Nearly 2,000 Oregon
jobs lost to trade in 2012
The U.S. Department of Labor de-
termined that 1,911 Oregon workers
lost their jobs to offshoring or foreign
competition last year, according to data
compiled by the Oregon Fair Trade
Coalition (OFTC), a union-backed
group that is critical of NAFTA-style
trade agreements.
The number represents permanently
laid off workers who were certified for
participation in a federal government
program of benefits for displaced
workers where trade is determined to
be a factor. OFTC has been tallying the
Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA)
certifications each year, and says
55,085 laid off Oregon workers have
been certified for the benefits since
NAFTA (North American Free Trade
Agreement) took effect in 1994.
“We can talk about American pro-
ductivity all we want, but it’s extremely
difficult for Oregon employers to com-
pete with what is by comparison al-
most free labor,” said OFTC Director
Elizabeth Swager in a conference call
announcing the job loss tally. “That la-
bor isn’t free because of the free mar-
ket; labor costs are low because work-
ers are brutally exploited and their
basic rights denied to them by repres-
sive governments. Trade can’t be free
when human beings aren’t free.”
Swager said the true number of
workers who lost jobs to trade could be
double that 1,911 figure, or more. The
Labor Department’s TAA program ap-
plies only to workers in manufacturing,
and doesn’t include their suppliers, or
workers in service sector jobs like call
centers or computer programming.
Under the 2009 stimulus act, the TAA
program was temporarily expanded to
cover service sector workers, and dur-
ing that time, Swager said, 42 percent
of the workers certified for TAA bene-
fits nationwide (and 51 percent in Ore-
gon) were service sector workers
whose job loss was brought about by
trade.
For those who get it, TAA pays for
job training, job search and relocation
allowances, income support, and assis-
tance with health care premium costs.
The Oregon workplaces certified as
having trade-related layoffs in 2012 in-
cluded ATI (Albany), Aosom (Lake
Oswego), Agro Group (Portland),
Boise (St Helens), CenturyLink (Med-
ford), Cognizant Technology Solutions
(Beaverton), Consolidated Pine
(Prineville), Cooper Bussman/Sure
Power Industries (Tualatin), FT Mate-
rial Solutions (Fairview), Fashion Tech
(Portland), Hewlett-Packard (Corval-
lis), IdaTech (Bend), Jeld-Wen (Bend),
Kelly Services (Albany), Lattice Semi-
conductor (Hillsboro), Lumber Prod-
ucts (Tualatin), Maxim Integrated
Products (Hillsboro), Peak Sun Sili-
con (Albany), SIC Processing USA
(Portland), Siltronic (Portland), Simple
Way (McMinnville), Solaicx (Port-
land), T-Mobile (Redmond), TE Con-
nectivity (Wilsonville) and Yahoo
(Hillsboro).
CAPACITY CROWD
ATTENDS LABOR
LAW CONFERENCE
Another capacity crowd attended the 17th annual Labor
Law Conference Feb. 1 at the International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers Local 48 hall in Northeast Portland. The
goal of the daylong conference is to help union officers and
staff serve their members better, be better equipped to
organize, and get training on how to avoid legal liability.
Among the many speakers at this year’s gathering were
Ronald Hooks, regional director of the National Labor
Relations Board (left), Oregon Labor Commissioner Brad
Avakian, and management attorney Richard Liebman.
Among union members in attendance were officers of
Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers
Local 114 (photo above). From left to right are Financial
Secretary-Treasurer Terry Lansing, Business Representative
Shad Clark, and local President Georgene Barragan. The
Labor Law Conference was founded in 1996 by Norm
Malbin, general counsel for Local 48. It is co-sponsored by
the Oregon AFL-CIO, Center for Worker Rights, Northwest
Oregon Labor Council, Labor Education and Research
Center (LERC) at the University of Oregon, and the
Columbia Pacific and Oregon State Building & Construction
Trades councils.
‘Do as we say,’ Congress says, then does what it wants
Congress exempts itself
from a number of laws
that apply to the private
sector and the Executive
Branch
By THEODORIC MEYER
When CBS News reported in 2011
that members of Congress weren’t pro-
hibited from insider trading, Congress
moved swiftly. President Obama signed
a law banning it within six months of
the broadcast.
But Congress is still exempt from
portions of a number of federal laws,
including provisions that protect work-
ers in the private sector but don’t apply
to the legislative branch’s approxi-
mately 30,000 employees.
Here’s a rundown of measures Con-
gress exempts itself from:
• Whistleblower Protections: Con-
gress passed the Whistleblower Protec-
tion Act in 1989, which protects work-
ers in the executive branch from
retaliation for reporting waste, mis-
management or lawbreaking. The Sar-
banes-Oxley Act gives similar protec-
tions to private-sectors workers. But
legislative-branch workers — a cate-
PAGE 8
gory that includes Congressional
staffers as well as employees of the Li-
brary of Congress, the Architect of the
Capitol and other offices — don’t get
the same protections.
• Subpoenas for Health and Safety
Probes: The Occupational Health and
Safety Act empowers the U.S. Depart-
ment of Labor to investigate health and
safety violations in private-sector work-
places. If an employer doesn’t cooper-
ate, the agency can subpoena the
records it needs. The Office of Compli-
ance, the independent agency that in-
vestigates such violations in the legisla-
tive branch, doesn’t have the power to
issue those subpoenas.
• Keeping Workplace Records: A
number of workplace-rights laws —
the Age Discrimination in Employment
Act, the Americans with Disabilities
Act and others — require employers to
retain personnel records for a certain
period of time. But as a recent report on
the Congressional workplace notes,
“Congress has exempted itself from all
of these requirements.” Congress is also
exempt from keeping records of in-
juries and illness the way private-sector
employers are.
• Prosecution for Retaliating
Against Employees: If a private-sec-
tor employer retaliates against a worker
for reporting health or safety hazards,
the Department of Labor can investi-
gate and, if necessary, sue the employer.
Congress’ Office of Compliance does-
n’t have that power — legislative-
branch employees must file suit per-
sonally and pay their own legal fees.
• Posting Notices of Workers’
Rights: Workplace-rights laws require
employers to post notices of those
rights, which often appear in office
lunchrooms. Congress is exempt from
this requirement, though this has little
real-world impact. The Office of Com-
pliance sends legislative employees the
same information each year, formatted
“in a manner suitable for posting.”
• Anti-Discrimination and Anti-
Retaliation Training: The No Fear Act
requires agencies in the executive
branch to provide such training to em-
ployees, but the legislative branch is ex-
empt.
• The Freedom of Information
Act: The public can request informa-
tion from federal agencies, but Con-
gress, the federal courts and some parts
of the Executive Office of the President
are exempt.
In addition to sparing itself from
complying with measures it has made
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
mandatory for others, Congress is vio-
lating of some of the laws that do apply
to it, according to a recent report from
the Office of Compliance. (The pint-
sized agency, created by Congress in
1995, is responsible for enforcing a
number of workplace-rights laws in the
legislative branch.) The sidewalks sur-
rounding the three House office build-
ings, the report noted, don’t comply
with the Americans with Disabilities
Act. Neither do the restrooms in the
House and Senate office buildings and
the Library of Congress’ James Madi-
son Building.
The Office of Compliance cites cer-
tain Congressional exemptions as par-
ticularly problematic. The agency’s in-
ability to subpoena information
regarding some legislative workers’
complaints about health and safety of-
ten means the office must negotiate
with Congressional offices to gather the
facts it needs.
“It can tie our hands sometimes,”
said Barbara J. Sapin, the office’s exec-
utive director.
The Office of Compliance has urged
Congress to apply the laws listed above
to itself — except the Freedom of In-
formation Act — with little result.
Eleanor Holmes Norton, the non-vot-
ing delegate who represents the District
of Columbia, introduced a bill in 2011
to do this, but it died in committee.
The number of complaints of dis-
crimination and harassment filed by
legislative-branch workers with the Of-
fice of Compliance has nearly doubled
in the last two years, from 102 in the
2009 fiscal year to 196 in the 2011 fis-
cal year. Workers’ complaints about re-
taliation or intimidation have risen even
more sharply, from 36 in fiscal year
2009 to 108 in fiscal year 2011.
Even so, Debra Katz, a Washington
lawyer who specializes in workplace-
rights law, said some Capitol Hill em-
ployees might be holding back from fil-
ing complaints. House and Senate
staffers, she said, are often reluctant to
speak up about harassment or discrim-
ination for fear of jeopardizing their ca-
reers.
“People are very loath to burn
bridges by filing a complaint or going
to the Office of Compliance,” she said.
“They don’t want to go forward with
bringing a claim, even when it’s cov-
ered under the law.”
(Editor’s Note: Theodoric Meyer is
a reporter for ProPublica, http://
www.propublica.org. )
FEBRUARY 15, 2013