Union at Amazon

Amazon Labor Union leader Christian Smalls celebrates the landmark win

A team of Amazon workers has forced the technology giant to recognise a trade union in the US for the first time.


Workers at a New York warehouse voted 55% in favour of joining the Amazon Labor Union.


The group is led by former Amazon worker Chris Smalls, who made his name protesting against safety conditions at the retail giant during the pandemic.


Mr Smalls' victory marks a major defeat for Amazon, which had fiercely fought against unionisation.


However, in Alabama, where Amazon was facing a separate union drive, the company appeared to have fended off activists in a tight contest in which challenged ballots could yet overturn that result.


Together, the two elections mark a milestone for activists, who have long decried labour practices at Amazon, the country's second largest employer.



Mr Smalls emerged from the vote count looking tired but jubilant, and popped open a bottle of champagne he was handed by supporters.


"We did whatever it took to connect with these workers," he told the crowd, recounting an against-the-odds campaign that started with "two tables, two chairs and a tent" and relied on an online fundraiser for money.  READ MORE...

Is Gardening Cheaper?

 

With food costs rising, many people are contemplating starting a garden. This makes sense, since human beings have been growing their own food for thousands of years. The stuff just comes out of the ground and literally grows on trees. Gardening offers a lot of benefits: It can be spiritually and emotionally fulfilling, improves the look of your property, and provides delicious sustenance. The potential to save money doesn’t hurt, either.

At first blush, this might seem like an obvious win: Once you get a tomato plant going, for example, you get free tomatoes as opposed to having to buy them all the time like a sucker. But gardens have hidden costs, and not all crops are the same in terms of cost-effectiveness. Can you really save money by growing your own food? The answer is yes, but you have to be thoughtful about it.

Do some garden math
Once again, your high school algebra teacher wins. This is yet another moment in your life where you will use math.

The starting point is your initial investment. The good news here is that gardens are relatively cheap. A few years ago, the National Gardening Association conducted a costs survey and concluded that most home gardens required about $70 in initial investment. That money goes toward seeds, soil and/or fertilizer, cages, covers, water, tools, and fences, if those are necessary. 

The better news is that you can expect an annual return of about $600 and moving forward, seeds are incredibly cheap compared to grown fruits and veggies in the grocery. Tomatoes on the vine cost about $2 a pound, but a packet of seeds will be about $4 and each plant that grows is capable of yielding anywhere from eight to 30 pounds of tomatoes (though there’s no guarantee you’ll get that much, of course).  READ MORE...

The Colonial Pipline

This pipeline stretches from Texas and curves around and through the south on it way to New Jersey... and, because it was secured properly was the victim of a hacker attack from a group located in Russia (but not necessarily sponsored by the Russian Government) which shut down oil transportation services to several southern States, including the on that I am living in, Tennessee.

While being online has its advantages, it also has its disadvantages and this is one of those disadvantages which is incidentally impacting millions of Americans.

This afternoon, my wife and I went to a local grocery store that sells gasoline on the side and filled up one of our vehicles along with a contain for our lawn mowers.  Each pump and there were 5 of them had vehicles beside them with 1-2 other vehicles waiting.  In less than 20 minutes, we had gasoline and were on our way.

Returning home, we passed our regular gasoline station, Weigle's and each of the 20 pumps had yellow bags covering the delivery pumps indicating that the entire station was out of gasoline...  this was completely unexpected since a local grocery store was still pumping gasoline.

It is unsure how long this gasoline shortage will last but one thing is for certain, it will cause gasoline prices to increase and that increase will not be reduced anytime soon...  and, because of that increase, the entire US Economy could be headed towards inflation which has not been a problem for almost a decade.

Interestingly, electric cars will be operating off of some kind of an online grid as will all the recharging stations and as the country moves closer and closer to the end of gasoline vehicles we might opened Pandora's Box as we transition from gasoline to electric.

Sometimes life is just a BITCH...