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From Reuters | Jim Owens, the chairman and chief executive of Caterpillar, warned against regulations that might prevent Chinese and
other overseas companies from buying U.S. businesses. Owens said on Wednesday that efforts to discourage cross-border deals, like China National Offshore Oil Corp’s derailed effort to take over U.S. oil firm Unocal Oil back in 2005, made it more difficult for U.S. companies to invest in overseas markets.
Get the full story: reuters.com.
Associated Press | Boeing workers who assemble the giant C-17 cargo jets in Long Beach, Calif., are on picket lines in a dispute over pension and medical benefits.
The walkout began at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday, and picket lines are up at several Boeing locations in Long Beach. Boeing, which is based in Chicago, is Long Beach’s largest employer with some 1,700 workers.
Get the full story: Boeing workers protest changes in benefits.
Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, left, chats with Glenn Tilton, chairman, president and CEO of UAL Corp. as Jeff Smisek, chairman, president and CEO of Continental Airlines addresses the media at Willis Tower in Chicago on Tuesday. (José M. Osorio/ChicagoTribune)
By Julie Wernau
| Politicians and CEOs celebrated the $3 billion merger agreement between United and Continental Airlines this morning at Willis Tower, where United CEO Glenn Tilton told Mayor Richard Daley, “Chicago just got a whole lot more competitive.”
The gathering at Willis Tower, where the merged airline’s operations will be headquartered, included Tilton, Daley, Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn, and Continental CEO Jeff Smisek, as well as members of the Chamber of Commerce and dozens of news crews from across the country.
Associated Press | Machinists at Boeing’s St. Louis defense systems plant have authorized a strike if a contract is not accepted before the current agreement expires next month.
The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers District 837 said in a statement that the strike authorization vote was supported by 99 percent of the workers who attended a meeting on Sunday.
Union members sit in the audience listening as union reps and contractors testify in front of the Joint Committee on the Metropolitan Pier & Exposition Authority in early April of 2010. (Nancy Stone/ Chicago Tribune)
By Kathy Bergen | At a revamped McCormick Place, trade shows and their exhibitors could be
guaranteed a basic set of rights and show-floor work rules aimed at
cutting their costs, and the contractors and union workers who want the
right to work the shows would have to accept those terms.
At least that’s the legal concept behind the recommendations expected to
be issued this week or next by the state legislative committee studying
how to make Chicago’s convention business more competitive with
lower-cost rivals, according to a source close to the deliberations.
Dow Jones Newswires | A federal-court judge has ruled in favor of
Abbott Laboratories and its former subsidiary Hospira Inc. in a
case brought by former Abbott workers who alleged they lost benefits
after Hospira’s 2004 spinoff.
The plaintiffs in the long-running case — all Hospira employees –
failed to support their claims against the companies, U.S. District
Judge Robert Gettleman wrote in an order signed Thursday and posted
online Friday by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of
Illinois.
A United Airlines check-in area and a Continental Airlines kiosk at O’Hare International Airport. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
By Julie Johnsson | United Airlines’ merger talks with Continental Airlines are progressing
rapidly, and many of the key issues involved with melding the carriers have been resolved, said a person close to the talks.
Telephone calls are flying between carriers’ management teams and their directors, and a deal could be completed as soon as next week.
By Kathy Bergen |
The board of the agency that runs McCormick Place voted to recommend
making its union workers public employees without the right to strike,
as a tool to try to wrest further changes in work rules that add to
customer costs and aggravations.
It also voted to recommend reducing the number of unions that work in
the complex and as well as to recommend giving the exposition authority
the right to review show contractor invoices to ensure that labor cost
reductions are passed along to customers.
By Kiah Haslett
| More workers feel that staying connected means staying in a job, according to a new survey from InterCall, a conferencing communication company located in Chicago.
Nearly a third of workers feel the need to be connected to work during weekends, vacations and holidays, and a quarter admitted fearing the perception they’re not committed to their jobs if they don’t stay connected to work during their time off.
By Kathy Bergen | Recommendations
on how to cut exhibitors’ costs for labor, food and electrical service
at McCormick Place began to take shape at a marathon session Sunday,
with a vote on a roster of issues expected late Monday afternoon.
The interim board of the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority,
the state-city agency known as McPier that owns and operates the
convention center and Navy Pier, later in the week will forward its
recommendations to a state legislative panel that is examining how to
make McCormick Place more competitive with cheaper rival cities.
By Julie Wernau |
Good news for employees at Hobby Lobby — the arts, crafts and hobby store with 29 locations in Illinois. The company announced today that they are increasing the minimum wage for full-time employees at Hobby Lobby, Hemispheres and Crafts Etc! to $11 per hour, which is 52 percent above the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Part-time employees are now starting out at a minimum of $8 per hour, the company said.
This is the second year the company, which carries no long-term debt, has announced an increase in the minimum wage of its employees. During last year’s downturn, Hobby Lobby raised the minimum wage for full-time employees to $10 per hour. The move increased the pay for more than 6,900 employees and increased their monthly pay in some cases to by nearly $600.
United Airlines pilots and flight attendants picketing outside a board of directors meeting in 2009. (Alex Garcia/Chicago Tribune)
From Reuters | Airline industry analysts say that dissatisfied pilots, flight attendants and ground workers are a huge obstacle to the success of a merger between UAL Corp’s United Airlines and U.S. Airways. “If anyone thinks that sitting these groups down together and coming up with a single contract is going to be easy, they’re not reading the tea leaves,” Pat Friend, president of the Association of Flight Attendants, told Reuters. “I’m not even talking about what’s happening with the pilot groups — that’s another train wreck waiting to happen.”
Get the full story: reuters.com.
From MSN Money | Chicago-based Boeing Co. reported that it has finished training the first class of mechanics who will work on the new 787 Dreamliner.
Get the full story: msn.com.
From the Financial Times | Kraft Foods has asked about 3,600 people at British confectioner Cadbury Plc to choose between their present pension plan or possible pay increases.
Get the full story: ft.com.
Associated Press | The biggest increase in jobs in three years pushed interest rates in the bond market to their highest level since before the worst days of the credit crisis in 2008.
With the stock market closed for Good Friday, investors had a shortened day of trading in the bond market to react to the Labor Department’s report that employers added the most jobs in March since before the recession began in December 2007.
Treasury prices fell after the report, sending their yields higher. Bond prices tend to fall as investors’ confidence grows and demand for safe-haven investments wanes.
