Looking beyond safety and health in organizing women

Working women are spending more and more time on the job with less time for themselves and their families. Most say they would use any extra time to work a second job. The more than 12,000 women who took the sixth Ask A Working Woman survey online — released in late June by Working America, an allied organization of the AFL-CIO which works to build alliances among non-union working people and which provides workers who are not union members input into the AFL-CIO's policies, goals, and legislative efforts — also said the top item that would make their lives easier is a 10 percent raise.

Women have been turning to unions to address their concerns. The labor movement is no longer a predominantly male, blue collar preserve. The majority of union members are white collar workers and forty-four out of 100 union members are women. Fifty-five per cent of all newly organized workers are women. The survey found that equal pay; work and family issues (like paid family leave and child care), and control over work hours are the strongest reason for women joining unions. This presentation will address the findings of that survey, the role of unions in addressing women's concerns and providing them with a voice in improving the quality of the specialized services they provide and the products they produce. The presentation will include a discussion of specific challenges organizers face in organizing women and strategies that have been successful in meeting them.