Labor & Wages

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Everything happening on this issue in one stream — the latest bills tagged to it and news that references it, newest first. Each item links to its source. Coverage-honest: only what we've ingested and tagged appears here.

• News
  California voters to decide on controversial one-time tax on billionaires

  Oct 3, 2026 ·NPR(Lean left)

  California voters will decide whether the state will charge a one-time tax on billionaires. The idea that has split Democrats and labor unions.

• News
  The Future of Wildfire Response: AI, Drones, and Robots

  Oct 3, 2026 ·Mother Jones(Left)

  This story was originally published by Inside Climate News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. During the Sand Creek Fire, which has burned since the start of August in southwestern Montana, difficult terrain and fire-weakened trees posed hazards to crews searching for areas still smoldering on steep slopes after the blaze passed. So instead of relying only on firefig

• News
  The Good News on Federal Workers You Haven't Heard

  Oct 3, 2026 ·RealClearPolitics(Lean right)

  The federal government has reduced its workforce by 300,000 jobs since Jan. 20, 2025, bringing it down to a still-bulky 2.7 million employees.

• News
  ‘Things work out’: Singer Michael McDonald’s long-lost son recounts reunion

  Oct 3, 2026 ·NewsNation(Center)

  Michael Goessling saw McDonald live in concert in the 1980s and 1990s, little knowing the bond with the performer may have been more than musical.

• News
  Amazon investing $1B in data center communities

  Oct 2, 2026 ·The Hill(Center)

  Amazon plans to invest $1 billion in communities where it builds data centers over the next five years, the company announced Friday. The e-commerce and cloud computing giant will put the funds toward free community college and workforce training for residents, as well as energy efficiency upgrades. "We understand why there is apprehension in some...

• News
  A national school choice tax credit is coming, but some states are opting out

  Oct 2, 2026 ·Straight Arrow News(Center)

  Some Democratic governors are joining teachers’ unions in calling the program an attack on the nation’s underfunded public schools.

• News
  US adds just 29,000 jobs in September, unemployment edges up to 4.2%

  Oct 2, 2026 ·Straight Arrow News(Center)

  The U.S. economy added just 29,000 jobs in September, far fewer than economists expected, and the unemployment rate rose slightly from 4.1% to 4.2%, the Labor Department reported Friday.

• News
  Trump’s first-year government overhaul delivers change Washington hasn’t seen since the 1960s

  Oct 2, 2026 ·Fox News (Politics)(Right)

  The Trump administration has reduced the federal workforce to the lowest point in roughly 60 years, according to newly released data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. As of August, just 2.67 million people were employed by the federal government, down from just over 3 million when President Donald Trump took office, marking the lowest headcount since 1966, per the BLS. The administration has es

• News
  The U.S. Senate is up for grabs. Can this Ohio Democrat win back working class votes?

  Oct 2, 2026 ·NPR(Lean left)

  After 32 years in Congress, Ohio's Sherrod Brown lost his Senate seat in 2024 as many working class voters turned out for Trump. Now Brown is counting on union voters to send him back to Washington. (Image credit: Tom Williams)

• News
  US economy added 29,000 jobs in September, monthly jobless rate increased to 4.2%: Labor Department

  Oct 2, 2026 ·Just the News(Lean right)

  Economists surveyed by Dow Jones expected job growth of 84,000.

• News
  Vance Backs Eliminating ‘Completely Broken’ H-1B Program

  Oct 1, 2026 ·The Daily Wire(Right)

  Vice President JD Vance said Thursday he would support eliminating the H-1B visa program, calling it “completely broken” and accusing employers of using it to replace American workers with cheaper foreign labor. “My view is the H-1B program is completely broken, and I’d be very supportive of just eliminating it,” Vance said. “But while we have it, what we have to do is protect American workers. So

• News
  Alito’s Recusal From a Key Climate Case May Be Too Little, Too Late

  Oct 1, 2026 ·Mother Jones(Left)

  This story was originally published by Inside Climate News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Justice Samuel Alito decided Monday to sit out one of the most consequential climate change cases to reach the Supreme Court, but legal experts expected continuing ramifications due to his ownership of individual corporate stocks, including in the fossil fuel industry. After

• News
  Senate confirms insider Keith Sonderling to lead Department of Labor

  Oct 1, 2026 ·The Hill(Center)

  The Senate voted 47-41 Wednesday night to confirm Keith Sonderling, acting Secretary of Labor, to the post permanently — filling a seat in President Trump’s cabinet that has been officially empty since April. All Republicans present voted for Sonderling’s nomination, and all Democrats voted against it, but the nomination only needed a majority to succeed....

• News
  'Dirty Jobs' host Mike Rowe says 'the golden age of skilled labor' is upon Americans

  Oct 1, 2026 ·NewsNation(Center)

  The Alliance for America's Skilled Trades reported the United States must fill 1.7 million skilled jobs each year for the next decade.

• News
  WATCH: Senate health committee advances Dr. Nicole Saphier's nomination for surgeon general

  Sep 30, 2026 ·PBS NewsHour(Lean left)

  Saphier, a radiologist and former Fox News Channel contributor, was advanced out of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions on a 12 to 11 vote to serve as surgeon general after she was grilled at her confirmation hearing earlier this month about her stance on childhood vaccines.

• News
  A Huge Gap Between Fastest- and Slowest-Building Cities

  Sep 30, 2026 ·RealClearPolitics(Lean right)

  The Soviet Union famously churned out tens of thousands of new apartment buildings in the 1960s, '70s, and '80s - some assembled in as little as 12 days - together comprising tens of millions of individual apartments. Such speed is not unique to communist command economies, or even to grim concrete mega-blocks. In Sweden and Japan today, modern, high-quality new homes can be factory-built and asse

• News
  TSA loses its chairs, leaving its union worried about worker health when forced to stand

  Sep 30, 2026 ·Straight Arrow News(Center)

  TSA decided officers will no longer be allowed to sit while verifying passengers' identities at security checkpoints.

• News
  When Trump Opened Bears Ears Land to Mining, the Hobbyists Swooped in

  Sep 30, 2026 ·Mother Jones(Left)

  This story , originally published by Grist in partnership with The Salt Lake Tribune , is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. It didn’t take long for prospectors to stake their claims on land in southeast Utah that was previously protected in Bears Ears National Monument. On September 11, the first day the 1.2 million acres were opened up, miners filed 16 claims, two months

• News
  First Trump Came for Immigrants. Then He Came for Their Lawyers.

  Sep 30, 2026 ·Mother Jones(Left)

  Last year, on Labor Day weekend, an immigration attorney named Cooper Richardson spent her Saturday calling the Phoenix-area shelter where one of her clients—a child from Guatemala—was being held. She was checking to see if Immigration and Customs Enforcement was on the way: Her colleagues at the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project had received word that the Trump administration was finali

• News
  Liberal stronghold set to adopt eye-popping minimum wage amid business exodus

  Sep 30, 2026 ·Fox News (Politics)(Right)

  Seattle is slated to increase its minimum wage to $22.14 an hour in 2027 as the broader metro area contends with a sharp drop in job openings and Seattle businesses face mounting cost pressures. Beginning in 2025, all Seattle employers, including small businesses, were required to pay the same minimum wage, which is adjusted annually for inflation. Several Seattle restaurant owners who have since