The Worker Institute brings together researchers, educators and students with practitioners in labor, business and policymaking to address issues related to confronting systemic inequality and building a fair economy, robust democracy and just society. We will share opinion, analysis, research, data, insights and training from our faculty and staff.
Publications
Reversing Inequality, Combatting Climate Change: A Climate Jobs Program for New York State
In Fall 2014, The Worker Institute at Cornell convened the Labor Leading on Climate research, education and policy initiative. This New York State-based initiative brings together unions, workers’ organizations and policy experts to develop job creation and economic development strategies to drastically reduce greenhouse gas pollution and confront the climate crisis.
Labor Leading on Climate: Creating Good Jobs While Combating Climate Change
Skinner chairs the Labor Leading on Climate Initiative while serving as associate director of The Worker Institute. She co-authored the preliminary recommendations for an upcoming report, “Reversing Inequality, Combatting Climate Change: A Climate Jobs Program for New York State.”
Wagner’s work was part of a report to the United Nations Commission on Women meetings in March in New York City. The report is titled “Ending Gender-Based Violence in the World of Work in the United States”.
Standing Up for Dignity: Report Reveals Struggles of Women Day Laborers
On August 2, The Worker Institute at Cornell hosted the launch of Standing Up for Dignity: Women Day Laborers in Brooklyn, NY, a report on the working conditions of a uniquely vulnerable and often overlooked workforce.
Union leaders, activists, policymakers, academics, and arts and entertainment workers discussed changes in the industry and the challenges of representing its workers.
“A Climate Jobs Program for New York State: Reversing Inequality, Combating Climate Change” recommends job creation and economic development strategies to drastically reduce greenhouse gas pollution and confront the climate crisis.
In 2012, researchers from ILR and anti-street harassment organization Hollaback! began a partnership to conduct a street harassment research survey in New York City. The study expanded to 42 cities around the world.
ILR and Hollaback! Release Largest Analysis of Street Harassment to Date
Last year, Hollaback! and The ILR School partnered to conduct a large-scale research survey on street harassment that spanned the 42 cities around the world.
Authors of "Women's Committees in Worker Organizations: Still Making a Difference," Worker Institute faculty members Lois Gray and Maria Figueroa, are now releasing an compact guide on exactly how to form a women’s committee in a union or worker-centered organization
Engaging in Wage Policy; Elimintaing the Tipped Wage
Worker Institute Senior Associate Linda Donahue presented testimony she co-authored with ILR faculty members Shannon Gleeson and Kati Griffith today in front of the New York State Wage Board in Buffalo supporting the elimination of the tipped wage rate in the state.
The Berger-Marks Foundation announces the release of its newest report, “Women’s Committees in Worker Organizations: Still Making a Difference,” written by Lois Gray and Maria Figueroa of the Worker Institute at Cornell,
, ILR lecturer Lee Adler and Cornell ILR senior Ariel Kaplan have researched whether these proposals would be of help to New York's governmental entities that are truly in financial distress. Adler and Kaplan conclude that the changes would not offer financial relief to these communities.
Authored by Lois Gray and Maria Figueroa of the Worker Institute, "Women's Committees in Worker Organizations: Still Making a Difference" is the newest in a series of collaborations between the ILR School and the Berger-Marks Foundation.
In 1937 autoworkers boldly grasped the means of production, gained recognition from General Motors, and proceeded to build the kind of institutional power that transformed history. It’s an incredibly seductive story. Perhaps too seductive.
Enforcing European Corporate Commitments to Freedom of Association by Legal and Industrial Action in the United States: Enforcem
We believe it is important to discuss industrial action as one way to enforce commitments to abide by international labor standards in part because of the challenges of "hard" law enforcement, not only in an international context but also in the enforcement of domestic labor policies.
Undocumented Workers: Crossing the Borders of Immigration and Workplace Law
Undocumented workers uncomfortably straddle two legal regimes: immigration law and workplace law. Because of their undocumented immigration status, immigration law formally excludes these workers from such things as voting, the workplace, and access to most federal public benefits.
As immigration reform efforts continue to experience fits and starts in Congress, immigrant and non-immigrant workers have joined together to advocate for immigration reform at the federal level and to protest the surge of exclusionary immigration measures at the state and local levels.
Women and Union Leadership in the UK and USA: First Findings From a Cross-National Research Project
This is a report prepared for Cornell Conference on Women and Union Leadership held at Cornell University, New York City on May 8th 2010 and for Queen Mary/SERTUC Workshop on Women and Union Leadership held at Congress House, London on 11th September 2010.
Emerald Cities in the Age of Obama: A New Social Compact between Labor and Community
In the historic election of 2008, Americans clearly and decisively voted for change. Organized labor, including the building and construction trades unions, did more than they had ever done before to help elect a president.
Psychosocial Capacity Building in New York: Building Resiliency with Construction Workers Assigned to Ground Zero after 9/11
The accent with psychosocial capacity building is equally on the social as well as the psychological. There were elements of both approaches in the project described in this paper.
Is There A Women’s Way Of Organizing? Genders, Unions, and Effective Organizing
Between spring of 2008 and summer 2009, Cornell ILR Labor Programs faculty, staff, and students conducted a project to investigate and analyze several recent examples of women-focused union organizing campaigns. Our purpose was to contribute to the ongoing debates among labor and community activists about how to organize more effectively.
The Cost of Worker Misclassification in New York State
This study uses data based on audits performed by the NYS Department of Labor Unemployment Insurance Division during the four-year period 2002-2005. Audits were performed on firms in certain industries, and data was extrapolated statewide for these industries only, based on given employment information.
Health and Safety Guidance for Composting in the School Setting
Composting project in a school, either in the classroom or on the school property, can be a terrific opportunity for students to gain direct knowledge and experience with natural processes and a method of reducing and recycling biodegradable wastes.
