I was involved with Planned Parenthood in different capacities for about ten years and was a few months into working at a Planned Parenthood state affiliate when I found out that I was in need of emergency surgery. I soon learned that I had no paid medical leave and would have to rely on a combination of short term disability and unpaid leave to recover from surgery. Unpaid leave was not an option for me as I simply did not earn enough from the job to accumulate any savings. (I worked a second job just to make ends meet.) The process just to get approval to work from home for a few weeks while recovering (instead of taking time off) was incredibly onerous -- and I was lucky to even make that work as working from home isn’t an option for so many of my coworkers working in Planned Parenthood clinics. Overall, the experience of taking time off for a critical surgery was extremely challenging and it’s not just the lack of paid medical leave that was a problem for me and many Planned Parenthood employees. I’m also concerned for my former coworkers who are new parents. I learned that they do not receive any paid parental leave. Ultimately, because of what I went through, I decided I needed to leave the organization and look for other opportunities. It’s just unfair and it’s hypocritical for Planned Parenthood to deny their hard-working employees paid leave -- even as more and more employers are expanding similar benefits. I know that other state affiliates also lack paid family and medical leave and it is a major source of frustration for my former coworkers.

A few months ago, I became a dad to Fynlee and becoming her dad has been one of the greatest joys of my life and the time I get to spend with her is precious. But my employer, Publix, doesn’t offer any paid family leave, so after she was born I was left with no option but to use my vacation days to have the time I needed to bond with Fynlee. It wasn’t nearly enough. Even after only three months, I can see the difference between the connection she has with me and the connection she has with her mom. I try to make her smile the way she smiles with her mom, but it’s not the same because I’m not the one spending all the time with her. After reading PL+US’ 2018 Employer Scorecard, I learned that Publix is the worst employer for families -- they provide zero weeks of paid family leave. I’ve been at Publix for 15 years and I love working there, but the values they show their customers are very different from the reality facing Publix employees. When I found out that they don’t offer any paid leave, I was disappointed. And I’m not alone. A coworker with a five-month-old baby shared with me that she only had one week of paid short-term disability and seven weeks of FMLA, which is unpaid. It’s sad when you see mothers coming back to work at Publix so soon after giving birth. When I tried to use my sick days to help support Fynlee’s mom while she recovered, I was told that it wasn’t allowed. And I couldn’t afford to use FMLA because our family couldn’t go without a paycheck. Fathers have a role as caregivers too, but we can’t do that if we’re not given the time. Some days I see my fiancé and Fynlee for only a couple of hours because of my workload. I do my best. I am there, just not as much as I’d hope any father could be. Join me in asking Publix to take this opportunity to lead the way in creating a workplace where families can thrive. Ask Publix to introduce a 12 weeks paid family and medical leave policy for all employees.

We do the same, if not more, than management. So how are they paid time and a half on holidays while other AMC employees don't receive holiday pay? They've told me they're not required to by law. I looked into it myself and found out that the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) exempts us (hourly crew) from its overtime requirements “any employee employed by an establishment which is a motion picture theater.” 29 U.S.C. §213(b)(27). The FLSA was enacted in 1936. Movie theaters have drastically change since then -- so have the job requirements and daily job duties of movie theater employees. For example, not all movie theaters only show movies anymore -- they have full service dine-in restaurants that still serve food whether or not you buy a movie ticket. I believe that the movie theater exemption should be taken out of the FLSA in order to truly protect the everyday employee, but even so, that doesn't mean that AMC can't provide greater benefits for its hourly employees right now. I believe companies such as AMC, who make well over a billion dollars in revenue a year (5 billion reported in 2016), can afford to pay the new era of movie theater employees overtime, as well as holiday and sick leave like salaried employees already receive.

More and more drivers are living in their cars. Unable to afford housing based off earnings as a driver, or unable to travel the distance home. More and more drivers are spending less time with their families, seeing their children, or taking care of themselves, because they cannot afford to turn their app off. What once was a reliable way to make income has become a cycle of driving as many hours as possible to barely scrape by. As Uber and Lyft prepare to go public this year with IPO offerings, they are doing everything in their power to show the profitability of their business. And they are doing this by taking more and more money from their drivers. Uber just reached a new low - cutting drivers’ mileage rates from $0.99/mile to $0.68/mile. Not only did Uber decrease the overall mileage rate, they changed the way drivers receive surge pricing - which is an incentive pay that drivers rely on to make a living. Prior to the change, surge pricing was based on a multiplier of the total trip (i.e 1.8x surge would earn the driver an additional 80% on the overall trip). The current change in surge pricing places a flat dollar rate such as $2.50, with a note that claims “you may earn even more than this amount on longer rides.” The key wording here is “may.” Driver experience has shown us that while some trips have added additional surge, others have not. Uber’s lack of transparency on how they formulate and determine surge payouts leaves drivers guessing what their fare will be. Gig Workers Rising is taking action against Uber and Lyft’s unyielding greed. Reverse the rate cuts and give drivers a voice! Join us by taking action and signing our petition.

The workers at MSP, the cleaners, cashiers, servers, cart drivers and more, that make the airport function every day make as little as $10.65. Glen Brown, a wheelchair assistance driver for Delta sub-contractor G2 for three years and a member of SEIU Local 26 said "I live in St. Paul with my wife and kids, so I've seen the cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis win the $15 minimum wage for workers in those cities. Why not here at the airport? We deserve the same pay and respect as workers in cities that border the airport!" For Feben Ghilagaber, a UNITE HERE Local 17 member who has worked at the airport for 13 years, $15 is important because "many of my co-workers are parents working 2 jobs. We believe at an airport as wealthy as MSP that one job should be enough!" Thousands of workers would benefit from raising the minimum wage to $15 at the airport, which would pump close to $13 million into the Twin Cities economy through wage increases! Right now, the Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC) is considering raising the airport minimum wage to $15 One Fair Wage! Please sign this petition to let the MAC know that you support them raising the airport minimum wage to $15 One Fair Wage! Brought to you by: SEIU Local 26, UNITE HERE Local 17 and the Minnesota Airport Workers Council

$10 an hour is hardly anything in this economy, especially for part-time employees trying to support their families. Teens working at McDonald's start off around $15.

Times are changing and I believe Publix is far behind in certain terms. Revising the dresscode won't change the satisfaction of your customers, nor should it affect the quality of your business and products, with that in mind I think you should be taking another look at your dress code. Like I said before, in these modern times this type of self expression is VERY important to some people. There's no point anymore in drawing out the past, and conforming people to this poorly out-dated dress code. When someone refuses to change their hair/etc. for Publix you're thinking they must not want to work there badly, but the message you're truly sending is that unless you give up your individuality you cannot work for our company. If someone decides they want to do something different for themselves they should be able to with out fear of losing their jobs.

A vast majority of the staff scrape by living check to check. Their sudden closure of Country Inn has left many workers, most with young children and families, with nothing for the upcoming holiday season. Most, if not all, these workers gave their all for JANCO for years and years only to be tossed aside 12 days before Thanksgiving. A lot, if not all, workers are facing a really difficult time through no fault of their own

For an industry that brings in $250 billion dollars in profits in NYS/NYC each year, there is plenty to go around and the successes of the industry should translate to greater flexibility and share of the profits by the workers. With your support, we can bring these issues to our city and state lawmakers and show employers that their consumer base wants them to do the right thing by their workers.

Lives we’re effected

It's not right that the rich corporate just shut down businesses without warning and putting so many people without jobs. This is an issue that's been going on for so long and there has to be an end to this. It's before the holidays and people are out of work in a time where right now jobs are hard to find. While the corporate people are sitting comfortable cutting peoples' jobs, the people he cut out of jobs are worrying about how they're going to feed their families, pay their bills, live. Justice is due.

REI’s CEO, Jerry Stritzke, and the Board of Directors are well aware of our hardships, which we have voiced as loud as we can. Collectively, we have faced: homelessness, medical debt, having to rely on food stamps to feed ourselves, even selling our plasma so we can pay the rent, and living off of credit cards. REI’s leadership has known about our struggles for years, and yet they have no plans to make any meaningful investments in their dedicated retail workforce, also known as REI’s Green Vests.  Amazon, Whole Foods, and Target have committed to a $15/hour starting wage and the retail workers of #OptOutside are asking our co-op to do the same. On average we start at a little over $10/hour and in some regions under $10/hour. Help us hold REI accountable to the values it was founded on. BOYCOTT our beloved co-op until our leadership announces a $15/hour store-wide wage increase, more full-time opportunities for regular sales associates, and more hours for every retail worker, so we can all make ends meet. We would like to stress that a living wage increase alone is not sufficient. Payroll cutbacks have plagued our work culture and they would become more drastic. It is essential that our leadership commit to a scheduling policy that offers us more full-time opportunity, which would ensure that a broader number of store employees receive guaranteed health benefits and a retirement plan. It is also imperative that REI commits to giving its green vests more hours overall, because too many of us are scheduled so few hours that we are struggling to survive our jobs. Stand by REI’s extraordinary retail workforce. If thousands of REI members and outdoors lovers sign in support of this petition, it will make a difference. Your voices will be heard! REI will do right by us if this petition amasses thousands of supporters. Help us to continue doing what we love doing best — educating and outfitting you all for a lifetime of outdoor adventure and stewardship. Gift us a campfire story like no other. Wages matter, hours matter, we matter!