Unions picket at bailed-out banks: ‘Good jobs now!’

From San Francisco to Boston and points between, angry workers are showing up at banks demanding, “Good jobs now! Make Wall Street pay!” The AFL-CIO is organizing 200 actions across the U.S., targeting six large bailed-out banks: Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Citibank, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo/Wachovia.

In Buffalo on March 18 a gathering raised these demands outside Bank of America. The following day in Philadelphia a crowd of 1,000, with many unions represented, marched through downtown chanting, “No jobs, no future!” Many then marched through the lobby of a Bank of America office.

About 80 labor and community activists rallied outside the downtown Cleveland office of Morgan Stanley on March 22, where they listened as a number of speakers denounced the “banksters” and also engaged in street theater.

On March 25 in Boston more than 200 activists — from 40 unions — marched and demanded that jobs be restored.

On that same day the cold wind didn’t stop a loud demonstration at Bank of America in Detroit. “Bail out the people, not the banks! What do we need? Moratorium!” chanted the crowd, demanding a moratorium on foreclosures and evictions as well as jobs. In a leaflet distributed at the main bank, the Metro-Detroit AFL-CIO charged Bank of America, Michigan’s largest bank, with forcing homeowners into foreclosure. Jobs with Justice and the Moratorium NOW! Coalition supported the protest.

Also on March 25, dozens rallied in front of a downtown San Francisco branch of Bank of America demanding, “Good jobs now!” Organized by the S.F. Labor Council, the rally was attended by labor council officers and union delegates, the S.F. Living Wage Coalition, the Peace and Freedom Party Labor Committee, the Workers Emergency Recovery Campaign and the Bail Out the People Movement — Northern California.

Bank of America is getting bailout money at the expense of foreclosed homeowners and working and jobless workers all over the U.S. The San Francisco protestors chanted, “Bail out workers, not the banks!” and carried signs reading, “We are NOT your ATM.”

Joan Marquardt contributed the report from San Francisco.