By Our Hands: From Southwestern PA to South by Southwest

Richard Trumka
AFL-CIO

I’ll be honest, the last place I expected to be on a Thursday in March was Austin, Texas, at South by Southwest. As president of the 12.5 million member AFL-CIO, I spend my days advocating for working people on picket lines and in the halls of power. I grew up about 1,500 miles from Austin in the small town of Nemacolin, Pennsylvania. I followed my father and grandfathers into the coal mines, using that experience as the foundation for my career as a trade unionist. “Another day. Another dollar in the hole,” my dad used to say before we left for work. So my journey from digging coal in rural America to a discussion about the “robot uprising” and the “future of work” was a long one indeed.

How Unions Carried Pennsylvania’s 18th District — and Why the DNC Should Be Paying Attention

Conor Lamb Wins
AFL-CIO

Rep.-elect Conor Lamb made national waves with an improbable win last week in Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District. He faced down $10 million in outside money funneled to his opponent by corporate and right-wing interests. He fought through a barrage of incessant, hyper-partisan attacks blanketing the airwaves. He was abandoned by his own party’s national infrastructure in a district that hadn’t elected a Democrat in nearly 15 years. And he still came out on top.

Workplace Health and Safety

The Lessons of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire Are Still Relevant 107 Years Later

On March 25, 1911, a fire broke out on the top floors of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory. Firefighters arrived at the scene, but their ladders weren’t tall enough to reach the impacted area. Trapped inside because the owners had locked the fire escape exit doors, workers jumped to their deaths. Thirty minutes later, the fire was over, and 146 of the 500 workers—mostly young women—were dead.

Watch this video to learn more about the tragedy: