Ain’t I a Woman?! is the coalition leading the movement to end the 24-hr workday, a violent practice in New York City, which is destroying the health and lives of women of color home attendants. No More 24!

Speaker of NYC Council, Adrienne Adams is blocking the No More 24 bill. Two 12 hour shifts for those who need 24 hour care is better for everyone. Demand Speaker Adams bring No More 24 to vote immediately! Join October 18 at City Hall

In New York City, thousands of women-of-color are forced into consecutive 24-hour workdays without sleep or proper pay!

New York City is the cultural and financial capital of the United States, and yet it’s forcing its essential workers into working 24 hours, 72 hours, 96 hours nonstop! There are 360K home care workers here taking care of needy seniors and patients, many of whom need round-the-clock care day and night. Instead of splitting the vital care service into 12-hour shifts worked by two or more workers, the government here makes it so that companies widely assign 24-hour shifts to just 1 single worker alone! And steal 11 hours of wages each shift! For years, thousands of workers, predominantly women of color, worked sleeplessly to the point that they suffer from disability, chronic insomnia, and heart disease that literally led them to an early death. This is a crime against humanity that must be stopped. This is happening not in the country’s periphery, but right in the heart of the nation’s most important city. This is doomed to be an industry model that will spread nationwide (because it allows corporations and government to massively profit), and more lives will perish, if we don’t raise awareness and start a movement to end it NOW. Stop this crime against humanity NOW!

DOL: STOP THE CORRUPTION, ENFORCE THE LAW!
Protest Aug 30th, 11AM

Department of Labor Colludes with Insurance Companies to Steal Millions of Dollars of Wages from Home Care Workers; Workers Demand an End to the Agency’s Corruption 

JOIN US this May Day, to demand Speaker Adams prioritize the interest of all New Yorkers by ending her corruption and putting the No More 24 Act to a vote before May 1st – If not, she must step down!

🏛️ JOIN THE RALLY:
Time:  Monday, May 1st, 12pm
Location: City Hall (Broadway & Park Place)
Link for more information on how to get involved and to RSVP for the Rally

TELL SPEAKER ADAMS TO END THE 24 HOUR WORKDAY!

JOIN WORKING PEOPLE FROM ACROSS NYC TO DEMAND AN END TO THE RACIST VIOLENCE OF THE 24 HOUR WORKDAY!

CALL ON SPEAKER ADAMS TO BRING THE NO MORE 24 ACT TO A VOTE!

RALLY, APRIL 12, 12PM AT CITY HALL PARK (BROADWAY AND PARK PLACE)

NYC City Council: Pass the No More 24 Act!

End racist 24-hour shifts for home attendants now!

AIW is proud and happy to support New York City Council Member Christopher Marte’s bill, the No More 24 Act, or Int. 0175-2022. No More 24 Act would end the 24-hour workday for home attendants, mandating that all 24-hour shifts be split into two 12-hour shifts. Additionally, it would cap the maximum number of hours worked for home attendants to 50 hours per week.

For years, home care agencies in New York City have forced thousands of workers, mostly immigrant women of color, to work 24-hour shifts often back-to-back for up to 72 consecutive hours. These brutal shifts cause irreparable physical, psychological, and social damage to home care workers. They also reduce the quality of care provided to vulnerable patients!

Elsewhere in the state, patients requiring round-the-clock care have their cases split by 2 or even 3 workers who each work 12- or 8-hour shifts. It is only in New York City, with its large immigrant underclass, that we find this proliferation of violent 24-hour shifts.

If passed into law, the No More 24 Act will not only protect workers’ health and work conditions in New York City, it would also ensure a sustainable home care industry. By ending grueling 24-hour shift assignments, the city would make home care industry jobs more desirable for prospective workers.

How you can help

Join us in this fight by spreading the word and calling on your city council member to sign on to the No More 24 Act.

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY: HOME ATTENDANTS CONDEMN 1199SEIU’S SEXIST AND RACIST MEAGER SETTLEMENT OF 0.5% OF TOTAL

ALERT ALL WORKERS: ASK 1199 HOW MUCH THEY’LL EACH GET

New York - This International Women’s Day, 1199SEIU home attendant members— predominantly immigrant women of color—held a press conference to condemn 1199SEIU for forcing workers to accept an insulting settlement for their suffering of sexist and racist 24-hour workdays and to waive their rights without knowing the amount they stand to receive. The arbitration award comes while court cases involving 1199 home care workers are still pending, and while the NYS Department of Labor continues to investigate claims for hundreds of home care workers. 

Last week, workers received word through news articles that their union, 1199SEIU, announced a “historic” $30 million arbitrated settlement for 120,000 home care workers.  By the union’s own calculations, home care workers who worked 24-hour workdays are owed over $6 billion* in backpay as of 2019.  This settlement will only be enough for a few hundred or a thousand dollars to address back wages for the thousands of home attendants who worked grueling 24-hour workdays from 2013 to 2021. Lai Yee Chan, who has been leading the fight against her employer, Chinese-American Planning Council, for back pay and to end the 24-hour shifts, is owed $247,000 for 6 years. After 7 years of delay, this settlement will award workers just 0.5% of the backpay they’re actually owed for the years of 24-hour shifts. 

Home attendants voiced their anger at 1199SEIU for settling their years of pain and suffering for crumbs, and also for helping agencies continue the racist violence of 24-hour workdays that are destroying workers' health and bodies. They also raised that the arbitration does not even tell workers the amount owed and demanded the union share the amount of how much they are owed.

Workers also condemned the union for settling for far worse than non-union agencies. Typical settlements with non-union agencies alert workers to the amount they will receive by stating how many hours out of the 11 hours of stolen wages workers would receive through the settlement. Nonunion workers have received between 5.5 hours and 15 hours of back wages for each 24-hour shift worked. 1199SEIU’s settlement provides no indication of how many hours of backpay workers will receive.  

Lai Yee Chan, CPC home attendant and member of 1199SEIU: “1199 told me the arbitration would be good and fast. Seven years later, we get this insulting settlement. The union is treating us women of color as dirt! CPC stole more than $200,000 of wages from me. 1199, how much back pay are you planning to distribute for my loss?”

Mei Kum Chu, retired CPC home attendant and former member of 1199SEIU: “I retired from CPC due to injury at work. My arm has been in pain since then. But when I sued CPC in court along with other retired workers for back pay, 1199 forced us into arbitration as well even though I was no longer a member. My case is still pending in court. But with this settlement, the union is trampling upon my right and dignity. Is this the union’s response to my suffering from 24-hour workdays all these years?”

Azucena Deras, retired First Chinese Presbyterian home attendant and former member of 1199SEIU: “This arbitration award is a great insult to me. I worked so hard for 20 years, 24 hour shifts, and paid membership dues to 1199 for them to treat me this way. Now, in my retirement I get this little check and no dignity. I don’t believe in the union anymore because they and the agency robbed me.”

Epifania Hichez, retired home care worker for United Jewish Council and former member of 1199SEIU: “With this agreement, 1199 is stomping on us like cockroaches. How will this miserable agreement help me now that I’m retired with injuries in my hands from all the lifting of the patient at night? How will it help me now that I can’t sleep at night from 11 years of 24 hours? 1199 didn’t say a word about stopping this racist violence against us.”

Home attendants urged their colleagues to ask 1199SEIU the amount they stand to receive in backpay and join them to end the 24-hour workday. 

*In 2019, 1199SEIU itself calculated that the 42 home care agencies owe over $6 billion in wages, from illegally paying workers only 13 hours of each 24-hour shift. Today, three years later, the amount has far exceeded $6 billion. 

To view livestream of the press conference, please head to Chinese Staff and Workers Association Facebook page. 

MEDIA CONTACT:  JoAnn Lum, (212) 358-0295, joannlum8@gmail.com

READ The Nonprofit War on Workers, Part I. Weapons of Labor Violence: An Analysis of the Chinese-American Planning Council's Legal Tactics to Exploit Workers written by
David A. Lee, Legislative Director Produced for the Office of New York State Assemblymember Ron Kim, District 40

Justice for Home Care Workers Timeline

HOW TO GET INVOLVED

Call on your NYC City Council Member to support No More 24 Act (Intro 0175-2022) to ban 24-hour shifts.

Contact us, and help spread the word on social media using #end24hworkday

Full List of Endorser Here

RECENT PRESS COVERAGE

The “Ain’t I a Woman?!” campaign grew from a small group of garment workers who successfully held DKNY accountable for sweatshop conditions.

This become a call for a new women’s movement fighting for control over our time, health, respect and wages. DKNY workers have been joined by other workers who also tolerated abusive conditions for the sake of their families — such as the workers of Liberty Apparel’s factories, Great Wall, and Cache. Many women are inspired by the example set by these workers who risked so much to fight against longer hours, lower wages and worsening conditions.

Across industries from corporate law firms to garment factories, control over our time and our lives is slipping away.

A century after Sojourner Truth’s struggles against racism and sexism, women workers are stepping up the fight against the most destructive form that modern-day racism and sexism has taken: economic segregation and the perception that crumbs are better than nothing. Refusing to be treated like slaves or second-class citizens, we are coming together to build upon Sojourner Truth’s struggle and proclaiming Ain’t I a Woman?!