"A wave of women joined the paid workforce in the 1960s and 1970s...But this workforce was unorganized. As a result, their working conditions were humiliating and terrifying: low pay, a mind-numbing work pace, daily sexist humiliation, and the threat of summary firings for any infraction. “We are referred to as girls until the day we are retired without pension,” wrote one office worker. There were no job ladders out of this pink ghetto...Into this meatgrinder walked Karen Nussbaum and Ellen Cassedy, feminists and anti-Vietnam War activists who both got clerical jobs at Harvard. In 1972 they started a small group to discuss their working conditions."
From Jenny Brown's review of 9to5, The Story of a Movement in Labor Notes; click here to read more.

Tuesday, February 9
9to5: THE STORY OF A MOVEMENT
7pm EST; Register here

They couldn’t kill their bosses, so they did the next best thing—they organized.

When Dolly Parton sang “9 to 5,” she was doing more than just shining a light on the fate of American working women. Parton was singing the true story of a movement that started with 9to5, a group of Boston secretaries in the early 1970s. Their goals were simple—better pay, more advancement opportunities, and an end to sexual harassment—but their unconventional approach attracted the press and shamed their bosses into change. Featuring interviews with 9to5’s founders, as well as actor and activist Jane Fonda, 9to5: The Story of a Movement is the previously untold story of the fight that inspired a hit and changed the American workplace.

Post-film Q&A with 9to5 co-founder Debbie Schneider and Angel Darcourt from Working America, moderated by Elise Bryant, CLUW president, Executive Director, Labor Heritage Foundation.

Presented by: DC Labor FilmFest; Coalition of Labor Union Women (CLUW); Labor Heritage Foundation, Rochester Labor Film Series

Material published in UNION CITY may be freely reproduced by any recipient; please credit Union City as the source for all news items and www.unionist.com as the source for Today’s Labor History.

Published by the Metropolitan Washington Council, an AFL-CIO "Union City" Central Labor Council whose 200 affiliated union locals represent 150,000 area union members. DYANA FORESTER, PRESIDENT.

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