Edilberto Rojas-Rosas is a 25-year-old father of two struggling to support his family on the $378 he brings home weekly for working 72 hours at an East Harlem car wash. Paying the rent and putting food on the table is a daily struggle. For thousands of car wash workers in New York City, it is a similar story.

On March 16, Workers Aligned for a Sustainable and Healthy New York (WASH NY) gathered at LMC Car Wash on East. 109th Street in East Harlem to rally in support of workers like Rojas-Rosas. The car wash is one of many owned by mogul John Lage, who, in 2009, was ordered by the federal Department of Labor to pay more than $3 million in back wages to employees.

A new report issued by WASH NY—which is made up of community groups Make the Road New York and New York Communities for Change, with the help of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union—reveals that the kind of wage and hour violations suffered by Lage’s workers is widespread throughout the car wash industry in New York City. Read more.

State Assemblyman Rory Lancman has scored the first major labor union endorsement in the three-way Democratic primary for a new congressional district in Queens, the Daily News has learned.

Lancman got the backing of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union — which represents 40,000 members in the New York City area alone — in the race against Assemblywoman Grace Meng and City Councilwoman Liz Crowley.

“In many ways, he’s one of the family,” RWDSU President Stu Appelbaum said in predicting that Lancman would be a vocal advocate for labor.

“He comes from a working-class background. His mother was a waitress. He’s built himself up. He understands what it means to work and to seek to make a difference for working people.”

Appelbaum cited Lancman’s status as head of the Assembly’s Workplace Safety subcommittee and his watchdog attitude toward Walmart’s union-hated attempts to put a store in the five boroughs. Read more.

“The American pie is growing again, but most Americans aren’t getting much of a slice,” describes Robert Reich, a former U.S. labor secretary and professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley. Read more.

washnewyork:

First-of-its-Kind Investigative Report Propels Car Wash Industry Reform Effort

New York, NY— An eye-opening investigative report showing widespread mistreatment of the city’s car wash workers was released today by WASH New York, a new campaign launched by Make the Road New York, New York Communities for Change, and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU), UFCW, to improve industry standards and achieve greater protection of workplace rights. Read more.

In 2011, corporate profits hit their highest level since 1950, but this hasn’t translated into wage growth for workers. The decline in inflation-adjusted wages bodes ill for the sustainability of economic growth. Read more on ThinkProgress.org.