Analysis: Peoria area’s Congressional Districts similar, with key differences

Congress’ next election is about 20 months away, but as ongoing fund-raising appeals via emails and texts show, campaigning seemingly never ends.

Greater Peoria straddles two Congressional Districts, and frequent contrasts between representatives from neighboring areas can be distinctive.

In some ways, that’s odd. Both the new 16^th Congressional District (made up of much of the former 18^th) and the 17^th (remapped decades ago from the old 19^th District) feature considerable rural areas and prominent urban centers (Peoria and the Quad Cities, respectively). Both also have major industrial employers (Caterpillar and John Deere, to name two). Nevertheless, dramatic differences in Congressmen’s politics often bumped heads.

In the 1980s and '90s, there was conservative Republican Bob Michel from Peoria and progressive Democrat Lane Evans from Rock Island. For years in the early 2000s, there was progressive Phil Hare from Rock Island and conservative Aaron Schock from Peoria.

Today is comparable, with progressive Eric Sorensen, the first-term Democrat from Moline in the 17^th, and conservative Republican Darin LaHood, who’s served the Peoria area since 2015.

So it’s arguably instructive to compare the districts’ demographics, based on U.S. Census data released this winter.

The populations are close; that’s mandated in how legislatures create districts, with 744, 298 in the 16^th and 749,520 in the 17^th, and the gender breakdown is similar, with the 16^th having about 4,000 more men and the 17^th with about 13,000 more women.

People 65 years old and up make up almost 1 in 5 citizens in each district, but the biggest age-group slice is older in the 16^th, which has 94,526 people between 45 and 54 years old (12.7%), and the 17^th having 92,190 people 25-34 (12.2%).

Both districts’ dominant ancestries are German (27.8% in the 16^th and 20.1% in the 17^th) and Irish (13.4% in the 16th and 11.6% in the 17th). The 16th has 44,138 military veterans, and the 17th has 39,060 vets.

Of course, working people are no more of a unified voting bloc than women, vets, minorities, etc. Nevertheless, a glance at employment is interesting. The 16th has 595,594 people 16+ years old; the 17th has more – 603,980. Civilian residents 16+ in the labor force number 354,979 in the 16th and 329,509 in the 17th. However, unemployment seems to follow suit, with 20,727 jobless in the 16th and 27,895 in the 17th).

 

Here’s a snapshot of industries and occupations in the districts:

 

16^th industries’ workers

Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting, and mining          8,520

Construction   22,763

Manufacturing            56,886

Wholesale trade          10,790

Retail trade     35,906

Transportation and warehousing, and utilities           24,138

Information     4,601

Finance and insurance, and real estate and rental and leasing             28,042

Professional, scientific, and management, and administrative and waste management services    26,897

Educational services, and health care and social assistance   84,213

Arts, entertainment, and recreation, and accommodation and food services           24,332

Other services, except public administration 16,324

Public administration 11,567

 

16^th occupations

Management, business, science, and arts occupations           150,477

Service occupations    49,273

Sales and office occupations  64,993

Natural resources, construction, and maintenance occupations            32,958

Production, transportation, and material moving occupations            57,278

 

17^th industries’ workers

Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting, and mining          5,676

Construction   18,678

Manufacturing            49,917

Wholesale trade          8,798

Retail trade     42,434

Transportation and warehousing, and utilities           19,271

Information     3,409

Finance and insurance, and real estate and rental and leasing             19,647

Professional, scientific, and management, and administrative and waste management services    27,575

Educational services, and health care and social assistance   77,685

Arts, entertainment, and recreation, and accommodation and food services           32,477

Other services, except public administration 12,855

Public administration 11,087

 

17^th occupations

Management, business, science, and arts occupations           111,351

Service occupations    60,028

Sales and office occupations 70,376

Natural resources, construction, and maintenance occupations             24,253

Production, transportation, and material moving occupations             63,501

 

Notable for being remarkably similar are jobs in professional, scientific, etc. fields, and in public administration. Several sectors and job types are markedly different – by thousands. The 16^th has greater employment in the manufacturing, transportation, finance/insurance/real estate (FIRE), and schools-healthcare-social-services sectors, and more jobs in management/business, etc. and natural resources-construction, etc.

The 17^th outpaces its neighbor in retail, and arts/entertainment sectors, and a higher number of jobs in service occupations, sales/office jobs, and production and moving work.

(Perhaps the most surprising is the relative lack of activity in farming plus forestry, fishing and mining, with just 8,520 in the 16^th and 5,676 in the 17^th. That means to defy expectations for rural areas, much less politicians’ pandering to an idyllic farming America, which apparently has fallen victim to Big Business’ mantra of “doing more with less.”)

What this all means will be speculated by well-paid campaign consultants and spin doctors, naturally, but for everyday voters, the glimpse may help us all appreciate where we fall on incumbents’ priorities.

KnightShift: U.S. employers routinely break the law (Surprise!)

It’s not your imagination. Labor law enforcement is broken.

Whether flagrant Unfair Labor Practices or misclassification to bypass labor standards, employers routinely violate federal law, according to two new studies and even a ruling by the conservative-dominated U.S. Supreme Court.

Employers regularly use illegal tactics to suppress unions, reports the Economic Policy Institute, using National Labor Relations Board records from 2018-2022.

“An analysis of the latest government data on Unfair Labor Practice charges and union elections shows that employers were charged with violating federal labor law in nearly 40% of elections – everything from firing to retaliation to changing work terms.”

EPI defined a “violation” as having at least one ULP charge associated with a given election.

“Labor law in the U.S. fails to prevent private-sector employers from engaging in aggressive tactics that coerce and intimidate workers and prevent them from unionizing,” said the report’s authors.

In a climate of lax enforcement, NLRB Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo has tried to implement reforms to discourage companies from criminal behavior, but the agency can only go so far under the National Labor Relations Act. This leaves a labor code that blatantly favors employers, labor advocates say, with insignificant penalties for illegal anti-labor conduct and little incentive for employers to follow the law.

Further, as bad as the statistics are, “the data doesn’t show the extent of employer aggression because missing from the numbers are attempts by management to suppress unionization before workers even get a chance to hold an election,” EPI’s authors note.

A recent example is at billionaire Elon Musk’s Tesla plant in Buffalo, N.Y., where workers organizing as Tesla Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union, are seeking better job stability, improved wages and less productivity demands at the RiverBend facility of some 1,900 workers.

However, the day after the group announced their effort, dozens of workers were fired “in retaliation for union activity and to discourage union activity,” organizers said in a charge filed with the NLRB.

Musk has expressed opposition to unions in the past, beating back a cooperative effort by the IBEW and Steelworkers at the Buffalo factory in 2018, and a year earlier attacking the UAW for trying to organize a Fremont, Calif., plant, where the NLRB ruled Musk had committed multiple ULPs. After taking over Twitter last year, Musk laid off thousands of employees, including union workers.

Frequently, companies also improperly classify workers as independent contractors instead of employees, or – sometimes absurdly – claim a worker is a manager to avoid paying overtime wages. Workers exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act’s overtime rule typically must be paid a salary above a certain level and work as a “bona fide executive” in administrative or professional roles.

A report issued in January – “Too Many Managers: The Strategic Use of Titles to Avoid Overtime Payments” from the National Bureau of Economic Research – found companies titling regular workers “food cart manager,” “grooming manager,” and “carpet shampoo manager” – “jobs otherwise equivalent to non-managerial employees,” authors said. “We find widespread evidence of firms … exploiting a federal law that allows them to do so for employees termed as ‘managers’.”

The researchers elaborated on FLSA criteria, noting, “Managerial roles are traditionally thought to encompass increased responsibility and oversight scope. For example, managers are often in charge of budgets and

schedules, thus determining the workload and pay of others. In addition, they often interview potential

employees, along with decisions regarding promotion or firing… In line with this enhanced responsibility, compared to non-managerial employees, managers often receive higher salaries, other forms of pay (e.g., bonuses), and perquisites.”

Regardless of reality, “We document widespread and systematic evidence of firms exploiting the provision of the FLSA that allows them to be exempt from having to pay overtime wages if an employee has a ‘managerial title’,” the report says.

Meanwhile, on Feb. 22 the U.S. Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision ruled that a worker who worked about 80 hours a weeks at Helix Energy Solutions was qualified for overtime pay under the FLSA despite earning a six-figure income.

Elsewhere in Washington, the AFL-CIO urges Capitol Hill to pass the revived PRO Act, which in the previous Congress was approved in the House before it died in the Senate.

“The AFL-CIO calls on members of Congress to stand with working people by co-sponsoring the bipartisan Richard L. Trumka Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, to be introduced by Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) and Bobby Scott (D-Va.),” said AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler. “This bill would restore the original intent of the National Labor Relations Act, since eroded by corporate interests, to protect workers throughout the organizing process and beyond.”

Improving the law by adding serious consequences for law-breakers will lift up working Americans, she said.

“For too long, employers have been able to violate the law with impunity, routinely denying working people our basic right to join with co-workers for fairness on the job,” Shuler added. “Restoring our middle class is dependent on strengthening our collective power.”

Two-tier wages at Caterpillar eliminated in six-year pact ratified by UAW

The United Auto Workers on March 13 started working under a new, six-year contract with Caterpillar after a ratification vote the previous day resulted in 71.5% voting union members supporting the Tentative Agreement, according to Reuters. Neither the UAW nor Cat said how many ballots were cast.

Most significantly, perhaps, is the elimination by the end of the contract of the unpopular two-tier wages initiated in 2005, when new hires were paid less than existing workers.

Although the complete Tentative Agreement apparently wasn’t available to members until the day of the vote, outlines of the terms from both the company and Decatur UAW Local 751 includes:

* a $6,000 signing bonus that may be spent or placed in workers’ 401(k) accounts,

* a fifth week added to vacations after 20 years,

* improved layoff pay, to $170/week,

* after the initial 7% wage hike, workers get a 4% lump sum in 2024 and 2026, and 4% raises in 2025, 2027 and 2028,

* the company increasing its matches to workers’ retirement contributions from 50% to 75%,

* Cat making one-time $10,000 contributions to workers at 20 years of seniority, and

* “maintaining the current medical, dental and vision plans,” says the company, although it’s unclear whether that will apply to premiums, co-pays, deductibles, etc., other than there will no changes “unless the same changes are made for management employees.”

Also, paid parental leave is doubled to 80 hours, the company will provide or underwrite required equipment such as welding helmets and work boots, Cat will make available reports from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and consider recommendations for corrective measures, and the company claimed that its wage forecast will mean a Labor Grade 1 worker now making $17 will have wages increased to $20.47 by 2028 and a Labor Grade 6 workers will improve from $33.85 to $40.75 by the end of the contract.

Now headquartered in Irving, Texas, Caterpillar in 2022 posted profits of $6.7 billion on $59.4 billion in sales, the corporation reported.