Sample Bargaining Demands | Bargaining for the Common Good Network

A list of Common Good Demands put forward by union and community partnerships in the Bargaining for the Common Good network. This list is updated bimonthly and is based on input from members of the network. A short version can be found here.

BCG Primer | Bargaining for the Common Good Network

A one-pager describing the goals of the Bargaining for the Common Good network. 

 Seven Elements of Bargaining for the Common Good | Bargaining for the Common Good Network

An overview of the elements of BCG campaigns as partnerships between labor and community activists.

How Strikes and Community Coalitions Can Address the Crises We Face

Minnesota community and union leaders who led the nation’s first union strike for climate and environmental justice demands discuss the challenges and benefits of strong labor-community partnerships in fighting for climate justice.

Chicago Teachers Bargain for the Schools Our Students Deserve

Amisha Patel of Grassroots Collaborative and Stacy Davis Gates of the Chicago Teachers Union share their insights into the 2019 Chicago Strike and building long-term partnerships between labor and community.

Coronavirus Capitalism, the Climate Crisis and Bargaining for the Common Good

A webinar on how the coronavirus pandemic can catalyze our movement to unite around a set of common demands to protect the most vulnerable in this crisis, how to prevent corporate interests from exploiting this crisis for regulatory rollbacks, and how Bargaining for the Common Good can serve as a model to confront the climate crisis while creating and sustaining and clean union jobs.

Lessons from the LA Teachers Common Good Campaign and Strike Victory

LA Teachers President Alex Caputo-Pearl, Amy Schur of the Alliance of Californians for Community Engagement (ACCE), Rudy Gonzalves of the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE), and other community leaders and parents discuss the strategies and lessons learned from the recent victorious Bargaining for the Common Good campaign and strike.

How Unions Can Build Common Good Housing Work

BCG partnered with the Chicago Teachers Union, Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, and the Action Center on Race and the Economy for a webinar on bargaining for housing justice. Speakers discussed strategies, challenges, and best practices for how to build labor-community partnerships and advance strategic campaigns to win on housing justice issues. See resources shared during the event here. 

Strong Unions, Stronger Communities | AFSCME, SEIU, NEA, AFT
Through collective bargaining, union members are scoring victories that help entire communities – like safer nurse staffing levels that help patients and smaller classroom sizes that help students. Together with community partners, unions are also using their collective voice to advocate for policies that benefit all working people – like affordable healthcare and great public schools.

Benefits of Bargaining: Public Worker Negotiations Improve Our Communities | Policy Matters Ohio

Public sector unions bargain for better compensation and working conditions, which can improve the economy and ease recruitment. But do they also bargain for provisions that more directly benefit the community? Through interviews, literature reviews, and examination of collective bargaining contracts, this report seeks to answer that question for four professions: public school teachers, police officers and firefighters, and publicly-employed nurses.

Why Labor and the Movement for Racial Justice Should Work Together | In These Times
The Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) has made tremendous strides in exposing and challenging racial injustice, and has won real policy victories. The policies, while often imperfect, are a testament to the strength of the organizing and activism of the moment. Not coincidentally, this uprising comes at a time when income and wealth inequality are at peak levels and the economy for most black people looks markedly different than the economy for their white counterparts. 

The Schools Chicago’s Students Deserve (PDF) | Chicago Teachers Union
The Chicago Teachers Union argues for proven educational reforms to dramatically improve education of more than 400,000 students in a district of 675 schools. These reforms are desperately needed and can head Chicago towards the world-class educational system its students deserve.

The Schools St. Paul Children Deserve | St. Paul Federation of Teachers
The St. Paul Federation of Teachers believes that students and families deserve the following priorities in education: educating the whole child, family engagement, smaller classes, teaching not testing, culturally relevant education, high-quality professional development, and access to preschool.

Power of Community| St. Paul Federation of Teachers
This report follows SPFT’s earlier publication “The Schools Saint Paul Children Deserve” and features highlights of the innovative programs and initiatives created through that report and our union’s narrative.

I.O.U.: How Wells Fargo and U.S. Bank Have Shortchanged Minnesota Schools | SEIU Minnesota
The report lays some of the blame for a $2.4 billion school shift and other shortfalls in school funding on the practices of the state’s largest banks and their executives.

BCG Mapping Project
Check out the resources we put together for the BCG Mapping Project for workers in K-12 schools.

Bargaining for the Common Good in Higher Education | NEA Today
An article describing the burgeoning union movement in higher education and how professors, graduate workers, and campus staff can partner with student and communities to fight for the future of higher education.

Beyond the Neoliberal University | Boston Review
An article describing the burgeoning union movement in higher education and how professors, graduate workers, and campus staff can partner with student and communities to fight for the future of higher education.

BCG Mapping Project
Check out the resources we put together for the BCG Mapping Project for workers in Higher Education.

Webinar: Who Are Our Landlords and Where Do They Get Their Money?
Across the country, our communities are struggling to afford a place to live. Too often, they are seeing their rents rise while living conditions in their homes deteriorate. We need the tools to fight back. This Webinar focused on the skills and resources you can use to find out who owns land and buildings, and then research who they are, who they are connected to, and how they get their money.

Underwater America: How the So-Called Housing “Recovery” is Bypassing Many American Communities | Haas Institute
The report highlights the problem of widespread “underwater mortgages” – homeowners stuck in loans for more than their home is worth, which persists in many communities across the country. The report identifies the nation’s most troubled hot spots: the cities, metro areas and communities where the highest proportion of homeowners still have negative equity, or are “underwater.” The report’s authors argue that market forces alone will not bring the recovery to these severely impacted communities, and call for local or federal intervention to reduce mortgage principal.

Do Hedge Funds Make Good Neighbors? How Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac & HUD are Selling Off Our Neighborhoods to Wall Street | ACCE Institute and Center for Popular Democracy
A report detailing the sale of troubled mortgages to faulty players and calling for mortgage owners and holders to prioritize the sale of troubled mortgages to good actors who can help homeowners struggling in the aftermath of the crisis.

 Newark Homewrecker: The Impact of the Foreclosure Crisis on Newark | NJ Communities United

Privatization: Why It’s a Bad Idea | Steward Update
Why privatization is a bad idea; innovative ways to bring union strength to black communities; lessons from studying anti-union attacks; and talking about trade with solidarity.

Privatization and the Weakening of Democracy | Donald Cohen, In the Public Interest
At a time when state and municipal budgets are tight, government has contracted out or gone into partnership with more private companies. But the dangers of such arrangements are serious. The author gives examples of how cities and states have lost out and proposes a set of reforms on which he thinks all can agree.

Privatization Resources | In the Public Interest
In the Public Interest is a comprehensive non-profit resource center on privatization and responsible contracting. The resources below are produced by ITPI, members of the ITPI Scholars Network and other close allies. The publications are intended to provide educational information and inform winning campaigns to ensure that public services and assets are publicly controlled and contracts with private entities are transparent, accountable, effectively monitored, and that those contracts meet the long-term needs of communities.

The Taxpayer Empowerment Agenda | In the Public Interest
Eager for quick cash, state and local governments across America are handing over control of critical public services and assets to corporations that promise to handle them better, faster and cheaper. Unfortunately for taxpayers, not only has outsourcing these services failed to keep this promise, but too often it undermines transparency, accountability, shared prosperity and competition – the underpinnings of democracy itself. The Taxpayer Empowerment Agenda will help taxpayers reclaim control of our democracy. And state and local lawmakers who champion these proposals will stand on the side of taxpayers – and plain common sense.

BCG Mapping Project
Check out the resources we put together for the BCG Mapping Project around austerity in the time of COVID-19.

No Small Fees: LA Spends More on Wall Street than Our Streets | Fix LA
When Wall Street recklessly crashed the economy in 2008, it brought a world of hurt onto many people. But Wall Street banks and corporations hardly felt the pain. Throughout the recession, Wall Street profited off Los Angeles. Just last year, Wall Street banks made $290 million in fees at taxpayers’ expense. At the same time, hundreds of millions in cuts have been made to critical city services that keep LA neighborhoods healthy, clean and safe. LA stopped or deeply slashed sidewalk and street repairs, speed bump replacement, sewer inspections, alley clearance, vehicle abatement and a whole lot more. Our communities stopped getting what they need to thrive.

The Looting of Oakland: How Wall Street’s Predatory Practices Are Costing Oakland Communities Millions and What We Can Do About It | Reinvest Oakland
Oakland has faced down record budget deficits over the past five years as a result of the economic crash that Wall Street caused. These deficits have forced the City to make cuts that have crippled the City’s ability to keep our neighborhoods clean and safe, limited access to libraries and recreation centers, and deprived our youth of meaningful programs to keep them off the streets. However, while public officials again debate which services to slash and which bills to pay, the one option that would dramatically improve the financial health of the community is never on the table: Holding Wall Street banks accountable for their illegal and predatory practices that have cost Oakland taxpayers nearly half a billion dollars.

Dirty Deals: How Wall Street’s Predatory Deals Hurt Taxpayers and What We Can Do About It | ACRE
The financialization of the United States economy has distorted our social, economic, and political priorities. Cities and states across the country are forced to cut essential community services because they are trapped in predatory municipal finance deals that cost them millions of dollars every year. Wall Street and other big corporations engaged in a systematic effort to suppress taxes, making it difficult for cities and states to advance progressive revenue solutions to properly fund public services. Banks take advantage of this crisis that they helped create by targeting state and local governments with predatory municipal finance deals, just like they targeted cash-strapped homeowners with predatory mortgages during the housing boom. Predatory financing deals prey upon the weaknesses of borrowers, are characterized by high costs and high risks, are typically overly complex, and are often designed to fail.

Better Banks Accountability Scorecard | Committee for Better Banks
The Committee for Better Banks, a project supported by CWA, launched the Better Banks Accountability Project to raise awareness and hold America’s financial institutions to account for their policies and practices that impact bank workers, customers, communities, investors and other stakeholders. In the midst of COVID-19, this tool aims to highlight the actions taken by banks to support communities in need.

BCG Mapping Project
Check out the resources we put together for the BCG Mapping Project for workers in Finance and Banking.