Robert Reich

UPS workers will go on strike from August 1 if wage talks are not reached, according to the President of the Teamsters union, one of the world's biggest labor unions. During a rally in Atlanta, Teamsters President Sean O'Brien stated, 'We've organized, strategized, now it's time to pulverize!' A potential strike could cause significant disruption to the distribution network around the world, resulting in long delays in item delivery. Although UPS part-time employees receive the same benefits as full-time employees, their salaries are lower. Part-time employees begin at $16.20 per hour, with the possibility of a higher hourly rate after 30 days, resulting in a minimum wage of $20 per hour for part-timers.

Unions are stretching their muscles, boosted by a labour shortage even as executives face their own challenges and increasingly rely on automation and AI to get the job done. If labor talks fall through, unions for United Parcel Service (UPS) and Detroit's so-called 'Big Three' automakers are likely to include striking actors and screenwriters in the coming weeks, and neither of these scenarios is a long shot. The odds of an autoworker strike in America are 'better than 90 percent,' according to Bank of America's auto analyst John Murphy.' UPS has just ten days left to negotiate a contract with the Teamsters union before the July 31 deadline for downing equipment is reached.

The nine atmospheric river storms that have battered California since late December have reignited concerns of a bleak future of 'whiplash' weather, seesawing between winter floods and summer droughts. According to a growing body of evidence, climate change is man-made, real, and California is facing a front-line battle against floods, droughts, wildfires, mudslides, and other severe weather events for decades. Greenpeace, an environmental organisation, warned that the power outages, flood, levee breaks, washouts, and landslides seen in recent days were'one typical sign of the fossil-fueled climate change rollercoaster.'