The City's New Office of Worker Power

Brian Lehrer (0:10)

Brian Lehrer on WNYC. We turn now to a new New York City office that Mayor Mamdani just created in time for Labor Day called the Office of Worker Power. Have you heard about this yet? Its goal is to support labor organizing and strengthen worker protections, specifically in the private sector, kind of like the rental rip-off hearings, if you remember those. The administration is selling it as a sort of one-stop shop for workers who have issues with their employers or who are thinking about forming a union. The office also plans to do some outreach into sectors where they see a lot of labor violations. So that's the premise of the office, and they're announcing it at an interesting time. The Mamdani administration is still trying to curry favor with some prominent business leaders. That's been in the news. They might not be too thrilled about the initiative, and the administration is also about to start contract negotiations with several public sector unions. So the vocally pro-labor mayor is actually on the management side of those conversations. He's the boss. The new office is going to be led by Tony Perlstein, a long-time union organizer who used to be a longshoreman in Bayonne, and it's going to be overseen by our next guest, the Deputy Mayor for Economic Justice, Julie Su. So we'll talk with the Deputy Mayor mostly about this new Office for Worker Power, and hopefully if we have time to touch on a few other things that the Deputy Mayor has been working on, some of you may remember she was the acting United States Secretary of Labor under President Joe Biden. Deputy Mayor, thanks so much for joining us. Great to have you on the show again.

Julie Su (1:48)

Hi, Brian. I'm so glad to be here.

Brian Lehrer (1:50)

So did I get my description right just now more or less, or do you want to give your own summary of what this Office of Worker Power is going to do?

Julie Su (1:58)

Well, I'm excited to be here to talk to you about it because you are right that we created an office, the first of its kind in the nation to make sure that basically working people will have the ability to organize when they want to to have a greater say in their jobs. I think you got it right, and we've talked about this a lot. The mayor has, this administration is committed to it. You talk about it a lot too, which is that we have an economy right now where working people keep on working harder, but keep on falling farther behind.

In order to address that, we have to not just think about business as usual, we have to think about what needs to be done to shift the balance of power so that working people can get a little bit more of what they make and live a little bit more with security in the city.

Brian Lehrer (2:49)

The city already has a Department of Consumer and Worker Protection that's supposed to be responsible for enforcing workplace laws. How is this different from that?

Julie Su (2:59)

This office will not do enforcement. You are right that we already have a few agencies that do enforcement.

The Department of Consumer Worker Protection, we have the strongest human rights laws of any city that is enforced through our Human Rights Commission, and we have a Tax and Limits Commission that also looks out for our for hire drivers. This office, though, recognizes that we are not going to enforce our way to a fundamentally fair economy, that what that's going to take is working people actually before they experience a violation, before their rights are violated, before they need an investigation of their workplace to be able to come together to say that we deserve decent working conditions. You know this, when workers can bargain in their workplace, they can get things that's even higher than what the law requires, not just minimum wage, but a true living wage, health benefits, paid vacations, things that are not required by law. So this is a way for workers to get more of what they really deserve through having their own voice on the job.

Brian Lehrer (4:09)

Listeners, your calls and texts are welcome about this new Office of Worker Power. In the city of New York, does it sound like something that might be helpful to you or anyone you know? 212433 WNYC, do you have any questions for Deputy Mayor Julie Su about how it's going to work? Maybe you're a business owner and have questions about how this is going to work on your end. You are welcome. 212433 WNYC, call or text. Maybe you're a worker who has maybe wanted to organize your shop, but have so far hit insurmountable obstruction or other obstacles. Maybe Deputy Mayor Su can give you some advice, says the Deputy Mayor for Economic Justice. Give us a call or send us a text. 212433 WNYC, 2124339692