Investment returns in multi-employer pension funds improved in 2003, said a survey conducted by New York-based Segal Advisors and reported by the Construction Labor Report last month.

The report found there was a median investment return of 17.2 percent for multi-employer pension plans last year, compared to an 8.2 percent loss the previous year. All building trades union pension plans are multi-employer plans.

“Although these are positive results, the survey report noted in its conclusion, some plans may require several more years of higher returns before they can make up for double-digit losses in recent years,” said AFL-CIO Building Trades Department President Edward Sullivan.

Building trades union leaders are still irate at President Bush and the Republican Congress for failing to provide legislative tax relief for multi-employer pension plans earlier this year – while providing such relief for non-multi-employer plans.

The Bureau of National Affairs’ Wage Trend Indicator released June 15 “confirm that the lingering effects of the generally sluggish labor market in 2003 – along with the new indications that some job sectors remain weak – are likely to restrain wage increases into early next year.”

Federal mine inspectors for the U.S. Labor Department were recently issued new coveralls emblazoned with a U.S. flag.

There were two problems, according to Charles Mercer, president of the Union Label and Service Trades Department, AFL-CIO. First, the flag was affixed upside down. Second, the garments were made in Mexico.

In addition, OSHA inspectors are required to wear Labor Department-issued green and yellow windbreakers when they staff high-profile events. Those jackets, Mercer said, carry a label indicating they’re made in Vietnam.

“All of this says volumes about how far the Labor Department has strayed from its original worker-friendly mission” set by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who initiated the department, Mercer said.

President Bush’s plan to take away overtime rights for thousands of U.S. workers “will harm rather than promote and protect the interests of U.S. workers and their
families,” said a new report by former Department of Labor officials.

The officials worked under both Democratic and Republican administrations. They said the new rules, which are set to go into effect Aug. 23, “removes existing overtime protection for large numbers of employees currently entitled to the law’s
protections.”

Vice President Dick Cheney recently traveled to Bentonville, Arkansas, home of the nation’s largest corporation, to praise Wal Mart and its key role in our economy.

“The story of Wal Mart exemplifies some of the very best qualities in our country, hard work, spirit of enterprise, fair dealing and integrity,” Cheney said. “The managers and associates at this great company are helping to drive our economy forward. You’re making a vital contribution to the most prosperous economy in the world.”

The average Wal Mart employee earns a little over $8 an hour which puts them well below poverty level for a family of four.

And on June 22, a federal judge gave the green light to one of the largest class action lawsuits in history. The judge Ok’d the right by more than one million past and present female Wal Mart workers to sue the company for sexual discrimination on the job.