Richard Trumka Quotes

Employers will work you longer for less money and under questionable safety conditions because it is their duty to prioritize the bottom line. As individuals, we cannot complain. That's why we need a union to speak for us, certainly when our safety, our health, and our very lives are at stake!

We must defend the rights of working people to bargain collectively for fair wages and safe working conditions.

We're going to be very strong with employers in all of our aspects, because I think there's been too much of this idea let's try and get along here, and we've eroded some of our standards.

Were the workers who sweated to put food on my table paid at least minimum wage? Did they get health benefits? Overtime? Were they unionized? Protected from pesticide exposure?

It is imperative that we set the national example and make it clear that companies seeking to do business in New York City cannot be allowed to treat their workers like second-class citizens.

I think environmentalists do no service to their cause by taking fundamentalist stances. I am not defending corporate India's track record, but for many environmental problems, there are technological solutions.

In the 1960s, if you were a blue collar worker or uneducated, and you had an injury on the job, the company basically dismissed you.

In May 2007, congressional Democrats and the Bush administration agreed to a plan to include environmental and international labor standards in upcoming trade agreements.

Despite Arizona's remarkable growth in recent years, we have met the current federal health standards for ozone pollution and the Environmental Protection Agency recently approved our dust control plan.

I'm for anything that lets people come here to work legally. There are more protections for workers who are here legally than for those who are not. It's also safer for the workers and employers have a more consistent pool of workers.

Our goal isn't to close Wal-Mart down. It is to make it a better, more humane company toward its employees and the communities it is in.

On April 16, 2010, 34 Chinese environmental organizations, including Friends of Nature, the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, and Green Beagle, questioned heavy metal pollution in a letter sent to CEO Steve Jobs.

More and more Americans are asking about the price that we have to pay when Wal-Mart comes into a community, treats workers poorly, violates immigration laws and squashes small businesses.

I have got to lay a foundation of personal security for the working people of this country and their families in order to succeed as your president.

I will only stop defending the rights of workers when I die.

I am glad to see a system of labor ... under which laborers can strike when they want to.

Thank God we have a system of labor where there can be a strike.

What the labor movement did in this country is to make sure that capitalism worked.

No-one wants polluted air, water or land, denuded forests or extinct animal species. But the error most people make is to trust the legislature to prevent these tragedies. What they don’t realize is how big a role the legislature has played historically in causing environmental destruction.

When labor is strong, America is strong.

Corporations are not people. Corporations fire people.

All we want the Labor Secretary to do is enforce the law and protect workers’ rights.

We have many rules and regulations that can be sometimes confusing and complicated. By reaching out to the employer community and educating them on what their responsibilities and obligations are to their work force, that, along, with strong enforcement, is the best way to protect workers.

I will continue to do all that I can to ensure and enhance worker protections, including the right to bargain collectively.

Unions go hand-in-hand with a strong middle class.