Institute for Research on Labor and Employment

Career Conversation: "Lessons from a Recent UCLA Graduate" with Ashley Michel
2021-05-25 11:00 - 12:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Online
What is work life like after graduation? Interested in working for a non-profit organization connected to worker’s rights? Join us for our last virtual hangout of Spring Quarter, Tuesday, May 25th, from 11am-12pm to connect and have a stress-free, informal Q&A with UCLA Labor Studies recent UCLA graduate and Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE) community organizer Ashley Michel. Let’s share space one more time this year to have a casual conversation about nonprofit sector jobs and get some firsthand work tips and truths from a first-gen professional.
Ashley is a first-generation student who graduated from UCLA in 2021 with a major in Labor Studies and minor in Chicanx & Central American Studies. The granddaughter of Bracero farmworkers, Ashley was born in the California Central Valley and grew up in the San Diego-Tijuana border region, where she was raised by a domestic worker. While at UCLA, she was involved in AAP’s Research Rookies, the Labor Summer Research Program, UNITE HERE Local 11, and SLAP. As the former Labor Studies communications student assistant, she created content for our social media and was one of the original masterminds behind Labor Studies Virtual Hangouts! Now, Ashley works as a Community Organizer for LAANE & Reclaim our Schools L.A.
RSVP HERE.

Labor Studies 101: The Global Struggle for Platform Workers’ Rights Beyond Proposition 22
2021-05-27 10:30 - 12:00
On Thursday, May 27th activists from the UK, Spain, Italy and Belgium will join students from the UCLA Labor Studies Program to discuss recent developments in the global struggle for platform workers’ rights.
In California, Uber, Lyft and DoorDash have invested more than $200 million to pass Proposition 22 by granting platform companies an exemption from local labor laws to continue the practice of hiring workers without social security, paid sick leave and the right to organize and bargain collectively. The CEOs of corporations, such as UBER, suggested that Proposition 22 would set a precedent for the gig economy at the international level.
However, platform workers have mobilized across the world to promote a more just regulation of this sector. Between February and April 2021, the UK Supreme Court and Italian Labor Inspectorate dictated landmark rulings against Uber, Deliveroo JustEat and Glovo that established the classification of platform workers as employees by providing them with labor rights and social protections. At the same time, the European and Spanish parliaments are discussing groundbreaking law proposals that would require more transparency in the management of data by companies.
Alex Marshall, president of the Independent Workers of Great Britain (IWGB), Isabel Chacón from Taxy Project and Riders X Derechos in Spain, Anne Dufresne, co-founder of the first European network of food delivery workers and Paolo Borghi, member of the grassroots union, Deliverance Milano and postdoctoral scholar at the University of Milan, will discuss how the struggle for labor rights in the platform economy has advanced after California passed Proposition 22.
Watch on Facebook Live at 10:300AM PT on May 27th.
