politics, music, et cetera
I am
» a graduate of New College of Florida in Political Science/Economics
» a resident of Jamaica Plain in Boston, MA
» an anti-sexist, anti-racist, pro-LGBT, leftist, humanist, straight, white, male sonovasonovagun
» someone whose nightmares include: tidal waves, tornadoes, large predatory animals, unintentional and self-surprising violation of social norms, loss of teeth, permanent Republican control of government
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Steelworkers Partner With World’s Largest Worker-Owned Co-Op
Big news from last week largely overlooked by the mainstream media: The United Steelworkers will join forces with MONDRAGON Internacional, S.A., the largest worker-owned cooperative in the world, to start worker-owned factories in Canada and the United States.
“We see today’s agreement as a historic first step towards making union co-ops a viable business model that can create good jobs, empower workers, and support communities in the United States and Canada,” USW International President Leo W. Gerard said. “We need a new business model that invests in workers and invests in communities.”
Under the historic agreement, signed October 27, USW and Mondragon will try to integrate collective bargaining with Mondragon’s collective practices. The two sides have also pledged to explore new approaches to bargaining in order to encourage worker participation and labor/management cooperation.
Finally, USW and Mondragon will investigate co-investment strategies for integrating the cooperatives into the larger community. Worker-owned cooperatives just might offer a solution to the conundrum of manufacturing in North America.
Slate: Get ready for the rebirth of cider in America.
(via savingpaper)
“Shortly after the Harrison landslide, Americans would begin to drift away from his beloved libation. (He was spared the pain of witnessing its decline, succumbing to pneumonia only a month into his presidency.) A century later, cider would be almost completely forgotten. Most Americans now consider cider—if they consider it at all—to be in the same category as wine coolers or those enigmatic clear malt beverages: chemically suspect, effeminate alternatives to beer. And who can blame them? America’s mass-market ciders are comically weak and inexplicably fizzy. Many are made not from cider apples but from the concentrated juice of eating apples, which is a bit like making wine from seedless table grapes.”
— Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations (1776)
