN CORPORATION, they are still structured and operated as a legal corporation. The head people are still CEOS who get paid millions in bonuses as the corporation fails or makes bad decisions such as buying new vehicles that make workers feel unsafe, can't fit in urban areas, cost so much more! 2) "They don't provide a useful service its only flyers" "what about my cheque!" It can't be both, you can't claim Canada Post workers are useless for spam mail while also touting small businesses are failing, people needing their pay, and delivering where other courier services wont! Currently Canadian Postal workers will deliver benefit checks and child support on volunteer. 3)"Why are they striking now when its busiest??" They are striking now because it will affect you to care, its moot point to strike when there is little to no leverage against. THATS THE POINT OF ANY PROTEST! Show solidarity with the workers, if you have issues and want the strike to end complain to the company to work with the union (who have been asking for a resolution for years before wanting to strike) RAISE AWARENESS FOR IT.

[thehaberdasheress]

Wishing strength to the sword arms at the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, who are striking for better wages and working conditions at Canada Post. That's our national mail service, which is currently shut down - mail across Canada is not being collected, processed, or delivered until an agreement is reached.

Postal workers do hard and invaluable work that is the backbone of our economy, and also my business. The union are fighting for a lot of things, from rest and meals during the workday to gender-affirming care in their insurance package.

This means I'm writing my MP to encourage the government and Canada Post to find resolution through compromise, not force and legislation.

I apologize to my customers for any delays or expenses that happen while this dispute drags on. I'll do my best to find alternate mail carriers and let you know what's going on. This will affect orders of embroidery patterns and sewing tools, but print-on-demand items like mugs, dresses, or umbrellas should still work smoothly.

[archie-sunshine]

i will see an essential worker's vehicle and ask 'is anyone going to turn that into a big robot' and not wait for an answer

anyway heres parcel, he's a canadian postal service truck (UNION STRONG, STAND WITH THE STRIKERS!!!)

[afeelgoodblog]

Best News of Last Week - December 11

1. Biden administration to forgive $4.8 billion in student loan debt for 80,300 borrowers

The Biden administration announced on Wednesday that it would forgive an additional $4.8 billion in student loan debt, for 80,300 borrowers.

The relief is a result of the U.S. Department of Education’s fixes to its income-driven repayment plans and Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.

2. Detroit on pace to have lowest homicide rate in 60 years this year

A partnership to reduce Detroit crime is being praised with the City on pace for the fewest homicides in 60 years.

"This is the day we’ve been waiting for, for a long time," said Mayor Mike Duggan. The coalition which includes city and county leaders that Detroit Police Chief James White formed in late 2021 to return the criminal justice system in Detroit and Wayne County to pre-Covid operations.

3. Dog that killed 8 coyotes to protect sheep running for Farm Dog of the Year

Over a year ago, Casper was stacked up against a pack of 11 coyotes, and he overcame them all to protect the livestock at his Decatur home. Now he needs your help.

Casper, the Great Pyrenees livestock guardian dog, needs the public to vote for him to become the American Farm Bureau's "Farm Dog of the Year: People's Choice Pup" contest.

4. Shimmering golden mole thought extinct photographed and filmed over 80 years after last sighting

De Winton's golden mole, last sighted in 1937, has been found alive swimming through sand dunes in South Africa after an extensive search for the elusive species.

5. About 40% of the world's power generation is now renewable

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and World Meteorological Organization (WMO) have released their first joint report to strengthen understanding of renewable energy resources and their intricate relationship with climate variability and change.

In 2022 alone, 83% of new capacity was renewable, with solar and wind accounting for most additions. Today, some 40% of power generation globally is renewable, due to rapid deployment in the past decade, according to the report.

6. Jonathan the Tortoise: World’s oldest living land animal celebrates 191st birthday

The world’s oldest living land animal - a Seychelles giant tortoise named Jonathan - has just celebrated his 191st birthday. Jonathan’s estimated 1832 birth year predates the invention of the postal stamp, the telephone, and the photograph.

The iconic creature lived through the US civil war, most of the reign of Queen Victoria, the rise and fall of the Soviet Union, and two world wars.

7. New enzyme allows CRISPR technologies to accurately target almost all human genes

A team of engineers at Duke University have developed a method to broaden the reach of CRISPR technologies. While the original CRISPR system could only target 12.5% of the human genome, the new method expands access to nearly every gene to potentially target and treat a broader range of diseases through genome engineering.

---

That's it for this week :)

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[elodieunderglass]

I am absolutely wild and feral over HDM (legit like, daemons fit SO well. I'm watching dunmeshi wondering where Laios' dog went) and super curious if you do plan a sequel or other fics following this AU??

(In reference to the His Dark Materials / Dungeon Meshi fusion fic)

thank you so much for this question I love this question god!!!! Thank you thank you thank you

God sorry about HDM being delayed, I’m going through hell over it at the moment. It’s meant to end a little after the dragon, then a timeskip epilogue, with special coding so that you can read it two different ways, depending on whether you want spoilers for the manga/season 2. (My idea is that you’ll click a button to reveal/hide it, and the spoiler-free epilogue will be like found poetry.)

Firstly, if you or anyone else would like to take the concepts/characters in His Delicious Materials forward for themselves, you must do this. You don’t need my permission (but I’d love a link! so I can read, scream, reblog, comment, link to it, etc. there is also the “inspired by” setting on ao3 so we can link works directly to HDM, forming a collection for anyone who reads one and wants more.) I don’t own any of it! We are all just having fun! YOU can be the sequel you want to see in the world! If your heart feels a way forward, then follow your heart!! A daemon AU is really about revealing character and I find them really inspiring, like adding a whole engine to a story idea.

If I were to write something to follow up, I do know what the sequel WOULD be! It would be a sort of Discworld novel about the slow social revolution occurring in the half-foots as a chain reaction to Bee settling as a weasel, all occurring behind Chilchuck’s oblivious and unhelpful back. Pushed into a sort of bottleneck of sparrow- and mouse-souls, and marginalised to the very edges of society, half-foots are precarious and endangered. Chilchuck is mostly eating a ham sandwich unhelpfully in the foreground, and at the end of the story looks back and sees to his bewilderment that his people have found a way forward (they don’t have a Shire or a Chosen One, but they do have a goddamn functional worker’s union and their own collective dignity.) kind of Discworld-commentary-comedy, kind of a loving argument with Tolkien, kind of Sharpe hostile-and-awkward-protagonist-POV-doesn’t-know-and-wouldn’t-believe-that-his-men-genuinely-love-him, kind of about the experience of parenting, and kind of gently warmly political BUT FUNNY so it would be ok. but feel it would be too much of a stretch of people’s patience and the original materials’s intentions to call it fanfic. Too many OCs needed to carry the weight, too little reference to the other Dungeon Meshi characters, almost too little “payoff” for what would be a full 70k word work. So maybe to let the story breathe, it would be better worked up as original fiction?

(Plus, that is actually an actual novel: if people write their own novels and manga about orc coffeeshops and dnd parties, I could just write my own too: wait but how do you know if you should?)

Anyway, that is an entirely separate kettle of weasels and my own cross to bear! If your heart cries out for a sequel the best way to manifest it in the world is to write it!

If you feel that A Weasel Heart In Defiance feels like it would scratch that itch, here is a bit that is mildly relevant to Dungeon Meshi, which is Chilchuck and Bee starting to work away from home while the girls were still small. You’ll probably see what I mean from it.

About seven of the village children, including his own three, had a snake in a wooden bucket. They didn't look up.

The reappearance of a random guy who functioned mostly as a postal service and occasionally shouted at them about bedtime - in a way that could be easily blanked out if something more interesting was happening - simply could not be expected to compete for attention with a snake in a bucket.

Chilchuck could recognise this on some level, but as his own children ignored him, he felt very hot and angry, in a way that he had never wanted to feel about children, especially his.

Bee, also rigidly pissed off, growled, "Easy, boss."

This was where Chilchuck did the only thing so far that he was proud of, in this day. He did not start shouting, even though his temper was going something like What the fuck, kids, but worse. He stopped, took a minute, and remembered he'd had this whole thing where he'd wanted his kids to love him. He rubbed his nose, said, "Remind me," and his daemon reminded him: "What do we want them to actually do?"

And he said, "The bare minimum fucking acknowledgement would be nice."

And Bee said, "Have we explained that to them? Do they know?"

So Chilchuck and Bee, hot and tired and cross and still on the job apparently, sat down on the ground with the kids and looked in the bucket. The snake, poor bastard, looked very limp and tired. Chilchuck could relate.

After a while, Chilchuck said, "Girls?"

Or more accurately, something like, "Girls! Girls. Meifleurpatti-I mean Puck-PUCK. Listen up. Mei! Fleur, I'm talking - thanks Fleur - Puck. (Ryeland, stop the baby.) PUCK. Mei, Fleur, Puck - PUCK, eyes on me - thanks, Ryeland - PUCK. EYES," which condensed in parent-speak to a single roar of "Girls!"

When he had them more or less listening, he remembered to set his voice to the more singsong cadence one used for children, instead off the deeper version of his natural voice that he used for shouting at the top of his abilities at tall people; making the choice to be patient and gentle, or at least pretend to be someone who was; and in this manner he said reasonably, "Now, your dad's been away for a very long time and missed you all very much. What do you say? What do you say when your dad comes home?"

Six children stared at him blankly, and the baby toppled gently into the bucket. He fished it out, stuck it sideways under his arm, allowed the snake to escape in the confusion, acknowledged someone's grievously injured finger, stopped Fleur from pinching, took out his pocket handkerchief and wiped Puck's nose in essentially one continuous motion.

To be completely fair, now that he'd let go of the initial anger, he could see that the kids had absolutely no idea what he'd wanted of them. Kids had practically no social instincts at the best of times. Chilchuck coming home was remarkable, sure, but beyond their influence; how were they supposed to react? What do you say to a comet? What do you say to a hailstorm? What do you say when daddy comes home?

He repeated the question, as the children had universally drawn blanks and devolved into staring vacantly.

"Good morning, Daddy!" A child chirped helpfully, setting off the rest in an automatic drone of "good morning, Daddy," in the strangely universal dreary tone of all children saying that.

"So close, Fernwise! Is it morning? What else do we think?"

Bee, fighting for order among the kit-daemons, was simultaneously washing Fleurtom's daemon, Pantoufle's, face; receiving a long rambling report of a grievance from three incoherent witnesses; and minding the baby's chick-daemon; up to her ears in parenting. She said, around a mouthful of Pan, "Speed it up, boss, you're losing them."

"Where are your spots, Daddy?" Pan asked him. He was in the form of a young ferret and scrabbled against his mother's grip on his scruff.

"My what?"

"Your freckles," Bee said grimly, and seeing he'd been temporarily disarmed - and being a valiant beast in her way - charged in to her human's defense, "Is that nice, Pan? We don't want to make people feel bad about their looks, do we?"

"Yes we do," said Fleur.

"Fleur! We've just - we haven't seen much of the sun, that's all," said Bee, taking charge, the best and most loyal soul a man could have. "They'll come back, and they're not spots."

"Mei has spots."

"Freckles."

"Grimbob has spots."

"Yes, and you shouldn't notice," Bee said. "Think of Grimbob's feelings."

"I do, I think he feels spotty."

"I'm thirsty," Puck said flatly.

"Stick to the point, kids," Chilchuck said, recovering from the fact that his usual face was apparently indistinguishable to children from Grimbob's, who had been taking puberty hard. This was surprisingly difficult to do.

Ryeland, a mildly bright spark who was older than the Chils girls, connected two dots and suddenly roared "WELCOME HOME DADDY," so six children all repeated that automatically, and Fleur added sunnily, "I missed you Daddy!"

And just as a very small piece of Chilchuck's heart was finally allowed to melt, she added, equally sunnily, "Mei didn't."

"I did a little," Meijack said vaguely.

"That's great kids, well done, we got there in the end," Chilchuck said. "Remember it for next time, okay? It makes Daddy feel better about his stupid life. Now, next time, let's remember that it's traditional to do a hug."

He realised his mistake instantly, as six children and their daemons all bore him - and the baby he'd forgotten he was holding - to the ground.

___________

[earthly-ali3n]

This current labour model is exploitive!! Workers deserve better and they deserve our support! My heart goes out to people missing important packages, I know it is frustrating, but Canada Post has been denying negotiations for a year. Make sure you’re aiming your frustration at them, not at the workers defending their job security.

Not to be that guy but the anti union voices on tik tok are getting out of hand and it’s pissing me off.

for people who aren’t Canadian or don’t know, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers is currently on strike. They have been negotiating their new contract for about a year now, and those negotiation took a turn when benefits and protections were threatened.

Canada Post has been implementing tiered benefits for new hires, making it nearly impossible for new employees achieve full benefits as Canada Post rarely hires full time employees. Instead, they hire part time and temporary workers, allowing them to treat them as lesser employees while working them like full time.

The work Canada Post is offering is unreliable and unsustainable. The argument made by critics is that CUPW workers already make much more than minimum wage, but if you are part time or temporary, you most likely work >15 hours a week except during november and december. That’s still not a living wage.

This strike is about much more than money and I’m sick of people acting like this strike is just a money grab.