Sean O'Brady

McGill Spent Over $1 Million Fighting Unionization – The Rover Union organizers at the university say this is part of a broader trend towards corporatization of the public institution.

"Although the university has its own legal counsel and is in the midst of a $45-million budget cut for fiscal year 2025-2026, it pays a premium to outside lawyers who specialize in fighting unions."

therover.ca/mcgill-spent...

Today's AI #EGgrantee spotlight features @vdoellgast.bsky.social, @cornellilr.bsky.social prof John McCarthy & @sobrady.bsky.social.

Their research focuses on how telecommunications & video game development companies apply AI in service & technical occupations.

equitablegrowth.org/grants/ai-in...

As Air Canada Strike Ends, Ottawa Accused of Anti-Union Bias | The Tyee Labour groups are angry over frequent use of power to end walkouts.

“Union leaders are fiercely criticizing the federal government’s back-to-work order, with one calling it “a misuse of government power.”

thetyee.ca/News/2025/08...

Amazon workers win certification in Delta B.C. VANCOUVER—The B.C. Labour Relations Board (LRB) has sided with Unifor and awarded union certification to workers at the Amazon facility in Delta, B.C.“Workers at Amazon organized against very difficul...

Nice victory for the Canadian labour movement.

www.unifor.org/news/all-new...

How Will AI Impact Call Center Jobs? Will AI make call center jobs obsolete? While this may sound revolutionary, it’s far from the reality businesses face today—and, in my opinion, in the foreseeable future.

"A Gartner report predicts that by 2028, regulations in the EU may mandate the "right to talk to a human," emphasizing the enduring demand for human interaction...Rather than making call centers obsolete, AI is set to redefine the role of human agents."

www.forbes.com/councils/for...

The threat of social decline: income inequality and radical right support Income inequality and radical right parties have both been on the rise in Western democracies, yet few studies explore the linkages between the two – despite prominent arguments about voters feelin...

"We find that rising income inequality increases the likelihood of radical right support – most pronouncedly among individuals with high subjective social status and lower-middle incomes."

www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1... #economy #politics

Awesome. Thanks for helping me out, Mel!

What piece can I use to introduce undergraduate students to international HRM and employment relations? The ideal is for it to be interesting and thought provoking.

Public opinion / New CAUT poll: Post-secondary education enjoys high By Brad Lavigne This May, the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) asked Counsel Public Affairs to do a deep dive into Canadian opinions and attitudes on post-seconda

Postsecondary education institutions are among the most trusted institutions in Canada. Virtually tied with the military, and more trusted than banks, hospitals, and the police. According to research from the @caut.bsky.social.

www.caut.ca/bulletin/202... #cdnpoli #canpoli

New study! We find that unions and works councils nudge managers towards less abusive monitoring and discipline, and more developmental coaching in remote work. Focus is call centers in N America and Germany.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.... #industrialrelations #work #RemoteWork #economy

This morning, FACULTY UNIONS led by @aaup.bsky.social sued the Trump administration over the unlawful funding cuts at Columbia. We will not let the federal government use coercion to rob us of academic freedom and critical research!

So proud of my union!

protectdemocracy.org/wp-content/u...

Academic Capitalism and Precarity in the Neoliberal University: Job Insecurity and Stress in Two Liberal Market Economies This study analyses the relationship between academic capitalism and employment precarity. Drawing on two cross-national sources of survey data, we compare academics' experiences with job insecurity ...

Our study finds that universities that rely more on international student tuition for revenue imposed more job insecurity on workers during covid + casual workers were most vulnerable. Co-authors: @gregbamber.bsky.social and Brian Cooper. Check it out!

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Election Fact Check: Winners and Losers from the Tax-Cut Promises | The Tyee The Liberals and Conservatives are both promising income tax cuts. But 9.6 million low-income Canadians won’t benefit.

Proposed Conservative tax cuts would cost $12.2 billion, Liberal tax cuts would cost $5.4 billion. Turns out few poor people will benefit, and that benefit will be low. The cuts will mainly benefit wealthier Canadians.
- @davidmacdonald.bsky.social

thetyee.ca/Analysis/202... #cdnpoli #cdnecon

Canada's affordability divide: How the 1%'s rise left millions behind Affordability and neoliberalism

"If real after-tax incomes for the bottom 50% had kept up with economic growth, 15 million Canadians would have had, on average, $6,450 more in their pocket in 2022"

www.taxfairness.ca/en/resources... #cdnecon #economy

Quebec government moves to eviscerate the right to strike Bill 89, as Quebec’s CAQ government readily admits, was inspired by the actions of the federal Trudeau government, which in the last six months of 2024 repeatedly used a newly cooked-up reinterpretati...

Quebec's gov. is trying to crush the right to strike. They want binding arbitration to replace many strikes, since arbitrators agree "that workers’ job, wages, and working conditions should be conditional on bumper profits for the bosses and investors."

www.wsws.org/en/articles/... #canlab #cdnpoli

Amazon closing Quebec warehouses, laying off 1,700 employees Amazon is moving to a third-party delivery and in turn closing its seven warehouses in Quebec — with 1,700 regular employees set to be laid off between now and March. Amazon has warehouses in Laval, L...

Amazon clearly wants stop union momentum in the industry. Strong legislative supports for sectoral bargaining would be one way to combat these tactics. If all warehouses were covered by a master agreement, it wouldn't matter who's operating it.

montreal.citynews.ca/2025/01/22/s... #canlab

The strike is over – now what? 'You can't buy back a relationship': When disputes like that involving Canada Post subside, the hard work continues, say three experts

What happens after a strike? How do management actions during strikes impact labour relations when the strike is over? I was asked these questions in an interview with the Canadian HR Reporter. Check out the article below:

www.hrreporter.com/focus-areas/...
#canlab #cdnpoli

Ho-ho-ho, solidarité!

Labour minister asks Canada Industrial Relations Board to step into Canada Post contract dispute | CBC News Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon is sending the labour dispute between Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) to the Canada Industrial Relations Board.

Permanent exceptionalism continues for the regulation of labour conflict in Canada. The last suite of federal back-to-work orders are consistent with decades of neoliberal labour policies suppressing the rights of Canada's working class.

www.cbc.ca/news/politic... #cdnpoli #canlab

Explore Jeonghun Kim's @cornellilr.bsky.social review of Debbie Goldman's new book 'Disconnected' @illinoispress.bsky.social that documents how call center #workers exercised their collective agency and protected their working conditions under #neoliberal pressure.

This is what happens in the absence of a strong labour movement that can force companies to share their wealth.

@sasemeeting.bsky.social is on bluesky! Submit your abstracts for SASE 2025 in Montreal: to networks on comparative capitalism, digital economy, finance and society, global value chains, postcolonialism and more…

New @etui.bsky.social book, 'Experimenting for union renewal: challenges, illustrations and lessons' - Mélanie Laroche & Gregor Murray, eds. @kurtvandaele.bsky.social www.etui.org/publications...

Planning the obsolescence of Canada Post There is an unwillingness to entertain a future in which Canada Post’s role can evolve to serve the needs of Canadians. The degradation of delivery work by Amazon is accepted as a fait accompli, inste...

As @parismarx.com writes, the @cupwsttp.bsky.social strike raises the question of “not just what we want the future of Canada Post to be, but also what kind of society we want to live in.”

canadiandimension.com/articles/vie...

The HIAL storm: Resisting the technological transformation of air traffic control Whether and under what conditions the implementation of technology can be resisted hinges on how labour can mobilise structural, associational, institutional, coalitional and ideational power resourc...

"The HIAL storm: Resisting the technological transformation of air traffic control".

In this newly published article, @huwthomas.bsky.social & Peter Turnbull demonstrate how different power resources can complement, but also compromise workers' interests.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Grève à Postes Canada : pas de retour au travail en vue, dit le ministre du Travail Le conflit pourrait encore durer plusieurs jours, selon le ministre fédéral du Travail Steven MacKinnon.

So far, the federal government is signalling it will not intervene to end the Canada Post strike because the issues on the table need to be negotiated, not arbitrated

#canlab #cdnpoli

ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/212...

Bluesky is the new destination for X/Twitter’s health and science community. Here's why #MedTwitter is migrating en masse from X to Bluesky, suddenly making it an essential hub for scientific discourse. Here's why.

www.statnews.com/2024/11/21/b...

Just released!

We prepared a practical guide for investigative journalists who cover the medical field to help them avoid being taken advantage of by pharmaceutical companies and pr firms who do their best to shape narratives to further their interests.

carleton.ca/ghostmanagem...

GM laying off nearly 1,000 workers, most in US, source says General Motors is laying off nearly 1,000 workers worldwide, most in the U.S., as it looks to streamline operations, a source told Reuters on Friday.

#GM is laying off 1,000 workers while it reports record profits and high pay for its CEO. A sure sign that we need to majorly tilt the scales and boost workers' ability to seize more gains from production.

www.reuters.com/business/aut...