Labor Capital Strategies
The earnings that workers defer for the sake of secure retirements feed financial decisions that in turn determine the quality of employment and character of goods and services those very same workers enjoy. Yet the institutions and individuals that manage pension funds often pursue narrow goals whose consequences undermine the very workers whose savings they tend. Can the long-term interests of workers be aligned with those of financial managers, or must labor and capital oppose one another in even the use of labor’s capital? Can the interests of workers be considered equal to those who hold financial shares in enterprises?
- Union Investment Funds To understand union investment funds there are only two things you need to know. One, pension funds – valued at $7 TRILLION dollars - are the single largest entity in the investment world. And two, it only makes sense for labor to be active in how its money is being invested.
- Industrial Heartland Investment Forum In the fall of 1995, United Steelworkers Secretary-Treasurer Leo Gerard called together a working group to examine the dynamics behind the continuing job loss in our nation's industries. Layoffs had reached 43 million jobs since 1979. Since that first gathering, the group have met regularly to identify the source of this downward spiral of good paying jobs.
- Investment Practices of the Pension Fund Industry This paper examines the investment practices of the pension fund industry and the direct and indirect impact that these practices have had on the workers whose money was being invested.
