Work
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150+ interviews, zero job offers: Iowa job market ‘rough,’ says grad
The Iowa job market is abysmal right now, and one recent University of Iowa graduate is frustrated with how “rough” it is.
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5 unsung films that dramatize America’s rich labor history
Hollywood studios and independent producers have long depicted the collective efforts of working people to improve their lives and gain a voice in their workplaces and the larger society.
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Iowa working class news you can use: July 25
Iowa Working Class News You Can Use: Iowa’s farmers are left with rising bills and few guarantees as President Donald Trump’s second trade war brews—creating a storm of financial pressure in the heart of the state’s farm economy that could ripple beyond 2025, especially if global partners retaliate and fragile trade truces unravel. Yet some farmers still have faith…
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This week’s Iowa layoffs and more working news you can use
This week’s working news you can use: Job Corps cuts hurt Iowa’s employment: Despite its success, Ottumwa Job Corps—which offers free education and vocational training for at-risk youth ages 16 to 24—is among the 99 programs the Trump Administration is shutting down. The closure eliminates over 100 jobs in small-town Iowa, and displaces the 240…
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Iowa Board of Regents tries banning university courses that teach about social justice
The Iowa Legislature passed a bill this session banning diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and trainings by “public entities,” including Iowa’s public universities. And they spelled out exactly what they don’t want us to learn about: “unconscious or implicit bias, cultural appropriation, allyship, transgender ideology, microaggressions, group marginalization, anti-racism, systemic oppression, social justice, intersectionality, neopronouns, heteronormativity,…
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Nurses are overworked. Rivers Hills workers hope unionization helps
Workers at River Hills Community Health Centers in south central Iowa were fed up with being overworked and seeing their patients suffer as a result. So they decided to unionize. Over a hundred workers across six River Hills clinics announced this week in Ottumwa they would unite under River Hills United, affiliating themselves with Teamsters Local 90. Rivers…
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JBS workers at 2 Iowa plants win back pensions in national contract
Meatpacking workers at JBS plants across the country, including two in Iowa, just ratified a first-ever national contract across all plants.
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651 laid off at Whirlpool in Amana
On Tuesday, news broke that 651 Iowans are soon to be laid off by June 1 from Whirlpool in Amana. That’s about a third of its workforce.
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A love letter to the working class, from Gwen Frisbie-Fulton
It started in the back seat of my family’s Jeep Cherokee, the one with the broken AC and vinyl seats that stuck to my thighs in the late summer heat. After school we would wait, all the doors flung open, for my dad to get off work. My mother reading in the front seat, her…
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Iowa Republicans rush anti-apprenticeship, anti-union contracting bill, raising safety concerns
In 24 hours, Republicans in both chambers passed a bill that takes away an Iowa city’s ability to prefer contracts with established training programs for taxpayer funded projects. Iowa Republicans passed a controversial bill this week stopping local governments from requiring workforce training standards for contractors on public projects, a major blow to union and…
